King's Bounty: The Legend Review
King's Bounty: The Legend is an updated version of the game King's Bounty. It isn't exactly a direct sequel to the early 90s game, but it isn't a complete remake either. If you've ever played any of the Heroes of Might and Magic, this is a game in the same vein. You will be taking control of a hero and will be venturing to different parts of the land building an army, completing missions, and discovering hidden treasure.
The graphics for this PC game look good, they are right at the considered standard for PC graphics. I personally had to tone the graphics down, but that's because my computer isn't the best. The different unit designs are a complete draw from the other games. You are going to have your base unit look, and for the most part the tougher versions are going to be colored differently and might have slightly different features.
The music is that light renaissance fair that you'd expect in this time of game, and the sounds that come from the different attacks and areas seems to fit. At some points they sound almost recycled, like you've heard them many times before, but I think its because they work so well that they probably have been slightly over used over the years.
The controls are something that can hinder the game at times. There will be times because you're in a 3D world, where you are going to want to change the camera angle, and sometimes it doesn't move enough or it greatly over moves and pulls a 360 on you. Also sometimes you click on a spot that you want your hero to go to and the pathfinding isn't what it is suppose to be.
So it really comes down to gameplay for this title. You are a hero that through leveling up can increase their army size, grow stronger with skills, gain more powerful items, and adventure out on quests. The problem lies in the fact that the real way to level up is to take on quests like a mad man, where the original game was pretty simplistic in its quest(s), this game you feel like you have to take on quests when you find them, and then when you look back on them in your log you maybe at a complete loss. The log really doesn't give you all the info you need to figure out where you need to go sometimes and as a result you're going to get frustrated trying to complete a quest, and finding out that you mis-read it. The other thing is that after every battle, no matter my opponent I felt as if I had to completely reload my army. This would be fine if the places where you got units had infinite units, but as you try to progress in the game, and you don't have the gold for the better units, you're going to get frustrated as you're going to have to look in several locations to find, for example, swordsmen. I do like the treasure hunting aspect, which is if you are slowly moving through a location there might be a beam of light that starts shining, dig there and reveal a treasure. I also really like the fact that they have included treasure chest on the battlefield that you can pick up for extra goodies. The problem is that this game tries too hard to get quest to you, there are some requirements for somethings that seem ridiculous, there are going to be times where you're going to be in an area where all of a sudden anything stronger than very weak is going to devastate your army, and finally frustration is going to lead the way through parts of this game.
I think when I first picked up this game I automatically thought it was going to be this masterpiece, and that it could do no wrong, but I only set myself up for failure on that one. What this game is is a game that should be viewed without comparison to the rest of the games, by itself it has some merits, and some places that they need to work on. Sadly though I've played the original game, and I expect to have some of that experience and something better. King's Bounty, I'm afraid to say gets a 7.6 out of 10.