Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning - The Review

  • A couple of weeks (in the Chat Room) ago I promised a review of Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning and - finally - here it is.

    Kingdoms of Amalur is an action RPG from Big Huge Games (formerly THQ), drawing on the design talents of Ken Rolston, one of the major people involved in Morrowind, with lore input from author R.A Salvatore. It was on the drawing board from 2007, and actively developed from 2009 - before being released in March 2012.

    There are plenty of reviews of the game around the Net,but since this is The Skyrim Blog this review will 'compare and contrast' with Skyrim. Essentially we are analysing whether someone who loved Skyrim would enjoy Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning.


    THE WORLD

    The game is set in as huge landmass that is largely - but not entirely - open world. You can go wherever  you like from the start, although the areas are levelled and you wouldn't survive for long until you'd gained plenty of experience. There are four main areas: the starting area, Daletarth, is beautiful woodlands and forest.  To the East are the plains of Erathell, and to the South the scorching deserts and canyons of Detyre. The fourth area is a separate landmass, reachable only by boat and only later in the game. In its entirety I would estimate that 'the world' is comparable in size to Skyrim.

    Each of these main areas is further sub-divided into smaller 'zones' separated by narrow paths or ravines. These smaller areas usually have a major town or settlement with merchants, shops, healer and smith - they are usually around the size of Riverwood, and offer various quests. The rest of the area will typically be peppered with caves, dungeons, fortresses, farms and isolated houses or cottages. Far over to the East is the city of Rathir - a huge, sprawling metropolis with separate upper, middle and lower class areas, and significantly larger than anything in Skyrim.

    CHARACTER CREATION

    You start as a nameless 'blank slate', resurrected from the dead as part of an experiment by the gnomes. In this world 'fate' is incredibly important and your unique trait of being 'fate less' plays a major role in the story. 

    There are four races to chose from: Almain (Humans), the Dokkalfar (Dark Elves), the Ljosalfar (Light Elves), and the Varani (Humans). There are three 'destinies' to pursue : Sorcery, Finesse and Might which broadly correspond to the usual archetypes of Mage, Rogue and Warrior. You can mix and match, but the 'perk trees' (called 'abilities') have limited upgrades and it seemed better to go with a dedicated character. In my case I went with a Light Elf Sorcerer - I'm currently Level 29 and most of my perk tree is filled with fully upgraded abilities.

    STORY AND FACTIONS

    There's a lengthy main quest (I'm currently part way through). Because the areas are levelled there is really no way to simply blast through the main quest - you've got to do plenty of faction and side quests to get your character to a high enough level to have any hope of surviving the monsters and enemies as you progress across the map.

    Fortunately there is plenty to do other than the main quest. There are at least four factions (I think there are one or two more that I've not met yet). The first one you meet is The House of Ballads, a magical faerie guild. The Warsworn are the generic 'Fighters Guild', the Scholia Arcana are the Mages Guild equivalent, and the Travellers are the thieves / rogues Guild. The Guild quest lines range across multiple locations, with (usually) several Guild Halls. For example, the Travellers have a camp in Darentarth offering some starter quests, but you are packed off to their camp in Erenthell after a while. It has a feel of Morrowind, for those who remember being sent off to Aldruhn or Vivec to continue the quest lines.

    As well as the Factions (each of which has 12-14 multi-part quests) there are a TON of side quests. Every village and settlement has a load to choose from, and often you simply stumble upon quests out in the wilderness. These range from simple fetch quests to elaborate mini-stories with multiple locations and characters. Plenty of variety and a large number - I've completed 104 quests, and I expect the total to be at least double that. 

    GAMEPLAY

    As with Skyrim there's a lot of fun to be had from simply exploring the world. It's absolutely beautiful - rendered in bright colours, gorgeous lighting effects and viewed from an over-the-shoulder third person viewpoint.

    Combat is fast-paced and exciting - with a large array of weapon and armour choices to customise your character. For example sorcerers can specialise in staffs, sceptres or chakrams. I went with chakrams - because they are just to so epic (in a cool Xena sort of way). There's a whole variety - ones that spit fire, those that throw out lightening and so on. You can load of a secondary weapon, switchable instantly with a single key press - allowing a combo of ranged and close up weaponry. You can also put your favourite four abilities onto the hot keys - allowing you to trigger powerful special moves and abilities in combat.

