Does Lord of the Rings: Return to Moria Have Dedicated Servers?

Dedicated servers are one of the must-have features for online co-op games. Does the new Lord of the Rings: Return to Moria have dedicated servers, or do you have to rely on peer-to-peer connections?

Can You Play on Dedicated Servers in LotR Return to Moria? Answered

As you delve into the vast dungeons of Moria and engage in action-packed survival crafting gameplay, you might’ve decided to invite some friends. Players who engage in co-op have discovered that they simply cannot continue playing when the host leaves the game. In fact, I also experienced this when my friend, who was the host for our session, decided to leave. The rest of us had to log off since we couldn’t continue playing in that specific world without him. Our characters are saved on our own dedicated accounts, but the game world information is only saved on the admin’s profile.

This reveals that LotR Return to Moria doesn’t have dedicated servers. Unfortunately, this can be a big letdown on launch day, especially because the game was designed with online co-op in mind.

The admin would essentially have to stay logged in constantly to emulate a dedicated server. For example, this can be done on a second computer by leaving the host character in-game 24/7. That said, are there any plans to introduce dedicated servers in the future?

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Are Dedicated Servers Planned for LotR Return to Moria?

Even though this vital online feature is missing on launch, there’s hope for the future. Free Range Games’ Game Director Jon-Paul Dumont announced numerous features in a post-launch online interview. Mainly, he stated that their yearly roadmap includes dedicated servers through the shared worlds feature.

This will allow players to log out of their sessions and return to find the same world and characters waiting for them. Furthermore, any group can simply continue their activities on a server regardless of whether the host is present or not. Personally, while this is great news, I feel that waiting for dedicated servers for a year is ridiculous. Depending on where shared worlds are on Free Range Games’ roadmap, players would prefer this feature to be expedited and released as soon as possible. After all, any survival co-op game should ideally support both dedicated servers and crossplay at launch.

So, does Lord of the Rings Return to Moria have dedicated servers? No. Will they be implemented in the future? Yes, but we hope it’ll be sooner than later. Thank you for reading this article, and you can find more guides, tips, and news on the game on our LotR Return to Moria hub.