King's Bounty II Reviews
King's Bounty 2 is a fairly strong tactical RPG that is dragged down by a mediocre plot and a lot of unnecessary jogging.
I didn’t hate King’s Bounty II; I loved the combat system. The hex design and the battlefields are all highlights. However, the things that can be done in-between those fights is where the majority of the player’s time will be spent. And it as much as I usually enjoy exploring RPG’s, there was no joy in navigating the overworld in King’s Bounty II due to the ridiculously slow movement speed. Those that are fans of the franchise will no doubt find much to love here with the fun combat and varied units and even decent main story.
1C Entertainment's attempt to reinvigorate the long-dormant series proves two things: its turn-based tactical combat is timeless, and making a compelling open-world experience is harder than it looks.
King’s Bounty II has all the ingredients of a great strategy game but is held back by a counterintuitive UI and generic story elements. While the overworld offers a beautiful open environment to explore, often there’s not enough there to hold your attention as a player, and you’ll find yourself wandering around aimlessly. Added to this is that your character’s travel is particularly slow, the game has a sleepy pace at times that holds the overall experience back. While its strategy battles feature some interesting ideal mechanics that might appeal to die-hard fans of the franchise, if you’re looking for a broad roleplaying strategy experience, King’s Bounty II might not be the best fit for you.
Drastic changes to gameplay can be good, as proven by God of War. Unfortunately, King’s Bounty 2 turns out merely an underwhelming experiment. In the past, we got a series of good tactical RPGs focused on combat, seasoned with some character building. Right now, we get a subpar imitation of The Witcher 3, where battles are just a minor addition.
Review in Polish | Read full review
If you fancy yourself some King's Bounty, go and replay The Legend along with its expansions. Sadly, that's the best thing you can do at the moment to satisfy that particular hunger.
Review in Turkish | Read full review
With a bit more time and budget, King’s Bounty II could have been one of the pinnacles of the fantasy medieval genre. The turn-based combat is deep, rewarding and challenging (though sometimes unfairly balanced), while the world of Nostria is artistically interesting and well-realised. If only the developers had been afforded the time and money to actually get the title running properly to overcome all the technical problems. The story is lacklustre with shamefully bad dialogue and voice acting, with everything other than the core combat system feeling under-developed and lacking the quality of life elements that have become the norm. King’s Bounty II ends up a decent prize, but a rather hollow haul of treasure that had so much more potential – a bounty more fit for a nobleman than a king.
King's Bounty II is the sequel to a tactical RPG that came out over thirty years ago, but it does a fine job at keeping a great balance between the original game's formula and the standards that define today's tactical RPGs. This work is a lot more successful in its gameplay than in its execution, however, as the visual performance often falls behind expectations due to technical issues that don't allow it to be the fantastic experience that it could aspire to.
Review in Portuguese | Read full review
King's Bounty II is fun, but some frustrating details like the character's slow movement when exploring the world and poorly finished graphics give the impression of lack of polish and spoil the overall experience. Fortunately, the tactical combat is very good, offering nuances to explore. Studying the skills of each unit type, planning the perfect army, and thinking up strategies to make the best use of the terrain make combat like a fun and challenging board game. But unfortunately, in general, the game leaves a little to be desired.
Review in Portuguese | Read full review
King's Bounty 2 is a unique game, but it's uniquely mediocre.
Although it tries to innovate, King's Bounty II makes several mistakes. Only the most hardcore fans of the genre will be able to take advantage of its excellent combat.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
A disappointing game riddled with poor level design, painful movement speeds, a punishing learning curve for new players, and a bad UX.
If you're willing to invest your time learning the battle system and strategies to succeed in King’s Bounty II then there'll be some enjoyment to be found here. However, the game is very unforgiving with your time, forcing you to spend hours completing dull side missions and looting various places to level up your units, only for them to be slain in the next main mission battle you fight. Also constantly having to reload saves just to progress through the story feels very outdated.
Manage to get through King’s Bounty II‘s battles, though, and you’ll be rewarded with engaging exploration and a decent narrative that leaves you wanting to find out more about the fate of the world you’re in. Despite not looking great, it truly is a world that begs to be explored. Unfortunately, many of the battles are simply too unforgiving and frustrating to encourage you to keep going. Reloading an old save again and again isn’t fun and ultimately, it’s hard to recommend King’s Bounty II – unless you genuinely do enjoy getting defeated again and again.
King's Bounty 2 is a massive role-playing experience, but a hollow-feeling open-world works against its combat and gorgeous art style.
mechanics that could go back even further it feels like a relic. There is nothing egregiously wrong with it, and if the battle system looks interesting to you, it could be worth getting on sale. Launching at $49.99 US though I can’t recommend it in good conscience to anyone.
The more I played the game, the less magical it felt.
King's Bounty II has the potential to be great, but brings great frustration to what otherwise could have been a grand adventure.
A poor story, writing and performances coupled with outdated quest design make King's Bounty II a tough game to play through. Turn-based battles are enjoyable but can't make up for the game's numerous issues.
Tough game to rate overall, as there was some care and time that went into this; it just went to all the wrong places. Players looking for a strategy/tactical experience are going to be absolutely repulsed by the mix of "walking sim"/WRPG that leaves much of the core experience behind absolutely. The battles are simplistic, and the few redeeming features are buried beneath too many complaints and issues. There is simply very little strategy in this game that occurs, or is interesting to think about.