Do you want to spend more time on lead screens than playing a game? Play Pathfinder! Do you want to spend more time trying to figure out what all the gobbledygook on the camping screen is than actually exploring? Play Pathfinder! Do you want to wander around a world map aimlessly while trying to find a decently scaled place to actually win an encounter and solve a quest? Play Pathfinder. Do you want a resource management game and not an RPG? Play Pathfinder. Do you want timed quests in a game that requires you to rest almost as much as you stare at load screens? Play Pathfinder
The combat is boring. Pause, hit, pause, cast, pause, his, pause, hit, pause, hit. Die.
The AI sucks, so if you wish to have any control you will have to turn it off and then pause constantly.
While I hate games that completely scale to the level of the character this is ridiculous!
And seriously... those load screens. Half of my time is staring at them. UGH!
It seems like it's in beta still. Save your money and wait a while. This game is pretty bad right now.
Pathfinder: Kingmaker is about as enjoyable as a session with a rules lawyer. That is to say, if you ever wonder who the rules lawyer in your group is, and you enjoy this game, likely YOU are, in fact, the rules lawyers, putting adherence to what is supposed to be a guideline over a fun, rewarding session. Chances are, though, you've never recognized the vehement spite that underlies each exchange your table has with you, so this review won't deter you in the slightest.
For those who want to spend more time playing than loading, and more time experiencing than reloading due to min-max enemy builds and whacked out RNG, this game can go to the bottom of your wishlist until a community such as The Circle of 8 does for this game what was done to Temple of Elemental Evil--fix an elephant's phlegmy load worth of bugs and undelivered potential.
I\ve read a few reviews before I bought the game and turned out they were a bit wrong. If you loved Baldur's Gate I or BGII you will love this game also. It is really scratching that feeling of venturing the wilds like BGI, while also having similar quirks of Dungeon & Dragons system.
I am sure that many D&D fans are used to the fact that the best part of fights in this kind of games are cheesing them (using specific mechanics to "break them" in a way) and this game has a lot of that :D.
The Pathfinder rules which are translated quite faithfully from the rulebook are sometimes a bit of a burden like for example there is soo many types of weapons that it's very hard to find a meaningful upgrade for the one you need (that is a problem when you have a specific talent). The combat system could be seen as complicated by newcomers, but I remember Baldur's Gate to be Stupidly "brutal" in the beginning as well. Once you adjust to the system and to the fact that this is not a Hack&Slash type of game you will start to enjoy it tremendously.
Story-wise I really appreciate what Owlcat studio has done, a story is simple to follow yet rich in details and unexpected turns. It is a mix of Game of Thrones + BGI venturing the old ruins + a bit of typical D&D old-fashioned adventure. Also worth noting the fact that the game is very looong and if you take your sweet time enjoying it or trying to pursue every interesting choice or build it is absolutely MASSIVE (there is a lot of RPG and kingdom related choices for Good and Evil characters).
Please mind the fact that the game was made by the smaller publisher and mostly kickstarted so with the game of this scale it was bound to have some rough start (bugs) but as of today I didn't encounter any game breaking bugs and game is getting a steady amount of fixes from the developer.
Great game with interesting mechanics of kingdom ruling. Rich role playing with lots of choices how to solve quests. Awesome story and lots of nice NPCs. After many days of playing it is a great pity that game ends. Thanks developers for great world!
I have always appreciated the in-depth character creation of the Pathfinder Roleplaying Game system, and this video game really, in my opinion, captures the complexity and diversity of that system without seeming too overwhelming.
I also love the ruling system twist on the standard ISO RPG. Great way to make something new from something (the genre) old.
