Fellowship

The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
$19.98
The Lord of the Rings CD arrived in record time. I've never gotten anything in
as quickly. It was in excellent condition. I'm very pleased with this purchase.

The Lord of the Rings - The Fellowship of the Ring (Platinum Series Special Extended Edition)
$24.98
I got the theatrical version of Fellowship of the Ring when it came out. I didnt know the extended version would be released later. When the Two Towers and Return of the King came out I got the extended versions of them. I ended up trading in my theatrical version of Fellowship and buying the extended version. These are absolutely worth everything. Most movies that have extended or deleted scenes just throw them in a menu to watch all out of order. In this, the extended and deleted scenes are put INTO the movie, making each movie 30-50 minutes LONGER! After seeing the extended versions of these movies you will never want to think of the theatrical versions again. Plus, if you're someone like me and enjoy things looking badass on a shelf, these bulky book looking boxes are awesome collectibles that will spice up your DVD shelf.

Even without the two disks per film of bonus features, these are worth it just for the extended versions of the films. If you have the regular versions, I would recommend taking them somewhere that buys used DVDs and using the money towards buying these.

The Lord of the Rings Chess Set - The Fellowship of the Ring Edition
$124.95
I ordered the Fellowship of the Ring Chess Set (the only LOTR chess set listed on amazon) on October 12th, 2004 and instead received the Return of the King Chess Set. I find this to be a better set so I'm not returning it, but be duly warned.

The Board: It's a standard cardboard style gameboard. No more or less sturdy than in a standard board game. It's similar to the Fellowship board shown and has a nice map lightly imposed on the playing squares. It's dark enough to be pretty, but light enough to not be distracting.

The Pieces: The pieces are a higher grade plastic so they have a little more weight and durability than standard plastic. They are just plastic though, so swords and such (especially on the orc pawns) will get bent while the pieces are in the box. There are no extra pieces, which is a minor issue when promoting pawns. It's easy to use a square of paper or something for a promoted pawn to stand on to designate his new role.

The coloring is the same as the Fellowship set. However, they made all the pieces a reasonable size so they all fit easily in their squares. The pieces still have the standard chess symbols on their base which helps in recognizing a pieces's role.

Ancient Bone (ie. white) Pieces:
Aragorn - the King
Arwen - the Queen
Gandolf - a Bishop
Frodo - a Bishop
Merry - a Knight
Pippin - a Knight
Legolas - a Rook
Gimli - a Rook
Sam - the 8 Pawns

Antiqued Bronze (ie. black) Pieces:
Tower of Barad-Dur - the King
Ringwraith - the Queen
Gollum - the 2 Bishops
Warg-Rider - the 2 Knights
Wormtongue - a Rook
Saruman - a Rook
Orc - the 8 Pawns

FUN - 4/5 stars. If you get the joy of having Legolas capture the Ringwraith in game a chess, then you'll have a blast playing with this set. If you're just learning chess, I suspect it'll be too hard to keep track of each piece's role. The icons on their base helps, but the symbols are easily obstructed by other pieces.

EDUCATIONAL VALUE - 2/5 stars. I believe you have to already love chess and the LOTR to get the most out of this set. A standard, cheap chess set has more value for learning the game.

DURABILITY - 3/5 stars. See comments on pieces and board.

FINAL THOUGHT - If you love chess and the LOTR, and you can handle a slight learning curve in learning what role each piece has, you'll have a blast playing on this set.

The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
$9.99
Easy to install, and easy to play, and plays well, but just not interesting. I gave up after about half an hour. Well perhaps it is just me so I gave it to my 10 year old and he also gave up on it. So it went to the donation pile.