King's Bounty - Hype Thread :P (GS Review inside)

aaahh, Russia........the land of nukes, vodka, and TBS games, all in superb quality. :D

EXELLENT GAME !!!!!!!!! Really GREAT !!!

1 HUGE PROBLEM : NO AUTORESOLVE !!!!!!! How stupid not to include such an option !!!!!!!!!!!

EXELLENT GAME !!!!!!!!! Really GREAT !!!

1 HUGE PROBLEM : NO AUTORESOLVE !!!!!!! How stupid not to include such an option !!!!!!!!!!!

Zedit

for quick/auto battle results, the auto fight option in combat chess board is not far from autoresolve.

btw, yeah, indeed a great game, and nice to see a so purely SRPG, text-base, role-playing variety (actually more than such *modern classics* as Mass Effect and Oblivion) and turn base, chessboard combat.

It's not that good, 8.5 max...CavalAnts

another person who cant play a game that doesnt score over 90%? You are really missing out on some great stuff.

[QUOTE="CavalAnts"]It's not that good, 8.5 max...bonafidetk

another person who cant play a game that doesnt score over 90%? You are really missing out on some great stuff.

let this person be, this game is better than 9+ Oblivion and Mass Effect.

=D

Beautiful game.

Well, I have played the first KB since 1997 (though it was released in 1990) and I got to say HoMM3 is the best game ever made (I have a HOMM Guild in Xfire for those who got addicted to any HOMM here).

As for KB: The Legends, I've been waiting for this game for a while but after reading more and more about it and thought it would be like HOMM5 (that I badly hated) though I'll get it soon but I don't expect it to be better than HOMM3 of course. Anyways, I hope I'm wrong and it won't failed me like HOMM5 did.

BontraXenderKyl

you can try the demo to se how you like it, the demo does a pretty good impression of the .. a new version of the demo has come out some time back

ign review 8.1

While King's Bounty has some issues, there's a lot to like about the game. It's a familiar, yet refreshing RPG hybrid. You're going to spend a lot of time with the combat system and that's a good thing because it's simple, intuitive and filled with strategy and depth. The fighting requires players to adapt to the situation, and will constantly keep gamers on their toes. Yes, the difficulty can be very unbalanced at times, and sure the tutorial needs work, but as it stands, King's Bounty is a great game for all types of RPG fans.IGN

Startegy Informer review : 8.0

Kings Bounty: The Legend is a deceptively simple game. While you will be up and playing in moments the game does hide a level of complexity beneath its colorful surface and it will take you some time to truly master the gameplay. But this time will be well worth your effort as the gameplay, especially during the combat screens, is where KB:TL is at its best.StartegyInformer

ign review 8.1

[QUOTE="IGN"] While King's Bounty has some issues, there's a lot to like about the game. It's a familiar, yet refreshing RPG hybrid. You're going to spend a lot of time with the combat system and that's a good thing because it's simple, intuitive and filled with strategy and depth. The fighting requires players to adapt to the situation, and will constantly keep gamers on their toes. Yes, the difficulty can be very unbalanced at times, and sure the tutorial needs work, but as it stands, King's Bounty is a great game for all types of RPG fans.naval

Startegy Informer review : 8.0

Kings Bounty: The Legend is a deceptively simple game. While you will be up and playing in moments the game does hide a level of complexity beneath its colorful surface and it will take you some time to truly master the gameplay. But this time will be well worth your effort as the gameplay, especially during the combat screens, is where KB:TL is at its best.StartegyInformer

my thoughts on the reviews : IGN review is a prety bad one and doesn't gives a very good idea of the game. Startegy informer review is decent but its a short one and goes over the minor annoyances in the game in bit more detail

bumping the thread again (sorry if anyone is getting annoyed by this).

Here is a nice 4 page reivew by Gamebanshee :9.3

Calling fans of all RPG, turn-based or tactical strategy, and of hybrid games in between! King's Bounty - The Legend -- released without the trumpeted fanfare which accompanies some high budget titles (e.g., Fallout 3) -- includes fantastic single-player tactical / strategy / RPG mechanics, rarely-seen attention to graphic detail, a huge multi-continent world to explore, and a balanced 3-cIass character progression system you can't stop thinking about once you begin. I have not been this hooked since Heroes of Might & Magic III.

