King's Bounty II - Preview In Nine Minutes

RPG Geeks previewed King's Bounty II in 9 minutes. The video is in Russian but you can auto-translate it to English. Gamewatcher has a preview writeup of the Demo they witnessed.

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Life is hard for a noble knight! Either go and kill the dragon, then go to save the princess from captivity in the tower, and she during the captivity, take and grow some kind of dirty trick! And as a reward for you, brave hero, protector of the weak and patron of the innocent … well, how lucky. Sometimes half a kingdom, sometimes a shish with butter, but today - another part from the venerable game series, which for the second time is transformed beyond recognition. What came of this, and whether such a creation will be to the taste of fans of virtual knightly novels - we will now find out!

The editorial staff of the RPG GEEKS channel attended the presentation of King's Bounty 2, which is preparing for release in March 2021, and we are in a hurry to share our impressions! Dismount from your horse, hide the sword in the sheath and do not forget to lift the visor, otherwise it will be inconvenient to watch the video!

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King's Bounty 2 will feature three hero classes, each having their own story. We got a look at the warrior, who's able to field the largest armies but can only use magic through scrolls. On the flipside, warriors only have to worry about the main currency: Gold. The other currency - Mana - is a precious resource when you pick a spellcaster as your class.

Your class choice also affects the approaches you can take to completing quests. At one point in the demo, a pack of golems blocked the warrior's way. Without access to magic, fighting them was the only option.

You bolster your armies by purchasing troops from vendors found across the world. The location you're buying them from determines the available types.

More information.

King's Bounty II Previews

WCCFTech

Is King's Bounty II too ambitious for its own good? Perhaps. The game isn't going to replace The Witcher or Dragon Age any time soon, and yet, I could see its solid strategic combat, morality system, and unique army management attracting an audience. Will that audience be large enough to justify 1C Entertainment's investment (over 135 people are working on the game)? That remains to be seen. I'm willing to give King's Bounty II a chance, but I''m not quite ready to declare it a proper heir to the throne yet.

GameWatcher

Our first good look at King's Bounty II revealed a promising turn-based strategy game that sticks to what made its predecessors so fun to play while also adopting more modern elements.

Traversing the world in third-person and jumping into cinematic cutscenes at important points during quests is a welcome addition. It has the potential to flesh out the world and story in a way that previous games didn't quite manage to, especially if the developer irons out the technical kinks present in the demo.

Originally Posted by Couchpotato
The game isn't going to replace The Witcher or Dragon Age any time soon

Excuse me, but WTF? The Witcher, DA, and KB2 are three completely different style of game!

This new Porsche is good for what it is, but it's not going to replace chemotherapy any time soon!

Don't look at me bro I just shared the links and copy pasted the conclusion.

Originally Posted by screeg
This new Porsche is good for what it is, but it's not going to replace chemotherapy any time soon!

I'd say that all of them are cars. But it makes no sense to compare a racecar and a truck.

Originally Posted by Couchpotato
Don't look at me bro I just shared the links and copy pasted the conclusion.

Don't take it personally, Couch. We are happy for all that you dig up and post on this site. Besides reviewers who are ignorant enough to write such a comment always are going to draw an outraged comment or two.

What? I wasn't offended. I was joking about being quoted.

My Russian's not what it used to be but I think he said KB 2 is to Kraft Dinner what the Witcher 3 is to suede shoes.

That seems a pretty clear analogy to me - and should clear up any confusion from the previous comments and observations.

Indeed, it's clearly obvious that King's Bounty 2 is exactly like a Penguin surfing on a chez lounge.

Well, I'd be happy to join said penguin on the lounge and rap more about how good this game might be!

Am I the only one who's underwhelmed by the footage they've shown so far? I liked the art style of KB 1 + expansions a lot more. This looks somewhat generic tbh.

"Traversing the world in third-person and jumping into cinematic cutscenes at important points during quests is a welcome addition".

No it isn't! While I wouldn't say I hate ALL cut-scenes I certainly hate them most of the time.

huh, what happend to King's Bounty? this looks like a completely different game

Originally Posted by GothicGothicness
huh, what happend to King's Bounty? this looks like a completely different game

Different developer and publisher with a different vision it seems.

Edit: To clarify different developer and new owner of 1C Publishing EU Koch Media

Originally Posted by Couchpotato
Different developer and publisher with a different vision it seems.

Edit: To clarify different developer and new owner of 1C Publishing EU Koch Media

We've seen this so often before. New company buys age old series with a built in fan base. Said company decides series needs to be modernized to attract a new audience. No new audience materializes. Old audience is pissed and trashes new entry with negative reviews. Old series dies out. Might and Magic is a great example, so is Jagged Alliance.

The visuals and third person camera killed it for me. Like GothicGothicness said, feels like I'm watching gameplay from a completely different game than the previous and not a sequel.

I'm definitely not thrilled by the graphics changes, but I'm willing to keep an open mind about everything else. King's bounty was one of my favorite franchises, but by the end their games got a little too similar. So I'm definitely open to something that shakes things up a bit, I just hope they didn't go too far.

Yeah I'm giving them the benefit for now, hoping that they don't mess with the things that made this a great franchise. So right now I'm hopefully optimistic, but prepared to smite with terrible wrath if they muck up the formula.

Originally Posted by JDR13
Am I the only one who's underwhelmed by the footage they've shown so far? I liked the art style of KB 1 + expansions a lot more. This looks somewhat generic tbh.

Yep, it looks as vanilla as a very vanilla thing. I don't mind going for a more realistic look (though I quite liked the original look), but this has no character at all.

Originally Posted by forgottenlor
We've seen this so often before. New company buys age old series with a built in fan base. Said company decides series needs to be modernized to attract a new audience. No new audience materializes. Old audience is pissed and trashes new entry with negative reviews. Old series dies out. Might and Magic is a great example, so is Jagged Alliance.

Late reply but yeah when an IP is sold and gets a new developer some change is inevitable. Though sometimes it does reboot the franchise well, other-times it fails.

It's the age old problem of pleasing an old fan-base, and appealing to new buyers.