{"id":33769,"date":"2012-03-10T18:00:18","date_gmt":"2012-03-10T16:00:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/?p=33769"},"modified":"2012-03-10T18:04:47","modified_gmt":"2012-03-10T16:04:47","slug":"king-arthur-ii-review-pc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mygaming.co.za\/news\/pc\/33769-king-arthur-ii-review-pc","title":{"rendered":"King Arthur II review (PC)"},"content":{"rendered":"

Do you remember those “Choose your own adventure” books? You know, do this and turn to page 54, or do that and go to page 213. Well, Neocore Games do – and by mixing that in with RPG character building elements and Total War-esque strategy, they\u2019ve created a very interesting and very different game.<\/p>\n

King Arthur II is optimistically subtitled: The Role-Playing Wargame. You play the son of the title character as he tries to put his father\u2019s kingdom back together, and find a cure for his father\u2019s debilitating injury. To do this, you take your character and his army around mythic Britain completing quests, managing your realm, engaging in diplomacy and, of course, fighting battles.<\/p>\n

The roleplaying elements are relatively simple. You get to choose a class at the beginning \u2013 a standard Total War Warlord, a magic slinging Sage or an \u201cI hit things\u201d Champion \u2013 and unlock abilities in a skill tree that will be instantly familiar to anyone who\u2019s played a Blizzard game in the last decade or so.<\/p>\n

You can equip your characters with weapons and artefacts you discover, as well as marrying them off and granting them parts of your kingdom to govern \u2013 though that is just a way of affecting their stats.<\/p>\n

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King Arthur II: The Role-playing Wargame<\/p><\/div>\n

The real time battles are all Total War, with rolling hills, formations and tiny little men hitting each other with swords. There is one big difference \u2013 magic. Your knights and generals cast spells that can have fairly dramatic effects, at least after you wear down your opponents defences.<\/p>\n

There are mythic units like giants, faeries, werewolves and all sorts of flying nasties. Finally, there are special command points dotted around the various maps that grant the side controlling them special abilities. This gives the early part of every battle a little more cut and thrust, and gives your cavalry something to do other than waiting around for you to call them.<\/p>\n

Also, contrary to my experience with Shogun and the rest, you won\u2019t be shy about ramming your generals into the fight, as they can be dramatic tide turners.<\/p>\n

The grand strategy map shows a wonderfully detailed and fantastic Britain, through which you trudge from quest to quest. The game turns are based on the seasons, and you work your way through spring, summer and autumn. During these turns you\u2019re mostly just moving, attacking, being attacked and occasionally doing some diplomacy. Then in winter, you bunker down and prepare for the next year. Winter is the turn you can upgrade buildings, queue up research and level-up your heroes and troops.<\/p>\n

This divide creates an elegant flow to play. You don\u2019t have to focus too much on the fiddly bits of your kingdom for the majority of turns, so you can just move your armies (you get up to three) to the next point of interest. Then, in winter, you take a break and can switch focus to upgrading \u2013 spending the gold your kingdom has accumulated. Then \u2013 bing \u2013 back to the game.<\/p>\n

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King Arthur II: The Role-playing Wargame<\/p><\/div>\n

Of course, when the game doesn\u2019t involve armies clashing or upgrading buildings, it involves paragraphs of text being read by the narrator. Lots of paragraphs. Lots of: \u201cIt is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.\u201d<\/p>\n

Just about every quest or piece of diplomacy involves a small story with different choices open to you to shape your ruler and realm. Apart from taking you down different parts of the story (and getting different rewards), these choices also serve to guide your alignment. Alignment follows, on one axis, the typical good versus evil of recent RPGs. But King Arthur II also adds a second axis, which is Christian versus Old Faith. Your alignment unlocks different special units like avenging angels or Seelie archers, depending on your actions.<\/p>\n

The story itself is interesting and pretty dark, overall. This is a realm at war, being overrun by the demonic Fomorians, who can infect and corrupt anyone, anywhere. So there\u2019s lots of distrust, black deals and nervous well-I-hope-this-turns-out-well choices.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, all the narrative is read out to you by this one guy. He\u2019s got a good voice \u2013 putting on accents and going all squeaky when talking as a lady. But I found it became a bit samey, so I\u2019d try and read ahead and just go through faster \u2013 not waiting for his measured delivery.<\/p>\n

And while we\u2019re talking drawbacks, let\u2019s talk about the one that lets King Arthur II down the most: it\u2019s \u2018strategy\u2019.<\/p>\n

While it may look like a Total War game, and mostly plays like one, it\u2019s not one. You really don\u2019t have control in the strategy portion of the game. You don\u2019t choose where you\u2019re going to attack next because the defending forces will be massively out of your league until the story decides it\u2019s time for you to invade. That means you\u2019re following a story, not making one. I\u2019m told the previous game had something of the same problem, but offered new campaigns with full freedom \u2013 but they\u2019re not here, or announced, yet.<\/p>\n

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King Arthur II: The Role-playing Wargame<\/p><\/div>\n

For what it\u2019s worth, graphically, King Arthur 2 is a pretty game. The grand strategy map is beautiful, while the individual real time battle maps are otherworldly and fantastic \u2013 with great little touches from the magic, like a unit of infantry being scattered into the air after a lightning strike.<\/p>\n

Overall though, it\u2019s an odd game. A mish-mash of different genres shouldn\u2019t work. We\u2019ve all seen too many games that suffer from the \u201clet\u2019s just do everything\u201d syndrome, and end up watering down what\u2019s good about those genres beyond the point where it\u2019s enjoyable.<\/p>\n

King Arthur 2 doesn\u2019t suffer from this problem. The story layer complements the more traditional game elements and will give gamers a good, layered and deep, if overly directed, fantasy experience.<\/p>\n\n\t\t