Pros : Detailed graphics and animation, huge multi-continent world to explore, addictive character progression, 60+ hours of gameplay, superb tactical combat

Cons :Normal difficulty is pretty tough, player forced to explore almost everything in early areas

Gamebanshee

I've been following this game back when it was called Battle Lord (that's how hardcore I am :P ), it actually took me a while to realize it's the same game - I was like, how the hell did I miss this? :lol: Played the demo a while ago and it's awesome. It's Heroes lite, but since when is that a bad thing? The graphics and the art-styIe is amazing. The camera and the controls could use some work. Can't seem to locate a copy anywhere, though. Is this out in Europe?

I've been following this game back when it was called Battle Lord (that's how hardcore I am :P ), it actually took me a while to realize it's the same game - I was like, how the hell did I miss this? :lol: Played the demo a while ago and it's awesome. It's Heroes lite, but since when is that a bad thing? The graphics and the art-styIe is amazing. The camera and the controls could use some work. Can't seem to locate a copy anywhere, though. Is this out in Europe?

UpInFlames

Sadly , I don't think it's out in europe from what i know it could be as late as feb 2009 for most of europe. I do think its out in germany though (not sure)

They did fixed few of the issues with the latest patch like using W,A,S ,D keys for movement etc.

bumping the thread again (sorry if anyone is getting annoyed by this).

[QUOTE="Gamebanshee"]

I have not been this hooked since Heroes of Might & Magic III.

Cons :Normal difficulty is pretty tough, player forced to explore almost everything in early areas

naval

not annoyed in the least since non mainstream title, piracy and system war threads are rare in this forum.

anyway, don't like the mentioning of HoMM all the time people talking about this game; if anything, kb forumla was there before HoMM series.

and, what the world has come to be? the game being challenging is in the con department? "normal difficult" in my golden years of gaming days meant the way the developer intended the game to be played.

It's out only in parts of Europe, as I understand. For example, in my country it will be launched in a month.

You can get it from Gamersgate (digital) or Amazon.

not annoyed in the least since non mainstream title, piracy and system war threads are rare in this forum.

teardropmina

Glad to hear this. I would like to do something similiar for my other upcoming favourite non mainstream game - NWN 2 _ Storm of Zehir, If I get the time :D

anyway, don't like the mentioning of HoMM all the time people talking about this game; if anything, kb forumla was there before HoMM series.

teardropmina

yeah ! guess many people don't realize KB was theinspiration for HoMM games, but still HoMM 3 is the most popular fantasy TBS so comparisons are inevitable

and, what the world has come to be? the game being challenging is in the con department? "normal difficult" in my golden years of gaming days meant the way the developer intended the game to be played.

teardropmina

really, its a partial strategy game ... which is no fun if its easy.I have seen almost 70% of the english reviews mention this. But if you think this is strange just see other reviews like critizing TF 2 for requiring too much team work :P or criticizing Stalker because the AI is too good :lol:

anyway, don't like the mentioning of HoMM all the time people talking about this game; if anything, kb forumla was there before HoMM series.

and, what the world has come to be? the game being challenging is in the con department? "normal difficult" in my golden years of gaming days meant the way the developer intended the game to be played.teardropmina

How can you not mention Heroes, it's the same formula created by the same people (New World Computing). Heroes of Might and Magic is the evolution of that formula.

As for the difficulty, it seems that the issue is balancing which makes the challenge unfair.

[QUOTE="teardropmina"]anyway, don't like the mentioning of HoMM all the time people talking about this game; if anything, kb forumla was there before HoMM series.

and, what the world has come to be? the game being challenging is in the con department? "normal difficult" in my golden years of gaming days meant the way the developer intended the game to be played.UpInFlames

How can you not mention Heroes, it's the same formula created by the same people (New World Computing). Heroes of Might and Magic is the evolution of that formula.

As for the difficulty, it seems that the issue is balancing which makes the challenge unfair.

1. what I meant was that most of the HoMM references I've seen in reviews or gamer Q&A, there's a sense that HoMM is the original and KB:TL is the follower. only if they'd kind enough to give the original KB the credit.

2. I don't see any unfair balancing issue in this game. there're some areas not meant to be toggled at low levels. those are not force to the gamers even though it's open to exploration early on.

