In the demonstration game I played, I began in the Shire, wandering about, listening to some of the conversations between Hobbit NPCs and even taken a spin through Bilbo's party field. The Shire is a sweet place where good-aligned characters can rest, chat and receive missions from Gandalf. According to Vivendi, evil players will also have a similar place to rest and chat, but they're not quite ready to reveal where that is. While in the Shire I ran into Fredegar Bolger, a Hobbit of some notoriety, who handed me a letter from Gandalf asking me to journey to the Mines of Moria, find the tomb of Durin and retrieve a suit of semi-sentient armor and a sword before Sauron's troops could get a hold of them.