King's Bounty is out - 90% review from Gamespy

[Lesifoere]

The Blizzardish... inspiration does bother me just a tad, though. It looks like someone took Warcraft 3 or WoW and did a lot of copy-pasting. I kept expecting draenei to show up.

 

[made]

More importantly, why the fuck aren't any of your Rage creatures unlocked when you're level 19?

I really don't think that's his own screenshot.

Anyway, I like the graphics. Very oldschool 2D like and with plenty of detail. But yeah, I can see how for some they aren't realistic and gritty(™) enough due to lack of blood and gore.

 

[jagged-jimmy]

The dedication of the devs can be seen in 2 main examples: jumping squirrel and running rabbit. They arent just animated but also cause effects (squirrel produces some snow effects on trees while jumping).

 

[Burning Bridges]

Anyway, I like the graphics. Very oldschool 2D like and with plenty of detail. But yeah, I can see how for some they aren't realistic and gritty(™) enough due to lack of blood and gore.

That's not what I mean. The person who did the graphics has talent no doubt. So in a way I could say I like them (but I don't). They look nice, sharp and esthetic but also extremely cheesy and reeking of repressed homosexuality, Harry Potter style. I would be ashamed if someone entered the room and saw me playing such a game ..

So what I mean is, with some inspiration of the sort I am talking about, this game could look like ToEE, which I think stands out esthetically.

 

[Thrasher]

It looks like it has a little old word style rather than mundane minimalistic modernistic like ToEE. Nothing wrong there.

The male character art is a bt too prissy though.

 

[Jaime Lannister]

Bumping cause I'm dying anywhere outside of Greenwold at level 4 on normal.

Anyone wanna give a noob some strategies? I'm loving the game, it's just hard for someone like me who never played HoMM.

 

[A user named cat]

I sucked hard at first too, don't worry you'll learn everything soon enough. Your best bet would be to try avoiding any tough looking battles in the beginning areas. Just dodge enemy units and grab the flags for more leadership points, so you can recruit more troops. Strength lies in numbers afterall. Also pick up as many runes as you can, then depending on what build you went with, make sure to choose your skills wisely near the beginning because they can be crucial. I'd also suggest doing a few of the king's main quests before adventuring off doing all the side stuff and areas.

 

[Texas Red]

Bumping cause I'm dying anywhere outside of Greenwold at level 4 on normal.

Anyone wanna give a noob some strategies? I'm loving the game, it's just hard for someone like me who never played HoMM.

Do a few quests for the king even if you have serious losses. Soon he will instruct you to go the Islands of Freedom. On these islands you will find ridiculous amount of all sorts of UNGUARDED treasures just waiting to be taken.

This game could use some fixing though. For one how hard would it to implement a caravan system ala HoMM 4? It's SO fucking annoying to travel all across the world for recruitment, especially now that most enemies are "strong". The magic system is broken beyond belief. They copied so much from HoMM, I wish they'd copied HoMM 5 excellent magic system.

 

[Lesifoere]

Having to go everywhere to restock on certain troop types is certainly annoying--currently, if I need more orc shamans, I'd have to go all the way from elf-land to bloody Isles of Freedom, and if I want more black dragons, to this obscure spot in the Land of Death, and if I want evil beholders, it's back to dwarf land in the mines. I try to finish fights with as few casualties as possible, dragging on combat for several turns just to regenerate the mana required to resurrect downed troops. Makes for pretty silly situations.

 

[Gragt]

I wonder if the game is out in Belgium now, heard the date of the 23 or 24 of October... The annoying thing for me is that I have to move close to Brussels or even past it to get the UK version, if I buy it around where I live it will be in French. Sometimes the games have different languages included but I couldn't find that info anywhere.

 

[Texas Red]

Having to go everywhere to restock on certain troop types is certainly annoying--currently, if I need more orc shamans, I'd have to go all the way from elf-land to bloody Isles of Freedom, and if I want more black dragons, to this obscure spot in the Land of Death, and if I want evil beholders, it's back to dwarf land in the mines. I try to finish fights with as few casualties as possible, dragging on combat for several turns just to regenerate the mana required to resurrect downed troops. Makes for pretty silly situations.

I think a pretty easy solution would work likes this: all purchasable creatures around the world could just be bought from castles. It's pretty awful right now since the player is penalized for not having a full party for every encounter.