Time to revive the thread again. ... bunc of new reviews :P

WorthPlaying : 9.1

It more than lives up to the name of the original, surpasses the recent Heroes of Might and Magic titles in terms of sheer fun, and it caters to old fans and those new to the genre. Flawless? No, but King's Bounty makes up for those flaws with a level of charm that's rare these days. If turn-based strategy has ever been your thing, if you liked the HoMM series, if you enjoy thinking, or if the title sounds at all appealing, then give King's Bounty a home this Christmas. Even if you only download the demo, you simply must try this game.worthPlaying

GameIndustryNews : 4.5/5

Taken as a whole, King's Bounty: The Legend is a fantastic game that does justice to the original. All of its little flaws can be overcome, and what it offers is a solid gameplay experience that will keep you glued to your screen for at least 50 hours and perhaps longer for a single game. That's an excellent value that we don't often find anymore.

GameIndustryNews

GamesRadar : 9.0

 You'll love

    * Insane and joyous
    * Consistently surprising
    * Stable and wonderful-looking

You'll hate

    * Somewhat unbalanced
    * Not always fair
    * Not well-translated
 

GamesRadar

Also ... a new expansion pack is announced  : King's Bounty - Armored Princess

That princess is beautiful.Baranga

and she sure dresses nicely too :P

BTW whoever got Xfire and like HoMMs I have a HoMM Guild in Xfire here. Whether you guys play it or not and know someone who does please let him know about that Guild.

Thanks!

i've gone through quite some trouble to get a retail copy of this game, and in the end it wasn't worth it for me. :( it didn't really meet many of my expectations for this particular genre, including a sophisticated class/job system, complex battle maps, and most importantly a central player character to groom and care about during battles.

This game looks very interesting. I'm loving the art style. I'm downloading the demo as we speak. I've been hearing great things about this game and this thread may have opened up my eyes to a great game that I would have missed. Thanks guys.

Edit: Okay, I just played the demo and it just isn't for me. Art style although nice and vibrant, still looks outdated. It's just not my cup of tea, but it's worth giving it a try. Try the demo for yourself.

Also ... a new expansion pack is announced  : King's Bounty - Armored Princess

naval

Sweet! I'm loving this game! 

i've gone through quite some trouble to get a retail copy of this game, and in the end it wasn't worth it for me. :( it didn't really meet many of my expectations for this particular genre, including a sophisticated class/job system, complex battle maps, and most importantly a central player character to groom and care about during battles.

Jinroh_basic

This game looks very interesting. I'm loving the art style. I'm downloading the demo as we speak. I've been hearing great things about this game and this thread may have opened up my eyes to a great game that I would have missed. Thanks guys.

Edit: Okay, I just played the demo and it just isn't for me. Art style although nice and vibrant, still looks outdated. It's just not my cup of tea, but it's worth giving it a try. Try the demo for yourself.

Elann2008

well since the thread is already bumped, let me print out the Eurogamer review :

Right now, King's Bounty feels like a 10/10 game wriggling inside a slightly-too-wonky 8/10 game engine. None of its flaws are enough to dull the many pleasures of its impressively varied world, and the more time you sink into its meandering delights the more surprising the experience becomes. Rare are the games that have you muttering "Well, I didn't know that could happen!" after more than 30 hours, and the fact I could have written another 2000 words describing weird and wonderful moments you're best discovering for yourself is all the recommendation you should need.Eurogamer

Another interesting thing (although its a system wars material) :P

It's a sort of sequel-remake to the 1990 wandering role-player that helped spawn the Heroes of Might & Magic series, and it's pure happenstance that it's landed at the same time as Lionhead's headline-grabber. Provided you're not dogmatically devoted to the lure of blockbustery third-person adventuring though, you'll find King's Bounty offers a richer and more diverse experience than the land of Albion (Land in Fable 1/2) ever could.Eurogamer

well, so far as i've played ( and i've stopped ), all the maps are small and flat with only occasional obstacles thrown in. in the Tactics Ogre series, for instance, all maps are much bigger and more complicated. terrains and height are all important factors to consider to effectively command your units -- for example, you'd want to move your archer quickly to a hilltop, since height grants a damage bonus to missile attacks, while your melee units bog the enemies down in the swamp below and immobilize them. in one of the missions in Knights of Lodis, my troops started at the bottom of a cliff, and i had to force my way up through a small pass to assault a fortified castle. it was really impressive -- and it was on gba. so to me King's Bounty really could, and should, have done much better.

