King Arthur: Knight’s Tale Previews
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With King Arthur: Knight’s Tale now available in early access, you might be interested in learning more about NeocoreGames’ return to their old stomping grounds of Arthurian tactical RPGs. If that’s the case, you can now read a number of fairly positive previews below. Have a look:
You affect your placing by making decisions while on mission. Do you want to make a place Christian or return it to its Old Gods way, for example? What I really like about it is that wherever you go on the chart, you're rewarded, unlocking various benefits in keeping with your tone. Go evil, like I did, and you unlock the Black Knight companion early on.
I love the sound of this feature, just as I love the promise of so many other things in the game. The problem is, they're either not implemented yet or don't kick in until much later in the game. And I'm not sure I want to get there, or indeed, can. It's early access, and the very beginning of the process. That's frustrating, if you're really excited about the game, as it's not finished, but it's also reassuring because there's a lot of work left to do. And, really, it's now in the best hands: lots of hands, which will help hone and shape it as time goes on.
This new spin on Arthurian legend is immediately alluring, allowing players to forge their own path through Camelot and tell the story from the perspective of the villain. King Arthur: Knight's Tale is a unique tactical experience that has great potential. Though developer NeocoreGames is no stranger to projects set in the Medieval era, this Kickstarter-funded reimagining feels both familiar and brand-new. The Early Access for the game is a strong start that should excite fans for what is to come.
Originally I couldn’t recommend buying the Early Access version of the game in its current state because I didn’t think you’d be able to make it far before your game bugged out and you had to start over. However, Neocore has taken feedback and patched the game in just a short amount of time, and the Build I played just today on stream with the devs had almost no issues. I’m not completely sure how stable the current Build is, but I’d wager Neocore will have it patched up fairly quickly, so I don’t think there’s much of a risk.
Considering this is an early access edition of this game, there are a fair amount of areas that left us wanting more. From the tutorials that basically throw you in the deep end, to the quite limited exploration, or the bugs we encountered, King Arthur: Knight's Tale is a game with a lot of potential that doesn't quite show itself off in the most appealing way right now. Granted, there is a lot more content coming whenever launch day arrives, including 18 more story missions, over 25 more recruitable characters, more terrains to explore, a fleshed out Morality Chart, and even a challenging endgame. All of this should fill in a lot of the areas that currently feel lacking, but we have to see these implemented before we can take anything from it.
The promised roguelike elements are limited; mostly, they refer to the fact that there are no saves and death of any knights is permanent. This isn’t a bad mechanic in and of itself, but King Arthur: Knight’s Tale is too slow a game for it to feel good. The prospect of starting over in a deliberate strategy game is frustrating. This is not to say that a game focusing on careful strategy is bad, but it is frustrating to have to repeat the game’s overly simple intro rather than be hamstrung by a knight’s death. Luckily, it looks like another mode has since been added that allows for saves.
Neocore Games greatly impressed me with their latest project, King Arthur: Knight's Tale. I believe the gameplay to be deep enough to keep you captivated for the entire campaign, although simple enough for anyone to pick up and go. There are no details yet on the PvP mode but I'm quite excited to see what that will bring to the table. As far as the audio and visual design goes, I was wowed. The character models look fantastic, the voice acting is on par with AAA titles, and the cinematics are absolutely phenomenal. I was truly stunned by the level of quality. My only wish is that my first meeting with King Arthur: Knight's Tale was closer to its launch because my enjoyment was greatly hampered by the never-ending bugs.
