Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning Previews and Interviews

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Written by WorstUsernameEver on May 27th, 2011

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The demo I saw opened with a bit of in-town exploration in the city of Rathir, with a showcase of the ability to pick the pockets of various townsfolk. As you might expect, this requires a bit of stealth, and if you're spotted, the guards aren't exactly happy about it. Getting caught by guards pops up the game's dialogue wheel with multiple options on it. You can start a fight by resisting arrest, lose some XP by opting for jail time, or pay a fine to clear your crimes and get a fresh start on things. From there, the mage/rogue mix found himself a quest. Specifically, a man in town wanted you to go after his daughter, who went out to stop the Ljosalfar elves from infiltrating Rathir, which is inhabited by the Dokkalfar elves. Elf-on-elf violence, man.

Things pick up in a cave, where you find the guy's daughter and agree to help her find three switches that will stop the invading elves. Yeah, hitting switches. Heavy stuff. But this still gave us a good look at the game's combat, which allows you to equip two weapons at once and sort of switch between them on the fly, but the real combos come from putting points into mastering specific types of weapons. So, for example, if you drop a ton of points into daggers, you'll be able to mash out much longer combos by slamming the dagger button. It's not all mashing, though, as you can delay some button presses to branch your combos or hold the button down to charge up some attacks. Other weapon types include things like hammers, swords, and chakram--which are crazy sharp hoop-shaped blades. Different attacks can launch enemies up into the air, setting up juggle opportunities.

Like when you're pickpocketing, stealth can be a factor in combat. Toggling your sneak mode on puts meters above enemy heads that let you know how close they are to detecting you, and getting up close and nailing someone behind without being seen leads to stealth kills. You can also use abilities to regain a stealthy edge, like smoke bombs that confuse nearby enemies.

While combat isn't anything entirely new it was instantly satisfying. It sort of felt like an amalgam of what I love about God of War and Diablo. There's that clicky-button mashing need to obliterate your enemies backed with gratifying, graphics and clever take downs and abilities.

My character, for instance, could teleport through people, leaving in his wake a poison trail, a trail that was absorbed by enemies as he passed through them. Armed with a chakram and knives, my character was able to toss out waves of damaging attacks. I could also sneak up on enemies and deliver devastating, visceral sneak attacks.

The game, designed as a solid PC role-playing title, worked so well on the Xbox 360 controller, that I wondered aloud how they would make it work as well on a computer. (We're working on that,) I was told.

The graphics and backstory may not have a lot of instant appeal, but the fantastic combat system and colorful attacks and specials are sure to get gamers to stick around long enough to start caring and understanding about those things. And with a promised 60 hours of gameplay, it probably makes sense to slowly ramp that up over the course of the game.

You'll be able to pick from several classes and it seems combinations are possible, such as a mage rogue, and although there is no morality system, there will be consequences to your actions. For instance, if you commit a crime in a town, the villagers will react to you differently and if you're caught, you can either try to fight your way clear or pay a fine. Either way, people will remember what you did. At the same time, it's interesting to note that regardless of your decisions, all the quests will remain available to you, so feel free to be as good or as deliciously evil as you please. Quests are marked with exclamation points, and you can even participate in activities like blacksmithing (which reminds me of Fable III, to some extent).

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