King’s Bounty Warriors of the North – Is A fun way to do war

There are some games that I look forwarding to reviewing more than others, that’s natural right? Give me the new Crysis, or say new piece of Skyrim content and I’m all over it. But I had never really gotten ‘into’ grid turn based RTS games. I loved normal RTS games (I was practically born and raised on Command and Conquer – and before you ask, yes the Tiberium fields were indeed where I spent most of my days). But I’d never really found myself enjoying grid combat – there was only one exception that I can think off of hand, and that would be Mystaria Realms of Lore on the ill fated Sega Saturn. Despite all this, I dutifully installed the game and what do you know – I actually found myself quite enjoying my time with King’s Bounty Warriors of the North.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nDN-mDosaNY

Graphics in King’s Bounty Warriors of the North are pretty and functional

but with a few issues. Characters don’t seem to cast shadows for one. The camera being occasionally awkward is another. Tight spaces can be a pain in the butt (and so dungeons say hello) but aside from that, outside in particular, look lovely. Trees and bushes are detailed with leaves, stone buildings have more than sufficient detail – more to the point, the game has a certain character to it. It probably won’t win any graphical awards, but you know what, I really liked the style and aesthetic choices of the game.

Sound – that’s a bit of a different matter. The sound in the game is probably it’s weakest department. Warriors of the North features little in the way of voice acting, and so quests and story has to be read- while I suspect this won’t be an issue for the games target audience, for others it might be off-putting. I think it would have added to the charm of the game. However, low budget can lead to poor voice acting – and there’s not much more than can trash immersion faster than an actor who struggles to even sound like he is concerned about the 1500 troops that are marching towards his tome town and all he has to defend it with are harsh words. The music however is quite reasonable – like the graphics it probably will not be nominated for based game sound track, but it does it’s job and more to the point fits in perfectly with the subject matter.

Combat and gameplay in King’s Bounty Warriors of the North

is clearly the most important thing the game relies on – and does so well. It controls simply – you might to the spot you wish your hero to go to, and he does so. You can ‘dig’ in the ground for lost treasure (should you wish too) and you are free to explore dungeons and forests and the like as your leisure. Combat works as I mentioned earlier on a turn based grid system. If you’re not familiar with the concept think of it as like a game of chess. Your soldiers (pieces if you will) can move a certain number of spaces depending on the piece. Each is also capable of different actions, such as a high damage cleave which hits multiple enemies or a long range shot that hits enemies across the field of battle.

Like most commanders, in Warriors of the North your would be King only gets involved occasionally through certain abilities. You may also use runes on your soldiers to increase their damage or say defense. There are also spells available to heal your units or others to damage – for example poison.

Don’t forget to check out the video for more!