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Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning


Keywork
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Developers- 38 Studios, Big Huge Games
Publisher-EA
Release Date-February 7, 2012 (North America) February 10, 2012(Europe)
Genre-Single Player RPG
Releasing on- PS3, Xbox 360 and PC



What do you get when you put Curt Schilling, R.A Salvatore, Todd Mcfarlane and last but Jesus Christ not least, the one, the only Ken Rolston! You get Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning, a Single Player RPG that is of massive proportions. The game is absolutely massive with five unique zones and over 120 handcrafted and completely unique dungeons. Gameplay has been called a mix of God of War and Oblivion but the most obvious comparison would be Fable but what really is unique about this game is the class system and the way the story is told. You play a soldier that has died in a battle and has been resurrected via a machine called "The Well of Souls" and because you have escaped fate you have become a blank slate to change it or influence the fate of others. Since you are essentially a blank slate you can go into any of the 3 skill trees and depending on what skills you choose you will earn Destiny's which are makeshift classes that you can switch out for one or another.

In all honesty, im more than willing to buy this for Todd Mcfarlane but when i heard Ken Rolston was heading this i lost my shit. IM BATSHIT INSANE FOR MORROWIND! This is really high up there on my list and far surpasses Skyrim in terms of hype. If your curious about it hit up that second video i posted there, its a 22 minute video that they showed the press at E3.

BTW for the Rolston fans out there, click here for an Interview he did a few weeks ago for EA. Edited by Keywork
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I'm actually looking forward to this game, despite all the nay-sayers.

 

Combat fits my fancy, the aesthetics aren't too bad, and the story is perfectly fine with me so long as it isn't of comparable quality to Stephanie Meyer. On top of that, I feel that they are definitely trying hard and not half-assing it.

 

I noticed that a lot of people say that it looks like World of Warcraft. Well, that's fine and dandy to me so long as the armor that I'm wearing looks like it actually belongs to a damn set (like those cool armors that people get in those raids) instead of a visual abomination of various put-together armors.

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  • 1 month later...
  • 3 months later...

Now that the demo has been out for 4 days (an eternity in internet time), I want to know what peoples opinions are on the game.

 

I enjoyed it, but I also felt the entire time that the game was just okay, a game I'll buy one day, but not something I'll jump out to buy right away. I have to say, I love the art style and the effort put into designing the world, but the game overall feels very... safe. Nothing stands out that makes it a must have game, in my opinion.

 

I would like to see this game do well, give the developers some courage to come out with a real daring sequel, but I personally will wait for it to be on sale or drop in price.

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Yeah I'm with the rest of the camp in "It's kinda like Fable if fable wasn't made for babies". It was fun to play, had its issues mind, but other than that if it was going for £5 and my backlog was cleared (or clear enough) I'd jump right on it. The art style was a bit wow-like, and I think that was okay, though it does deaden the whole affair a bit. It was good, but not exciting.

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The art style was fine, but the environments were bland as hell. But I agree, I'd pick it up for probably <$10 on a Steam sale.

 

*Edit* - @Cyber: I got insanely bored before I even got out of the cave system. Like, the second or third conversation I was just like "I have no interest in continuing this"

Edited by TheMightyEthan
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I kinda wanted to like it because it looked interesting (the environments and weapons were cool), but nothing really grabbed me. I think the biggest problem was that combat was not as 'responsive' as it boasted. Hell, it wasn't even that interesting in any case. Regardless of enemy or weapon choice it seemed a case of repeating the same few actions over again.

 

Wasn't a fan of the UI stuff either. Upgrade screen confused me at first, until I saw I needed to move to the next screen for different areas (muscly person, magicky person, shooty/stabby man). Plus, I've already moaned about upgrade things before and this looked unfriendly, especially since it had skill descriptions that were just cut off so you needed to scroll down. I also found some of the spells I had unlocked were pretty useless/unnecessary.

 

Then there was the case of "Blah blah, fate and all that, evil ones that just like killing, OK, shut up now". I did get a sense of some complexity, with the grumpy gnome from the intro cutscene revealed as some sort of traitor (saved him from a bear and then, after some big conversational leap, he admitted to sending someone research notes, and then I had to kill him because I failed a Persuasion roll to learn more).

 

Overall, I just didn't find it too engaging even if it was nice to look at. Might interest younger people though.

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I havent tried it, but the fact that nerds were hyping it up before playing it still cracks me up. Stupid nerds.

 

doesn't that happen with pretty much every game these days? The pedigree behind this was the reason to be excited....gonna give the demo a whirl on Steam

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Apparently from the experience of an IGN editor, the game has some of the most non-static characters around.

 

Regardless of what you think of IGN, check out their work-in-progress review of Kingdoms of Amalur. Some of the questions asked by people in the comments have been answered. He's already said that the boring button masher one believes the game to be ends up not being true and that the combat does get way more challenging and better.

 

They also said the NPC's and characters are pretty damn good, and the first thing people will notice is how the NPC's and characters in this game stand out from other western rpg's. Apparently there are a shitload of sidequests as well, and the lore is apparently at least well developed as they give you a lot of chance to explore it throughout these many quests.

 

The entry area is not a good point to judge the demo. Like I mentioned in chat, I didn't judge Darksiders due to the beginning area and found one of my favorite games in 2010[?]. Admittedly it wasn't a smart decision to use this for nit-picky people such as rpg fans, but rpg demos aren't a common site nowadays and they can't just let you be in the middle of the game doing absolutely nothing. They have to do the opening area.

 

If you're curious about how the game plays later on, read this on as the editor gives hints at how the game gets much better. And it's not somebody who doesn't play rpg's being amazed by simplicity, the guy gives the impression of being an avid rpg player.

 

http://xbox360.ign.com/articles/121/1216527p1.html

 

If you're pretty much unimpressed and have no desire to play it, be my guest. I'd suggest waiting for actual reviews from people who have played more than the early hour or two. If the above article is anything to guide what the metascore of the game is, it might be in the 80's-90's level.

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Yeah, I'm not gonna write it off based just on the demo, but I am less interested than I was.

 

This brings up another topic though, about how games (especially RPGs) need to get better about having an interesting intro. The intro may not do justice to the game, but it's the part that anyone who's on the fence is going to judge it on, so you'd better work to hook them in.

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I feel like a Demo, even at 45 minutes, gives me a better understanding of what the game is, or what it tries to be, more than a review.

 

Like I said in chat, I'm not writing it off, but I now know what the game plays like, how main mechanics of the game work, and I wasn't impressed. I'll still play the game, just not at entry price.

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I don't think so, the email is titled "Thanks for playing the demo". Here is a chunk of text from it:

 

"Now that you've had a chance to experience the engaging storyline and responsive strategic combat of Reckoning, share your impressions of the demo with your friends and help us spread the word."

 

Ugh. Reminds me of some of the car salesmen I've been dealing with recently. I know where you are dude, I don't need you to remind me.

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