it' funny .. i think have played one of the tactics ogre game ( or a similiar game on gba only where the rain used to fill the battlefield with water and slowed the troops etc?? ) and its spiritual successor the FF Tactics and was pretty dissatisfied them. I felt that all you need to do to win the battles was follow simple set of strategies over and over again.

edit : in fact, because of my experience with those games, I wrote in my sig - role playing with REAL strategy

I like both styles...in fact one of my favorite games period is Shining Force for the sega genesis. dnuggs40

well, gaming is mostly about personal preference, no game is for everyone, even fanboys of such game as Crysis think otherwise. and that's why we have demo, though certain corperates are attempting to do away with it.

this game is certainly not for everyone, and more accurately it's appealing to a selected group of gamer. 

and all this time, with every opportiunity discussing this game here, I want to stress the difference between this game and HoMM...this game plays like a true CRPG, and only the battle takes place in a grid chess board in turn-base fashion. 

seriously I never really recommend this game to anyone since I know it wouldn't appeal to just anyone; people should try out the demo first. I can only say that, it's still my game of 2008 thus far (may change after I have time to get and go through NWN2's latest expansion).

t. I can only say that, it's still my game of 2008 thus far (may change after I have time to get and go through NWN2's latest expansion).teardropmina

Yeah it is. Grab a sega emulator and grab the rom for it...it you can stomach the graphics lol.dnuggs40

to be fair, King's Bounty has many strengths as well. while the action is disappointing ( to me ), the role-playing is surprisingly solid compared to other titles within the genre. the graphics is superb, imo, with rich colours and an appropriate fairy tale style. oh yea, the soundtrack is quite good as well.

No idea...only played the first two both of which were on the sega genesis...back when I was like 11 or twelve years old. I have actually played the game a couple times in the last few years again and enjoyed them a lot...I think nastalgia might have something to do with it though hehe.dnuggs40

i'm curious about something, naval. you said the game requires real strategies to be good at...but i have a feeling that it's only becoz the game is difficult in an unfair way. i mean, the limitations in the map design definitely takes a chunk away from the strategic depth, since your units have not much place to move about to begin with, right? so maybe you can tell me your side of the story. :)

i'm curious about something, naval. you said the game requires real strategies to be good at...but i have a feeling that it's only becoz the game is difficult in an unfair way. i mean, the limitations in the map design definitely takes a chunk away from the strategic depth, since your units have not much place to move about to begin with, right? so maybe you can tell me your side of the story. :)

Jinroh_basic

 i mean, the limitations in the map design definitely takes a chunk away from the strategic depth, since your units have not much place to move about to begin with, right? so maybe you can tell me your side of the story. :)

Jinroh_basic

Once a treasure appears, everything changes.

The spells (like summon a Pheonix or creating a ghost copy of a unit), the area damage of some attacks, your skills (like arranging the troops!), the abilities of the units (for example, the thieves that can teleport near treasures) and some of the Rage abilities (especially the wall and the cloud of poison) add a ton of depth.

It's pretty basic in the beggining, but still better than HOMM5. Once you reach the Islands and have a bunch of skills, awesome spells and the units start being more bizzare, the battles are a lot more interesting.

Also, not all battle maps are similar.

[QUOTE="Jinroh_basic"]

i'm curious about something, naval. you said the game requires real strategies to be good at...but i have a feeling that it's only becoz the game is difficult in an unfair way. i mean, the limitations in the map design definitely takes a chunk away from the strategic depth, since your units have not much place to move about to begin with, right? so maybe you can tell me your side of the story. :)

naval

well, I really don't know where do all these *unfair* or unbalance talks come from? 

the strategy is not about map size, it's about the moving around the map and the match up between or among units. which schools of magic to be used and which kind of units to be used to match up with enemies. the beauty of this game's combat strategy is that you cannot have an all powerful army set that can take care of everything you encounter in the game, that is, use one routine of way to do things all the time, the tactics orge, FF:T style or the good old fast building and rushing to enemy base in RTS.