Why Didn’t Everyone Play Kingdoms of Amalur?!
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The other tempting comparison is Skyrim, and that megalithic RPG having come out just a couple of months before can't have done sales of Amalur any favours. But it's definitely an inappropriate comparison. Yes, you can ignore the main plot, yes, you can kill absolutely anyone, anywhere, and still have the game somehow cope, and yes, it has the most stupidly designed inventory menus imaginable. But the atmosphere, the tone, the intangible feel of it all to compare it feels weirdly wrong. It's something much brighter, something much more accessible.
That's hugely helped by its being a third-person action game. Combat is true to that too, relying on some healthy button mashing and frantic dodging. Big fights with giant creatures are chunky, satisfying brawls, as you hammer away at the A button (yes, I picked 360 controls for this, and with the wayward mouse it's definitely the better option, and the one with which the game was obviously primarily designed to be played), throwing in shield blocks, dodging rolls, and your array of special abilities, spells, and old-school button combo moves.
For me, what's made this especially special, is it's the first time I've ever bothered to properly engage with a game's blocking mechanic. Like how most fun action-driving games really never need you to press the brake, most action-combat games never really need you to bother with blocking. There are ways, means, hammering of buttons that generally get around such a faff if you're as lazy as me. But here it's so damned rewarding, so absolutely satisfying every time you time it perfectly, that I'm finally converted. I'm actually slowing down for the corners, rather than bumping off the barriers at the side.
But when a game like this has such an emphasis on the combat, invariably that means the RPG side of things is watered down. Action-RPGs, the Diablo-mould creations, tend to have wispy plots, little chats to be had in hub towns, then back to the biffing. But that's absolutely not the case in Amalur. You could easily spend an entire evening nattering away with the residents of a newly discovered city, exploring the side-streets for those in trouble and needing your help, negotiating with bigwigs, exchanging loot for new equipment, handing in completed quests, discovering secret treasures in dungeons hidden behind a house's backrooms, stealing all the valuables from everyone's bedroom drawers, and gathering a new armful of tasks to complete in the surrounding area.
