Lord of the Rings Online dev to close abandoned player homes in next update

Lord of the Rings Online developer Turbine will be taking virtual bulldozers to abandoned homes in its MMO as of Update 11.. Players who own the buildings will have two months to pay off their debts or face eviction.

The move was outlined in a blog post from the studio, and warned, "With Update 11, if you own a home that has been locked for more than 180 days you will be issued a final foreclosure warning. At that point you’ll have 60 days to get your finances in order and pay down the upkeep or your home will be foreclosed and put back on the market.

"All your items that were stored in the house will be put into escrow. These items in escrow will stay there indefinitely but you will need to clear out your escrow before you are allowed to buy a new home."

The studio added that abandoned homes take up space and make it difficult for friends to find a place near each other.

"Later this year we will likely shorten the grace period," the post continued, "but seeing as this foreclosure business is new to a lot of players we figured we’d give some extra time when the feature goes live.

"The hope here is that by putting all of the long-dormant homes back on the market current players will find it easier to build close-knit communities with their friends. We’ll have more info on future improvements to the housing system down the road a bit."

Are you still playing LOTRO? Is this a big problem at the moment? Let us know below.

Thanks Edge.