Kings and Heroes – Review

Name: Kings and Heroes
Developer: Industry Games
Publisher: Industry Games
Released: 16.11.2017
Platforms: PC
Reviewed on: PC
Acquired: *A copy of this game was provided from publisher for review purpose*

I used to be a very keen World of Warcraft player (to the point of missing school)., and I still go back to it now and again, with some supplementary TERA. So when we received a copy of Kings and Heroes I assumed this would be a “just 30 more minutes”-week with little time for anything else.

Graphics

I will admit I am very split in what to say about the graphics. The textures and object themselves looks good. But the world still feels empty and dead. I also feel the urge to mention that the hitboxes are way off with several of the NPCs. With several of the mobs I had to aim to the left of them to actually hit them which takes a lot of the immersion. The map too doesn’t show my position correctly, for example every time I walked across a bridge, the map showed that I was flying mid-air.

5/10

Gameplay

I’m sorry to say that this is the weakest point of Kings and Heroes. It’s just plain boring. I do see that it follows the same formula as any other MMORPG, with a “go and kill said monster(s), and come back and get a reward”. When playing WoW I usually get the feeling that it helps the entire village when I kill some beast, in Kings and Heroes on the other hand, I just do the quest because I need the XP, not because I think it will help the world. And that takes away almost all of the fun of questing. One cool feature is the fact that no quests or quest-givers are marked on your map/have an exclamation mark above it, which means you have to actually read what the quest wants you to do, and then you need to search around more for said objective.

Another problem though is the incredible amount of micro-managing. You get new items all the time, but it’s often vaguely better than what you already have, and my inventory was often filled with unnecessary stuff.

What I do want to applaud is the character creator, even though it is very standard in many aspects, like the races and classes. The fact you have to throw a couple of dice to get your stats is a really good idea, it’s still not perfect, as you can re-roll as many times as you want. Another thing I wish they changed is the fact that you roll for all stats at once instead of one per roll. I feel it could be much cooler if you rolled for strength the first turn and then dexterity, and so on. And then could choose to re-roll one or maybe two of the stats once each, if you were unhappy with the roll.

4/10

Controls

The controls work surprisingly well, yes, they are pretty standard for an MMORPG but it’s a reason why the standard is like it is. There’s a somewhat cool dodging feature, which can actually be a life-saver. And luckily, everything can be adjusted to your preferences, so if you happen to dislike that ‘G’ is the interact button, that is changeable.

6/10

Replay Value

I’m not sure what to say when it comes to the replay value. I never felt the need to play the game again with a new character since the game randomly creates dungeons. Of course if you want to play as another class the game can have some replay value, but apart from the dungeons it seems like the game will be very similar apart from how you attack enemies, and whether or not you can heal allies.

6/10

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• Graphics 5
  5/10
• Gameplay 4
  4/10
• Controls 6
  6/10
• Replay Value 6
  6/10

Verdict

I can see that this game is made by someone who really likes MMORPGs and the fantasy genre. Unfortunately it all falls short, the world feels empty and there’s no feeling of urgency to do quests. The game in its current state is un-polished, and even though that can be fixed later on, the game currently is not worth the time it takes to make a level 50 character. The D&D-inspired stats-rolling is a cool addition to an MMORPG though. As is the randomly generated dungeons. I still can’t recommend this game unless you’re an extreme MMORPG fan and has grown tired of WoW, TERA, Elder Scrolls or FFXIV.

Overall

5.25/10

5.25/10

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User Review

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Pros

• Cool D&D-inspired character creator
• Textures looks rather good

Cons

• Feels empty
• Hitboxes doesn’t match
• Too many random items