King’s Bounty 2

King’s Bounty 2 was reviewed on a PS4

Get lost in this fantasy world filled with creepy spirits, cunning mages, undead zombies, and fearsome knights. King’s Bounty 2 is an ambitious open-world RPG despite leaving quite some room for improvements. It perfectly blends strategy, resource management and RPG elements in its 40 hours playtime. There’s plenty of quests to undertake and plenty of sights to see in this fantasy adventure, but are they worth the price of admission?

What is King’s Bounty 2?

King’s Bounty 2 is an open-world RPG featuring a ton of entertaining side quests and an addictive and robust turn-based combat system. It perfectly balances between strategy and RPG elements by having you control a character in a third-person view and engaging in combat with its hex-based battles. With finite resources and gold, you’ll have to carefully weigh your options when buying armor or recruiting new units. The fights are quest-specific or fixed in certain locations though, so grinding for XP isn’t an option here.

You have the option of choosing between three protagonists, Aivar the Warrior, Katharine the Mage and Elisa the Paladin. Your character choice won’t affect the story whatsoever but it will grant you different perks based on what you choose. However, you’ll have to make this choice literally at the first menu screen, meaning these perks are as meaningless as a doctor’s handwriting to you at this point.

Dazed and Confused

This is one of the game’s most glaring issues. The lack of a clear and comprehensive tutorial. The prologue will have you feeling like a fish out of the water, especially if you’re a newcomer to the series. You’ll have to rely purely on luck, as there’s not enough resources to learn new spells or buy new units during the prologue. Push on through though, and you’ll discover a satisfying and truly hard to put down RPG that excels in many aspects.

After a brief stint in prison, you’ll be released and tasked with investigating a mysterious disaster at the magefactory. The investigation will have you roaming the game’s gigantic map of Crown Lands and meeting all of its peculiar inhabitants.

It’s a shame that you’ll never cross paths with any of them as soon as the quest surrounding them is over. In comparison, Witcher 3’s characters felt like family members at the end of the game while King Bounty 2’s roster feels more like work colleagues that you’d merely talk to at a watercooler.

The horrendous voice acting doesn’t help neither with fleshing out the underdeveloped characters. The voice acting ranges from average to downright laughable. The characters sound more like people cosplaying as medieval people than real characters.

Gorgeous Environments and lifeless faces

There are a few action packed set pieces and cutscenes but they’re brought down by the voice acting and the stiff animations. Facial animations are wooden and lifeless and the horse riding animations are even worse. While I understand that the main focus of the series isn’t on the animations or the set pieces, but the game would’ve benefitted greatly if it tried to be more immersive. You’ll spend a lot of time walking back and forth in King’s Bounty. Thankfully, you can summon your trusty steed with a press of a button. He’s not that much faster than walking though, so the addition of a rideable horse isn’t much of a real game changer.

This brings me to the graphics. While you shouldn’t expect a AAA level of fidelity, the game’s environments in particular look stunning at times. Crown Lands’ villages, houses and castles are vibrant and colorful. A few locations are gorgeously designed like the majestic and spacious throne room. Although up close some of the textures can be a bit blurry which quickly ruins the player’s immersion. The blight-ravaged areas were grey, lifeless and burned to ash, making them memorable when juxtaposed with the map’s green pastures.

Exploring the map and discovering a new area was a treat. You can loot any treasure chests you come across, as well as trade with merchants and recruit new units. In every new location, there is a set of merchants and traders to barter with, as well as new side quests, making them worth exploring. Most side quests will end in blood, and that’s where the game shines the most.

Addictive and Enjoyable Combat

The combat is fast paced, visually pleasing and entertaining. it’s also accompanied by blood pumping battle music filled with percussive battle drums and medieval instruments. There’s plenty of units to assemble and use in your conquests. The game’s complex mechanics may seem daunting at first, but after a bit of trial and error, you’ll quickly get the hang of them.

Unit types don’t mix well with each other, causing a hit to their morale when assembled into the same squad. A low morale can cause them to occasionally skip a turn, which can truly turn the tide of battle during the more challenging ones. Having to maintain the right mix of unit types adds an entertaining extra layer of challenge.

Amassing a large army of units is extremely satisfying. From golems, to mages and spearmen, it’s not long before your army reserves are filled with all kinds of warriors and fighters. You can also use magic spells, which cost Mana but provide some abilities that can you help you out in a pinch. They also cost a ton of Mana to upgrade so you’re always forced to spend wisely. The same rings true when shopping for units.

Side quests Galore

There are countless side quests in King’s Bounty 2, and the developers want you to play all of them. Main quests’ fights are the toughest battles in the game. The only way to win them is to level up your character by finishing a dozen or so of side quests first. This can really disrupt the pacing of the game, but since the side quests’ storylines are more focused than the main quest’s plotline, I see this as a good thing. You’re often presented with a moral choice, but trying to do the good thing is more often than not, an extra battle away.

These choices correspond with a certain alignment for your character. For example, improving your character’s Anarchy alignment can give them a certain edge when controlling Anarchy units such as ghouls and free archers. And increasing a certain alignment allows you to level up the alignment’s specific set of abilities. Sounds confusing? That’s because it is.

You’ll have a hard time wrapping your head around all of the abilities, the buffs, the debuffs, your character stats, your units’ stats, your alignments, your unit types. However, this complexity is one of the game’s strongest aspects. Doing your research pays off immensely once you defeat that seemingly undefeatable battle after several tries.

Overall,

While King’s Bounty 2 does nothing special or innovative when compared to other RPGs, it’s definitely an addictive game that provides plenty of fun. The world that the developers built here is beautiful and satisfying to explore.

The combat is stellar as well and I often found myself spending hours at a time with the game whenever I sat down to play it. Don’t let the bad voice acting and the lackluster animations discourage you from trying it out, especially if you’re a fan of old-school RPG games.

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Special thanks go to Dead Good Media for providing us with a review code.

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