For years, Amazon Games was developing a Lord of the Rings MMO alongside Chinese game developer Leyou and Middle-earth Enterprises. There was a good amount of hype around the game, but it was abruptly canceled in 2021, leaving fans scratching their heads and wondering how it all fell apart.

Amazon Games president Christoph Hartmann told GameSpot that its Lord of the Rings MMO disintegrated when Leyou was sold to Tencent. Things got "very complicated," and Amazon Games elected to simply cut ties and move on.

"We had a deal with a Hong Kong-based company, Leyou; I think it would have been great to work with them. But they later got sold to Tencent and it just got very complicated," Hartmann said.