Game: King’s Bounty II
Genre: Role-Playing, Strategy, Turn-Based Tactics
System: Steam (also on Nintendo Switch, PS4 & Xbox One)
Developers | Publishers: 1C Entertainment | 1C Entertainment, Koch Media
Age Rating: US Teen | EU 16+
Price: UK £43.99 | US $49.99 | EU € 49,99
Release Date: August 24th, 2021
Review code used, with many thanks to Dead Good PR
King’s Bounty II is a turn-based tactical RPG developed by IC Entertainment. The original King’s Bounty was released in the ’90s and there was also a spin-off title released in 2008 King’s Bounty: The Legend.
Select your Character
In King’s Bounty II you pick one of three characters to take through the main story, each of which follows the same plot.
You can choose Aivar, a disgraced knight who is a descendant of an impoverished noble family and used to be a knight of the Royal Guard. There’s Katherine, who comes from a long line of nobles and is a mistress of the Arcane and can cast spells. And last but not least there is Elisa, a peasant from Lorain, who has magic abilities.
It is up to you which one you choose to start the game with. From a Role-Playing point of view, the characters felt a little hollow to me, story-wise it is only Elisa’s motivations that fit in well with the storyline. Aivar felt wooden to me and Katherine has the best writing and voice acting.
Let out of Prison
After picking your character the game starts with you having been released from prison and your character takes on a job for the king. It’s standard third-person RPG adventuring and you are tasked with trying to prevent a fantasy magical disaster from occurring. Why would you do that? Well, a wizard has informed you that you’re the chosen saviour. The storyline isn’t much to write home about and it really is nothing different from what we have seen in games before.
Roam an Empty Land
In King’s Bounty II you will roam around the world accepting side quests, make morality-shifting decisions, complete tasks, and loot boxes, barrels and chests. Collect scrolls and books explaining the world’s lore and completing easy puzzles. The world is yours to explore. It is therefore a big disappointment that much of the world feels empty and devoid of life. The towns and villages appear empty and uninteresting even when they are populated with NPCs.
There are plenty of houses and buildings. However, you can only enter the buildings that are part of the storyline. Everything else is out of bounds, and traversing the world to complete menial tasks and quests turns into more of a chore than a pleasure. There is little to do or see off the beaten track, in fact, the game is pretty linear. There is a lot of backtracking and the slow speed at which your character moves makes this tedious. Though this is helped slightly by a fast travel system. I say slightly as even the fast travel locations are weirdly spaced around the world.
Combat
Combat in King’s Bounty II is top-down, turn-based on a hex-based grid. Battles aren’t random and you’ll know when you’re about to go into battle when you come across a blue dotted line on the ground. You can either start the battle right away or take time to prepare for battle. You can choose which units to take into battle considering the foe and the setup of the environment. The units consist of ranged archers, mages to dwarven warriors and ethereal spirits.
Your character doesn’t take part in battles other than casting the odd spell. They stand on the sidelines like a Colonel issuing orders. Battles are enjoyable and tough against enemies that can wipe your units out if you don’t pay attention to the battlefield. Using terrain elevation, unit placement, managing troop morale and knowing when is the best time to use your characters skills, like buffs and spells in the battles is key to succeeding.
Permadeath
While I enjoyed the combat and the strategy it involves, it lacks a detailed tutorial. This leads to you floundering until you get to grips with its systems. The biggest stumbling block I found in the combat is if you lose, your units suffer permadeath, meaning they are gone forever. I don’t mind permadeath if there is a way to replace your units, but that’s not so simple.
To get new units you buy them from a merchant to build up your army and reserves. So for example, say you’re in a particular area where you have raided each and every chest, barrel and found all the cash. The storyline leads you to a battle, a battle which upon the victory of the storyline moves forward. If you fail and lose all the units you have to buy more. But things in the Kingdom of Nostra cost an awful lot of money, and if you haven’t any money left you’re backed into a corner of having to load an older save and try again.
Visuals and Controls
Visually King’s Bounty II looks fine, it’s not going to knock your socks off in the looks department but there are some highlights. Looking across a vista the game looks very well with the trees rustling in the breeze and the odd animal scurrying about their business. However, there are noticeable frame rate issues when the game is running. The game has full controller support and the controllers are fine and work as they should.
Conclusion
I think King’s Bounty II falls down slightly in its core game design. Especially the narrative and the RPG elements of it feel stifled and a grind. To me, King’s Bounty II feels like a game that wants to take inspiration from titles like The Witcher 3 with new discoveries and adventures around every corner. But it doesn’t quite hit the mark with its mediocre storyline and wooden characters and semi-linear world.
The combat, while tough and unforgiving, I did find enjoyable as I like a good challenge. King’s Bounty II is one of those games I’m not entirely sure how I feel about it one way or the other as it has as many good points as bad points so for that reason King’s Bounty II scores…
Final Verdict: I’m Not Sure 