I discover it amusing that a the resurrection of a beloved retro game is itself retro now.
I’m speaking about King’s Bounty: The Legend, which came to Computer in 2008. It’s a rebirth of the original 1990 game from New World Computer (produced by the similar people behind the Might and Magic series, and it is a progenitor for the Heroes of Might and Magic). 1C Entertainment place out a quantity of expansions and standalone releases more than the next six years, culminating with King’s Bounty: The Dark Side in 2014.
I got excited in 2019 when 1C and Deep Silver announced that King’s Bounty II was coming in 2020. Steam says I’ve place in 630 hours into the series. Like Civilization, it is a comfort-meals game for me. So of course I’m excited that a sequel is on the way. And it is taking a bit of a unique path the sequel is a merging of open-planet RPG with tactical combat, and it is ditching some of the lighter tone and artwork of prior games. You nonetheless decide on 1 of 3 heroes (warrior, mage, or paladin), and you are nonetheless exploring, taking on quests, acquiring new units for your army, and browsing for treasures.
Of course, 2020 getting that most awful of years, it got postponed to late March.
Changes I’m curious about
King’s Bounty: The Legend and its siblings have you exploring a series of maps (some are islands, other people are realms). This time, 1C is taking us to an open planet, and I’m very curious about how it goes about this.
In a demo in November, we saw a standard fantasy-medieval realm. Now, these are regular in the series, but they’ve normally been vibrant and vibrant, with lush colors, the clop of your horse’s hooves, and other particulars. As you advance via the campaign, you encounter unique regions, such as sylvan glades, snowy wastes, muddy bogs, fiery hellscapes, and underground caverns. Here, you’d fight against foes suited to these environments and choose up troops that live there (like elves in the glades, demons in the hellscapes, and so on).
1C showed off a village, some snowy lands, and some interior creating shots. The issue that is unique right here is it has persons and interiors. Before, you’d go to a shop or an inn, and a mugshot would pop up with text interactions or what you could obtain. If you hit up a castle, you’d go to a screen with the ruler and could see an additional occupant or two and what ever units and products it had for sale.
Interiors with persons imply you may possibly really get a opportunity to discover places outdoors of the most important map and combat, and I’m hoping this could lead to interactions with NPC and a deeper story.
Battle lineups appear more lively as nicely. Like in lots of tactical and method RPGs, your units appear like singular entities regardless of how lots of you may possibly have. Say you have a troop of 54 skeleton archers? You just see 1 on the screen. In this sequel, your units are produced up of several icons (although I doubt I’m going to see 200 spiders at 1 time).
And obtaining persons outdoors in villages, town squares, and other places will assistance give King’s Bounty II not just more approaches for the player to interact with the planet (quests and such) but assistance this open-planet really feel more vibrant.
But I do have two issues: Will this make King’s Bounty II more vibrant, and will it detract what from the core loop of creating your armies and taking on foes? 1C says it plans for a more severe strategy with creating Antara, and I realize the studio’s want to make a more mature RPG. King’s Bounty does have a light tone (you can recruit a cute dragonet companion in 1 game), and I’d be satisfied to see it ditch bikini-like armor sets for its girls characters. But that light tone is element of its charm, along with the Civilization-like “one more turn” appeal of seeking on the next island, down the next path, to see what new recruits you can add to your armies.
King’s Bounty II remains my most anticipated RPG of 2021. I just hope it nails each techniques and tone.
What else am I seeking forward to in 2021?
2021 appears like it is going to be a quite very good year for RPGs, although with so lots of studios generating games these days, it feels like just about every year is very good for RPGs now.
Here’s what I have my eyes on this year. Note — current dates could opportunity, specially for these that publishers have only stated are coming out “in 2021.”
The D20 Beat is GamesBeat managing editor Jason Wilson’s column on part-playing games. It commonly runs just about every other week, but like wandering monsters, it can seem at any time. It covers video games, the digital elements of regular tabletop RPGs, and the rise of RPG streaming. Drop me a line if you have any RPG news, insights, or memories to share … or just want to roll a digital D20 with me.