Gotta say right away that this game is bloody awesome! I only heard about it when I saw a video on the xbox 360 dashboard and being extremely bored I thought I would watch it, well I was hooked right away. For anyone who hasn’t heard or seen of this game then think Dragon Age 2 but a million times better. Ok Kingdom of Amalur doesn’t do anything special to set it apart from other RPG’s like Dragon Age, Skyrim or Dark Souls but everything in it is magnificent and consistently good. The story, the art design, the characters, the moves and ablities you can use and the weapons and armour, anyone who has played Borderlands know they have like a trillion different weapon combations well KoA has just as much with it’s swords, daggers, bows, staves and chakrams (magical discs for anyone who doesn’t know, I didn’t before the game came out!) and faeblades (just fancy daggers.)
So on with this review.
The Story :-
First of all the writing of the storyline and dialogue is done by R.A. Salvatore I had heard of him but never read any of his books but I assure you from now on I am gonna buy some (Look out for that in another blog shortly!) You start off dead. Kinda reminded me of Planescape Torment (if you haven’t played that then look it up, superb.) anyway you wind up in the Well of Souls where you are resurrected and so far you are the only person that it has worked on, creepy! You fight your way out of Allestar Tower and beat up some Tuatha which are one of the main types of enemies you will be facing especially in the main quests these dark elf people are corrupted by Prismere a type of crystal. I won’t give away anymore of the story because I don’t wanna spoil it but so far I’m like 30 hours in and love every minute of it. 10/10
The Graphics :-
The look and feel of KoA is immense, maybe it’s just me but I love exploring every little bit of the places I go to, so far I’ve only been in Dalentarth which is mostly forests but the colours of the trees look beautiful and you see what I presume are wisps and leaves falling, very scenic yes there are a couple of problems with framerates and texture drop-ins but I’ve not had any major problems with it yet. The looks and choices on the characters might not be as good as say skyrim but much better than dragon age 2. All in all I really enjoy the world of The Faelands. 9/10
Gameplay :-
The gameplay of KoA is flawless the battles you have with enemies again I hate refering to it but are much better than dragon age. The weapons you can choose are amazing you can have 2 weapons at any given time personally I’ve been using alot of Longsword and Chakram action but I try and use all the weapons especially since the enemies in this gam eare so diverse some are quick and nimble so obviously trying to hit them with a big hammer or greatsword is a no-no but daggers and longbows work a treat. Whereas if you switch it and fight big, heavy brutes like the Jottun (see pic below) I found a bit of evading and greatswords work really well, I guess it’s your choice thou and obviously everyone plays differently.
I’ve not even touched on all the alchemy, blacksmithing and sagecrafting you can do. All of them work seamlessly in the world of Amalur, the blacksmithing I really enjoy because if you can find the right materials you can craft yourself a great weapon or armour piece and not need to buy any off the merchants, personally I’ve found all my gear in locked or dispelled chests ;) clearly I’m just a lucky sod! So far I’m level 20 and have a armour rating of 550 with most of my weapons ranging from 60-100 damage. A really neat thing in KoA are the destinies you can unlock with the right might (warrior) finesse (thief) and sorcery (mage) skill points with these you can get different effects such as more melee damage, magic damage, elemental resistance you know the norm of what you would find in typical rpg games. And with these so let’s say you are someone who likes to be a mage well you need 14 might and 14 sorcery but the tier 3 battlemage has :-
- Gain 30% of damage recieved as mana
- +17% elemental resistance
- +10% melee attack damage
- Blink - a short range teleport which replaces dodge.
I think it’s a very good addition to the game and you can switch to any other ones at any time you choose provided you have the right amount of skill points in the right requirements.
Gameplay for me 10/10
Also I’ve not mentioned the quests or the map size yet well as I said before I think I’ve done around 30 hours and not even left the Dalentarth bit yet and have many other places to explore and people to meet. So got quite awhile to go yet….might not be as big as skyrim but jesus it’s certainly got lots of quests like it.
All in all a extremely long blog from me and I’m pretty sure no-one will read it all, if you do here’s a imaginary cookie…and no you can’t have another you only get one! ;P Thanks for reading.
