Well made and well though tactical game. I do not fully agree with the idea that it's a "simplified Xcom": there is less content than what you can find in an AAA game, but everything is here for a reason. It creates a more focus experience globally. Balance is the main weakness, but nothing too bad. OST is a masterpiece !
I finally managed to finish Kingmaker, after ~70h of gameplay (I ended up using cheats around the last chapter). The first 30h or so were very promising: the game is well written, the pace is good and the difficulty manageable - especially is you tweak the very complete difficulty settings, and remove the most absurd rules, like not being able to remove permanent effect by resting. I have two main issues with the experience, which ended up being a cumulation of frustration on the second part. The first one is that is used to the letter the original tabletop rules, which only work because there is a gamemaster adapting its campagin to the player. In Pathfinder you can start a fight, fail a check, get all your band controlled / root / wathever; even if you prepared first. Only solution, reload and hope for a better dice role. Basically, having the good preparation, skill setup, level and strategy do not garantee victory. And it's not a tactical game either: a fail dice roll does not mean you'll need to rethink your strategy or adapt, just that now you have to hope to stay alive long enough. A game like Darkess Dungeon creates choices with its randomness, Pathfinder creates frustration. The second biggest issue I found is that preparation for a fight is almost impossible without dying and reloading. The first time you encounter a new enemy type, it might start as a group of 5 of them, coming from all direction. You notice a small band of bandits and attack them just to see 10 new enemies spawning from nowhere and attacking your ranged character no longer protected. The first time you encounter a Troll, if you have no acid spell or bombs, you cannot leave the fight. Basically, the original tabletop rules are not good and this game suffers from it. Tabletop RPG are designed with a gamemaster, they fall without it. I had some other issues with the game (balancing, loading time, etc...); but keep in mind that I really enjoyed the first 30h of gameplay.
