King's Bounty: The Legend

First I have to explain the title. I used year 2009 to play Baldur´s Gate I-II through and after this experience I have played mostly with consoles. I´m a old fan of HoMM III-game and picked up somewhere review about this game - KB: the legend. So last summer I tried it. My first reaction was that it was many ways beautiful and interesting game but too difficult for me. But then I started again and I slowly got "in" the game´s mechanics and structures. Sometimes game still feels too difficult but now I have underestand that in this situation I should go back and get some more "muscles". Then after few hours of gaming things will work out and you will progress. So - I recommend this game strongly - world is full of details and stuff to do and musics are beautiful. You have to learn but it is really rewarding. You are challenged, you are entertained and you want to go on. Especially slow gamers who want to enjoy - like me - here is game for you.

This game has a hard beginning where you have to plan every fight but after this though start you get a great TBS game with plenty of choice on armies. The addition of the spirits is a nice touch and gives you the choice on how to level up these spirits. The only flaw in the game is the travelling back and forth to get your armies back to strength, and in the end you'll find yourself going back to your home castle where there's the unlimited supply of good troops. But all in all a good game and in many ways superior to HOMM V.

Little history: This game is recreation of old Kings Bounty from NWC (Jon Van Caneghem) (creators of Might and Magic games and then Heroes). And this game was creted first before HoMaM. I never played original but this game is very good, and you can do lot in game. The difference between HoMaM, you are playing only one hero whole game and as there are cities, you don't own any and can't build any. However, you can hire warriors to your army in cities, or buy some items, spells etc.. and can take quests. You can choose three type of heros, Fighter, Mage and Paladin? ( I can't remeber what was third, but you allways end up as Treasure Hunter, but with Mage, Fighter or Third class abilities. ) Also you are playing with one hero whole game, that means you can level it up. In the end you can end up with prety strong hero, I ended up as level 50 - 60+. (If I remember correctly). You are wandering on map freely, but once you fight, it is turn into turnbased compat system with grid. You have, and need army and first steps can be tough on first gameplay. After each win in fight you get a experiences. Later on game, you can upgrade your special item with interesting way. You have to fight with item. Also you get a experience from this fight. As Mage you get not only damaging spells but also many different spells which can make your steps to win. Also except spells / skills you got power item which you can improve (level up) and use it in combat. As you wander, you can found many friendly and unfriendly beings (animals, dragons, humans, elves, trees ...) which can join to you or hire them for gold. Each beings has good and bad things and even some can hate others and you have to build your army carefully. You can do a Quests and some can lead into interesting bonuses to your character. Story is basic, but as this game is oriented into gameplay instead reading lot of texts or watching video sequences, it is ok. In the end, you are not playing this game because the story.

I just decided to write this small review after i felt one more fun moment in this game, this was a quest then a frogman NPC asked player character to bring the flag to his brother's 'castle'. Thinking a bit about it, i realized that this idea is not without a bit of depth, this frogs castles are actually located on swamp and all this guys doing is competing about flags. The game is just full of such details. Battle system like in HoMM is like a chess - endless tactical possibilities, makes you thinking most of time. Limited resources is a lot of fun - it forces you to try different combinations. Brilliant story, fresh and full of new original ideas. Great attention to details. Not spoiled with oversimplifications (what's the point of 'searching' something in some other games, if game draws you an arrow with direction to go?). And yeah, runs perfectly on Linux =) Then I am playing this game, i just feel like touching something done with great care and love, recommending to everyone.

I get a kick out of how they say it's similar gameplay to the HoMaM games. Heroes of Might and Magic took its gameplay from the original King's Bounty game. Anyway, this game is amazing. I can play it and play it and it never gets old. :)