    Every successful kill adds points to the 'fate meter' - when this is filled you can trigger 'fate mode' This is a bullet-time style slo-mo mode, where you can deal heavy damage and trigger awesome - and extremely brutal - finishing moves.

    With the combination of primary and secondary weapons, the abilities favourite menu and the regular use of 'fate mode' the combat flows and comes off as being exciting and visceral.

    Of course, there's a lot more to it than combat (although you'll be fighting monster spawns regularly). Everything is fully voiced (voice acting is so-so) and all of the key characters have multiple topics to chat with you about - and its not just generic guff either, they have unique things to say. In fact, eventually you start to feel there is almost too much speech - often times I'm thinking. 'come on...get to the point!' when someone is rambling on interminably!

    There's a fully realised alchemy system, buyable player houses, crafting with weapons at blacksmith forges and the ability to upgrade weapons with gems at sage crafting altars. Each skill can be upgraded - you get one skill point per level upgrade - so things like alchemy, dispel, sneak, sagecraft  and persuasion can all be upgraded to the max.

    SUMMARY

    All in all Kingdoms of Amalur is a fast-paced, fun romp through a well-realised fantasy world. There's plenty of lore to uncover via scrolls, books and just through talking to everyone you meet. It's not as 'in depth' as Skyrim in terms of character builds - the three 'destinies' seem to be pretty similar apart from the choice of weaponry and skills. Gameplay itself doesn't alter much with different play styles, and - as such - I doubt that the game has much replayabilty.

    If you want a game that going to give through 400+ hours as you carefully play through several times with different builds, then this probably isn't going to be that game. But if you want an incredibly fast-moving, fun and exciting game that you can pick up for an hour and have a great time. then I would recommend this game.

    If I'm going to mark Kingdoms of Amalur out of ten, I'd give it a solid and worthwhile eight.

    Hope you enjoyed the review, and if you have any questions then please ask away 

Comments

16 Comments
  • Kynareth
    Kynareth   ·  June 9, 2012
    Well, when browsing the game section at our local video store, I stumbled across a used copy of this for half price.  I paced by it for some time before I picked it up, and have not regretted purchasing it.
    I am about 20 hours into it, and enjoying ...  more
  • Glenn
    Glenn   ·  May 3, 2012
    Played it myself, and being a huge fan of Celtic mythology, I saw a lot of it, and hugely enjoyed the game. I think one thing that should be mentioned is the ability to reset your skills through people called "Fateweavers", I believe. Pay a sum of gold an...  more
  • Guy Corbett
    Guy Corbett   ·  May 1, 2012
    Excellent review man I like that you do it as a comparison to Skyrim as I would of bought this game off the back of Skyrim purely because of its credentials. But after reading through your review I think Im actually going to give it a miss. I think Im too...  more
  • Paiea
    Paiea   ·  May 1, 2012
    Thanks for the review.  I have been very curious about this game.  I think I will wait till a price drop though. 
  • Garth
    Garth   ·  May 1, 2012
    Nice review Paul,
    however I have to say that, in my opinion, the story of the main quest as well as most side quests are pretty boring. I can't quite figure out why, could be too many fantasy clichés.
    Praise is also in order though, I really l...  more
  • Tygravius
    Tygravius   ·  April 30, 2012
    @RuneRed-I'd say around 80-100hrs. It depends on how much you want to do and how many guilds/factions you get involved with. Just like Paul said, you do have to level up in order to continue on with the main quest, otherwise you won't be strong enough, he...  more
  • RuneRed
    RuneRed   ·  April 30, 2012
    Nice review - I like how you compared it to Skyrim.  I rarely buy games, but I was wondering, how many hours would you think it would take for one play thru?
  • Batman
    Batman   ·  April 30, 2012
    great review Paul i was humming and harring about getting this as i've already got a full plate as far as games go but its now added to the list.
    I don't think we need a group per se  the gaming forum is fine for that.
  • Kynareth
    Kynareth   ·  April 30, 2012
    Thank you for writing this up, Paul, as this is on my radar, too.  I appreciate how you compared it to Skyrim, the common reference point for all of us.  I thought the visuals were appealing, and a nice contrast to Skyrim's beautifully rendered visuals.  ...  more
  • Drake
    Drake   ·  April 30, 2012
    dude i loved this game ive  been playing it for a while and its really great its a more cartoony game then skyrimm but still very fun and you have a lot of choices in what your doing and when you do it.