
King Arthur: Knight's Tale - Review @ RPG Codex
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RPG Codex Review: King Arthur: Knight's Tale
Back to the Once and Future
The year 2020 saw the success of yet another Kickstarter campaign. This time the people out for free money were the Hungarians of NeocoreGames, known for their cool King Arthur strategy games and a bunch of Diablo clones no one cares about, such as the Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing. The Kickstarter was launched to fund the development of a tactical turn-based RPG in the King Arthur series, titled Knight’s Tale.
As you may have inferred from the previous paragraph, Knight’s Tale immediately drew my attention. King Arthur: The Roleplaying Wargame might be one of my favourite strategy games of all time, and I never quite understood why they dropped the series to develop action RPGs, so merely looking at the various screenshots immediately made me feel at home.
Yet the developers never produced a game of turn-based tactics before, so naturally many people may be wondering whether Knight’s Tale is any good, especially given how easy this is to screw up. Now, two years after release and with a number of major patches applied, it is time to settle these doubts.
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Kneel Before your King
In the end, Knight’s Tale gives us a game that is first and foremost about combat. It’s obvious to me that the primary objective behind its development was to make sure that everything about the combat worked right, with no exceptions or handwaves, and that everything else was ten priority levels under that. Neocore knew precisely what they set out to accomplish and they did it with great success. This game simply knows what it’s about and it sticks to its guns exactly where it matters. Playing something with a focus and vision this clear and well-realised is always a true joy. As far as the genre of ‘Turn-Based RPG Encounters: The Game’ is concerned, Knight’s Tale is definitely one of its highlights. Its secondary or tertiary features may be lacking in some aspects, but that really doesn’t matter when the core gameplay is so well done. The atmosphere and style are also the icing on top that elevate it above many other entries in this genre, which tend to offer just the combat and nothing else really worth noting.
It took me a whopping 100 hours to finish, and frankly speaking, I was somewhat happy when it was over. Primarily because at some point I realised it was taking way too much of my free time, but also because by the end you’re mostly progressing on autopilot with your overpowered heroes, and the fatigue that eventually settles in just makes you look forward to the finish line. That’s why I strongly recommend playing on the hardest difficulty, and maybe even trying the roguelite mode if you’re feeling adventurous. But make no mistake – this is not a game that is best ‘dropped midway’. By quitting early, you’ll be depriving yourself of a significant part of the experience. Technically, there’s also post-endgame content that I think is supposed to be super-challenging, but I never even tried it. I couldn’t really be bothered.
Still, I had a great time with Knight’s Tale. Neocore has already announced a new standalone campaign for it too, which is Roman-themed and about the ‘lost’ IX Legion crawling out of Tartarus to end up in Avalon. It’s unbelievable, but for once I actually have something to look forward to among upcoming RPGs.
Thanks Couchpotato!
Information about
King Arthur: Knight's TaleSP/MP: Single-player
Setting: Fantasy
Genre: Tactical RPG
Platform: PC
Release: Released