King's Bounty: The Legend

"It's all in the gameplay"

Kings Bounty: the Legend (KBtL) is a great game and I can't wait for the expansion (Armoured Princess) to be released this Fall. In many ways, KBtL is a simplistic/pure experience, offering pretty much only gameplay. The thing is that the gameplay is so well judged that you don't generally care that the rest of the deal is either missing or sub-standard. I will explain what I mean as I go along but, if I were to tell you that the game features (a) a poor story and camp humour throughout, (b) no in-game voice work AT ALL, (c) a low-tech graphics engine (the Skyfallen engine from Dawn of Magic,) (d) no FMV's or other rewards for progressing or completing the game and (e) RPG level-ups that are lacking, you will think that I have lost my mind. I can assure you that I haven't, so read on.

Introduction - The original Kings Bounty was released some twenty years ago (you can download it for free if you can find a web site that features old, now "freeware" games.) The gameplay style was used subsequently in the Heroes of Might and Magic (HoMM) turn-based RPGs, which were popular in the mid to late 1990s, but died out with HoMM 4 (I am referring to the original 2D series.) New World Computing developed these games, but ran out of inspiration as the last games/expansions were released and it showed. New World Computing went out of business after HoMM 4 was released, but one of their top people acted as consultant on this game. Katauri Interactive are the developers and they represent one of a number of Eastern European (especially Russian) developers who are revisiting old games and trying their hand at re-inventing them. The Disciples series is receiving the same treatment and Disciples 3 should be released in Fall 2009. Nival Interactive attempted to revive the HoMM series back in 2006, but failed in the task after releasing lacklustre expansions.

Gameplay - 9 out of 10. KBtL is all about the gameplay, period. It had to be good (as it was in the old HoMM games) and it is good. You have an avatar; it has to be a he; a Warrior, Paladin or Mage. You are on horseback and roam the land beating up all the baddies you meet on your journey. They are absolutely everywhere and some of them are much tougher than you, so you have to be careful who you take on as the game commences. Your avatar does not fight, but his stats affect the attack and defence and number in the stacks of your fighters. You have five stacks of fighters who do your fighting for you. You face off against the enemy on a hex-grid and slowly take on and beat his fighters. All classes can use magic, both from a mana pool and scrolls and later on the Rage skills (another form of magic) feature heavily. It all starts off simply enough, with a modest starting tutorial, but later battles can be quite complex, some lasting 30-45 minutes. The gameplay is a subtle mixture of simple principles but complex execution and it all holds together well. Call the developers brave, but the game features the ability for your avatar to have a wife and children! Your wife and children give you stat boosts, but otherwise don't feature in the story arc. Technical wise, the game never crashed once (1.7 patch installed) during the many hours I played it. It has an auto-save feature, which causes the game to stall intermittently, but you get used to it. Level load times are short, which is a blessing after many of todays games have load times long enough to write a short story in!

Story - 5 out of 10. Nice try but no cigar. The problem here is that the game (ie. main story and side quests) features reams of on-screen text in dialogue boxes, but no voice work AT ALL. The text is generally well written, using very small text, but your eyes glaze over after you've read the 20th lengthy story dialogue box in one evening! There is a theme of humour in the writing and I think that it is pretty classy, all in all. It takes some getting used to but you can find yourself chuckling at the jokes you spot (mostly gaming "in jokes".) Sadly, I can remember no particular twists ot turns in the game story and it acts as the skinniest of bodies to hang the clothes of the game on.

Graphics/Sound - 8 out of 10. As mentioned above, the graphics engine is fairly low-tech and thus the game can be played on pretty much any machine out there. Even "web browser" quality systems will be able to run KBtL. The graphics engine was used in Dawn of Magic and features a fairly bright/garish look. The camera can be rotated 360 degrees and be zoomed in/out. The sound work is pretty weak but this is more than made up for by the stunning music on offer. It is a form of classical music that would be at home in many high budget films. As with anything, I turned the sound off for much of the time, but even long periods of gameplay didn't make the music oppressive. The lack of any voice work makes your time in KBtL a lonely experience, so be warned!

Play Time/Replayability - 9 out of 10. This is one game that you will want to play again. With five levels of difficulty, three avatar possibilities to choose from, many, many quests to attempt and the opportunity to stay single or have a wife and children; well the possibilities are many. I would say that a first playthrough will take 50 + hours and the next one, well, longer, if you up the difficulty.

Final Recommendation - 8.5 out of 10. For a game that is all gameplay, it is strange to score it so highly. At a time when games are all about pretty graphics and ragdoll physics, KBtL stands out like a sore thumb. Respect to Eastern European developers for re-inventing some of the older style games for us today and respect to them for making their games available to a wide variety of gamers (especially those with older systems.) KBtL is a great game; a keeper (especially as we wait for the expansion to be released for it) and one to play through at least twice. Praise indeed!

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 05/22/09

Game Release: King's Bounty: The Legend (EU, 02/13/09)