King's Bounty: The Legend Preview
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The sizable, cartoonish, open world requires dozens of hours of free exploration to unveil, and is crowded with distinct geography and stocked with an eclectic range of critters and skill-enhancing loot to increase your unseen hero general's abilities. Early on you're limited to recruiting a handful of tenderfoot swordsman and archers, but over time I graduated to fielding Dwarven artillery and werewolves that can terrify opponents into paralysis or eviscerate them with massive Wolverine-style claws.
Animations are first-rate, and I was constantly impressed by creative touches like Bela Lugosi style vampires transforming into bats. The distinctive traits of critters, like the griffins' ability to glide over prepared defenses, and your choice of hero skills give King's Bounty considerable tactical depth. Each area is patrolled by a few units of titanic strength that only a fool would confront before the late game - I had to scramble to avoid them. This adds real tension to exploration, as you might be going about the rote business of looting and exterminating groups consisting of a dozen berserkers and suddenly notice a horde barreling towards you with 2,000 of their kin, accompanied by hundreds of Archmages. If you haven't opted to improve the requisite scouting skills, you may not even realize the danger the group poses until hundreds of angry, kilted men are playing hacky sack with your Dwarves' heads. Risking those fatal confrontations does pay off, though, since any map nook could hold a new quest-giver, upgrade, or opportunity to recruit unique troops.