I'd fix the magic system by having skills that increase the duration of a few rounds of boosting and weakening spells to permanent. Like in HoMM 5, higher levels in magic schools skills should give the player mass spells, like mass bless.

 

[Heresiarch]

I'd fix the magic system by having skills that increase the duration of a few rounds of boosting and weakening spells to permanent. Like in HoMM 5, higher levels in magic schools skills should give the player mass spells, like mass bless.

Dude, most buffs and many debuffs in this game ARE mass spells once you upgraded them to level 3.

 

[Balor]

And if you don't need the 'mass effect' (hah), you can press shift or ctrl, to reduce the casting level of the spell by one or two levels (it will save you a lot of mana).

 

[Lesifoere]

And if you don't need the 'mass effect' (hah)

That was terrible, sir.

 

[MountainWest]

...or you buy extra of the troupes you use the most and leave them in the nearest garrison. No need to travel across the world then.

 

[Solohk]

Or you use more of the locals. In a way I actually like that you can only find certain troops in one location as it encourages you to keep changing your army and strategy.

Though I wouldn't mind if you could choose at least one type of unit to be able to buy remotely. I don't know what I'm going to do once I get out of Freedom Isle and not have easy access to Orc Shaman anymore.

 

[A user named cat]

...or you buy extra of the troupes you use the most and leave them in the nearest garrison. No need to travel across the world then.

That's what I do as well, basically. I keep troops that I don't have an infinite supply of garrisoned at castles I can fly to for easy access. You also can have two extra reserve slots, so I don't see why people are complaining.

Also noticing from my second time around, many places offer different troops so their placement is random. For example: on my first play the Dragon Tooth Tavern offered black knights, now it offers demons. I've come across quite a few other places offering different troops as well. So Lesifoere, when you say you have to go back to the Land of Death just for black dragons, on my first play I had around 4 different locations where they were supplied. Even right at the entrance to the dragon labyrinth.

 

[Xi]

Muahahaha! I bought this game! Finally something new to play. The real shame is that I won't have the time to play it for probably a week. Plus, I won't be in town for a while so I guess I will just have to cherish the thought. Oooh can't wait for a rainy day!

Trying to decide on the class I will be. Hrmm

 

[Texas Red]

What creatures do you guys use and avoid using? I just got access to Dryads and my power has significantly increased. It's almost ludicrous how powerful they are.

 

[Balor]

Well, ALL female troops get ridiculously overpowered when you do a quest for a certain ring.
And for 'backtracking to resupply'... two words:
Reserve
Sacrifice

Reserve is pretty much a must-have unless you have latter - it's chaos spell that allow you to sacrifice some of your troops to replenish other troops.
In the first versions of the game THAT was extremely overpowered allright. It restored MORE then it sacrificed, and when you sacced someone under Archmage's damage shield - the ratio was even 2x better.
It's fixed now, so it's not as uber - just convenient way of buying locals and 'converting' them into troops you want, but cannot buy now.

 

[1eyedking]

This game sucks. Every second I played it made me want to install HoMM3 more and more, till I finally did 'cause I couldn't stand it anymore.

 

[A user named cat]

This game rapes every boring HoMM to date and then some.

 

[Zhuangzi]

Balor is right. You don't need to go back to restock units in obscure places - just use Sacrifice. Buy a big stack of something very cheap (Peasants etc) and then find an easy fight to use Sacrifice in. In fact, you should keep some easy fights around the place for just this purpose.

I am nearly finished my third game now (!) and I must say that Anga's Ring 'breaks' the game. It is absurdly overpowered, turning level 1 Sprites and Lake Fairies into the most powerful units in the game. :shock:

But the game is still fabulous anyway. There is a high degree of randomness concerning item placement. This forces you to adapt to the situation, but it can be really annoying. For example, there are NO Lake Fairies for sale in my current game. In my first game there were NO Cyclops, which meant I couldn't complete a particular quest.

Probably put 200 hours into this now and I'm finally getting bored with it.

 

[JarlFrank]

I just got myself that game and installed it and played it and - woah! It's rather awesome and the combat manages to beat all of the HoMM games. Quests are interesting enough and travelling back and forth has only been a minor annoyance up till now, because walking speed is pretty quick.
Great game so far, really addictive and a lot of fun.

 

[Texas Red]

The music is so great. I usually have a tv turned on but with King's Bounty I actually enjoy the music.