King Arthur: The Role-playing Wargame II Reviews

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Written by WorstUsernameEver on February 8th, 2012

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The relentlessly pessimistic combat commentator is one of KA2'²s lesser bugs. Wander the handsome Britannia map for any length of time and you're sure to stumble upon worse. Occasional crashes and faulty quests, graphic anomalies and performance problems. Neocore are tackling the issues with impressive haste (there have been several patches already), but I'm still savegaming obsessively and making daily fact-finding visits to this slough of sorrow.

Would the technical problems together with the shrunken scope, prevent me from recommending KA2 to a curious Total Warrior? I reckon that question is best answered in the form of one of the game's own adventure dialogues:

While waiting at Gamers Gate you are approached by a ragged pedlar. He offers to sell you two uncommonly rich and atmospheric, role-playing wargames .

-You buy both games.

(+6 enjoyment, +1 frustration, -55 gold)

-You buy King Arthur 2.

(+2 enjoyment, +1 frustration, -30 gold)

-You purchase the original King Arthur together with its numerous expansions and DLCs.

(+4 enjoyment, -25 gold)

-You slay the pedlar, bundle his body into a nearby well, and walk swiftly away, clutching both games beneath your cloak.

(+6 enjoyment, +1 frustration, +5 tyrant)

-You bid farewell to the pedlar, promising to buy King Arthur 2 once Neocore's poultices have done their work.

King Arthur II is less ambitious but more refined than the glorious, sprawling reach of the original. Where that game threw everything into development and didn't seem to care what stuck, King Arthur II has opted to remove (rather than improve) the parts which didn't quite function correctly. Mechanically, it makes for a smoother experience, but it's at the expense of strategic freedom. Now, the focus is almost entirely on moving your heroes to key tactical battles and emerging victorious. Morality, magic, special items, province buildings and research all direct their results to your troops. King Arthur II is a simpler, more direct game than its predecessor, but as a result some of the expansive potential put forward by that title has been lost.

And there you have, my thoughts and opinions on King Arthur II: The Role-Playing Wargame. It's a fun game at its core; you just have to fight through some nuisances to get to it. Its story is amazing and honestly, I'd buy it for the story alone. The gameplay is pretty fun and easy to get into even for a n00b like me, however battles ramp pretty quickly and losing a battle you've been in for twenty minutes or so is a real kick to the cojones. The graphics are nice if it will even run on your computer, but if you've spent $2600 on you gaming rig like me, you should be fine. There's a lot to be had in this game and if you triumph over the technical flaws and other annoying features, you'll find a pretty enjoyable experience.

King Arthur II is a game made up of many different elements, and on the whole they work very well together. The turn-based campaign can be overly complicated, but even that fact can't detract from the games most obvious quality, satisfying combat and an epic storyline that fuses fantasy and mythology together with energy and flare. If you've got the patience to sift through menus and tutorials, then you'll be rewarded with an engaging and unique experience.

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