Portal Knights Reviews
Portal Knights has a few shortcomings, but the overall experience is a lot of fun. Its blend of RPG-esque leveling up with crafting and a steady learning curve keep you engaged. Those looking for a solid gateway game into the crafting sub-genre should check it out — especially if they enjoy RPGs. The music does hold things back, but every other major part of Portal Knights works well.
Portal Knights has been designed in such a way that encourages co-operative play; sharing the fun of exploring the worlds and discovering new things together is undoubtedly one of the game's largest selling points. If you would rather play the game alone, though, there is nothing stopping you from doing so and you'll still find that there is an enjoyable adventure to be had (albeit with a slightly different focus on how to go about completing tasks).Sitting somewhere between the Minecraft-type gameplay of building and exploring, and the RPG-like features of crafting, battling, and upgrading your character's skills and abilities, Portal Knights feels like it would most suit families, friends or even distant friends online, who wish to explore either of these genres of gaming together in a sometimes challenging - but usually charming - package.
Portal Knights takes inspiration from a variety of games, blending the crafting and building of games like Minecraft and merging loose RPG elements to make it a sandbox game with a goal.
The Minecraft's heritage here is inescapable. A good experiencie, and a really adictive game that allows us to improve our character through procedural environments.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
Portal Knights tried to combine the style of the famous sand-box games such as Minecraft with action-RPG games like The Elder Scrolls, and the game succeeded in many points. I spent hours playing, exploring, searching and finishing quests so I could develop my own home and character more and more. This is a game that is definitely worth experimenting with and especially on the Nintendo Switch.
Review in Arabic | Read full review
Portal Knights uses Nintendo Switch to cover some of its failiures and become a better game than the original one. A videogame that, without been perfect, it entertains the player for a lot of hours. [Víctor Rodríguez separately reviewed the PS4 (5.5) and Switch (7) versions. Their scores have been averaged]
Review in Spanish | Read full review
Ultimately, Portal Knights aims to put RPG elements and Zelda-style combat into a Minecraft-like game. Minecraft works because everything is systemic. It's huge, but everything you can find conforms to particular conditions – diamond only appears below a certain height, sugar cane is found on sand next to water, etc. – so you know where to look. When you remove these systems, you have a Portal Knights island; the resources are all over the place, at any height, and if you can't see them, you want you need another island. It removes the incentive to explore, because there is nothing to find.
Minecraft meets an action-RPG: a bunch of nice ideas not very well implemented. Very nice graphics.
Review in Italian | Read full review
If you're in the mood for a more light-hearted take on the procedurally-generated survival genre, then you may want to check out Portal Knights. Its inclusion of major RPG elements gives you new unlocks to look forward to and experiment with, and its easy yet robust crafting system always tasks you with collecting something different. Combined with specialized and upgradeable crafting stations, Portal Knights feels like it has more focus than many games in the procedural genre. These varying gameplay mechanics all meld together to produce a game that is good fun to play with friends.
Portal Knights is a Minecraft-alike with a lot of personality and a lot of promise, but in its current state, I just couldn't enjoy it. It feels bloated in places, empty in others, and just can't compare to other games in the block-placing, creation “genre”. Fun for a while, but outstays its welcome too quickly.
Portal Knights certainly takes inspiration from Minecraft, but does enough different to stand on its own. It's procedurally generated environments and visuals impress the most, which make for a nice laid-back adventure.
Portal Knights brings some interesting new wrinkles to the crafting genre that has become so popular recently. The increased focus on combat works well, particularly with the boss battles and having a clearly defined end goal is a great way of keeping you invested. Unfortunately, some of the other additions like the poorly thought out stats system and the reliance on random drops for creating crucial portals keeps the game from ever fully achieving knighthood.
Portal Knights is the perfect opportunity if you're willing to get close to the universe of Minecraft & C., or if you're looking for something a little bit more complex than mere resource gathering and building. The RPG component is pretty thin, but deep enough to offer different approaches to the game. Thumbs up.
Review in Italian | Read full review
Portal Knights is a game that will satisfy lovers of the genre, but unfortunately it still remains too classic, despite the story it offers. In addition the sounds' problems that we encountered have spoiled our immersion (the update 1.01, available at the launch, should correct this problem). On the other hand it catches up largely with its ability to play up to 4 players in the same team, and especially with its creative side which is very developed. It will allow you to spend many hours in order to build according to your imagination and your desires.
Review in French | Read full review
Portal Knights is a kid's game, and with that come the kid game trappings: Cutesy visuals, minor challenge, whimsical story, and simple design.
Poral Knights just about pulls off being a crafting game and an RPG adventure in one by keeping the important things simple. A well-implemented 4 player co-op adds another layer of enjoyment to proceedings, but combat and controller mapping problems slightly spoil an otherwise pleasant game.
Portal Knights on the Switch is a really enjoyable game outside of a few minor nitpicks. It can be a tad frustrating to have to constantly mine materials for new gear in the very early going. But much like Minecraft, a lot of the game is mining and exploring. If you take your time and enjoy every aspect of the game, you'll likely enjoy Portal Knights a lot more than if you just try to rush through each randomly generated island.
More than anything, I'd say Portal Knights felt mostly pleasant to me. A relaxing push forward, the visual asthetic along with the relatively unthreatening enemies (barring a few surprises) it seems like despite the push forward, the game is more encouraging of players willing to stop and smell the roses; and then build a huge castle on top of them.
Portal Knights feels like a natural evolution of the procedural block building and exploration genre. It packs in lots of RPG elements, exciting adventure, and addictive multiplayer that layers on top of the existing world creation mechanics popularized by Minecraft.
There is a lot for you to do in Portal Knights. Exploring the well-designed and colorful worlds while taking on groups of challenging and unique enemies is consistently fun but the shallow and repetitive quests and almost unnecessary crafting system make the game frequently tedious to play.