Kingdom Come Deliverance 2 is an inherently quite intimidating game. A lot of that is built off the reputation of the original, and much like the first game, it’s as close as we can really get to a medieval Europe simulator, albeit with the kind of fairytale character arc as you go from being a peasant to holding a fairly significant and influential position alongside those of noble blood. Your path is up to you, whether you play as a wholly honest and loyal subject, or rob and steal your way through the world to amass wealth, but whatever your choice here, it’s going to be a challenge.
In my time with the game so far, I have spent two hours being killed by three bandits time and again because one of them was in plate armour. I was convinced I almost had him and his two friends, but in actual fact was barely damaging him at all with my pathetic little hunting sword. These are randomly occurring bandits who just happened to appear on the way of my quest objective – they don’t even have real names. Like I said, Kingdom Come Deliverance 2 is as intimidating as its name is odd.
The game puts you back into Henry’s shoes, picking up after the events of the first game as he and Sir Hans Capon travel to deliver a letter of peace and alliance to Trosky Castle. Naturally, things go awry quite quickly and you lose the message, your armour, your weapons, and all of the other men in Sir Hans’ retinue. Without all your fancy looking armour, you can’t get into the castle to see the Lord and if you could, you’ve lost the official letter anyway. Retreating to the village of Troskowitz, you’re separated from Hans after falling out over his classic spoilt rich brat breakdown, leaving you to get into contact with the Lord of Trosky Castle all by yourself. That’s trickier than it already sounds when he rides off into the distance with a retinue.
Wearing your beggar’s clothes, you’ll have a hard time getting much done, but I was able to find a job at a blacksmith who also gave me somewhere to sleep so I could save my game without drinking Saviour Schnapps. I quickly set about trying to find my lost dog, Mutt, and found myself tumbling through a comedy of errors. First I wandered around the area he was supposed to be and was torn to pieces by wolves in the pitch black of night, then I did some stuff that eventually led to me finding out that Mutt was, in fact, likely with those wolves and I just didn’t notice whilst they were killing me.
Ten hours of game later, I went back to this place to face off against these wolves, better armoured, weaponed, and skilled, only for the aforementioned three bandits, only able to defeat the one in plate armour after two hours of repeated deaths once I gave up and left to get a nice big mace that. I’ll soon use for my sweet revenge and then finally get my dog back.
I don’t even have a horse yet, unless you count the one I stole after I saw its owner get murdered by a bandit. Obviously I avenged his death and took his horse as a postmortem payment, but even the horse fence wanted more than a thousand gold to make the horse be summonable and not considered itself stolen – horses, as we all know, are very litigious and want to see paperwork in triplicate before. Instead I sold the horse for 300 Groschen and went back to walking everywhere for the time being.
Thankfully, KCD2 is a very, very good looking game when it isn’t night time and you can actually see. Even facial expressions are particularly detailed, though more so with Henry. There are moments in this game where you could swear that the landscape you’re looking at is real. It’s gorgeous enough that just strolling through nature is quite pleasant. Until the bandits attack, obviously.
The fact that many of these eccentricities can’t be found in other games due to fear of narrowing its target audience is part of the attraction here. This is a grown up game that won’t really sugarcoat your failures or streamline things to make it easier for you. It instead feels like an immersive sim of medieval Europe. If you’re not going to take that on board and engage with that idea, you’re going to struggle constantly, but if that’s your thing and you enjoy existing in a convincing rendition of the real world, this is probably going to be one of the best games out there for your tastes.
There’s still some minor quirks that we hope are addressed with a patch in time for launch – KCD2 went gold in early December, and we’ve been provided with a review build roughly a month before release, so there’s plenty time for a further polish update. The aspect that most affects the believability of the world is how inconsistently characters will react to you. They’ll often vacillating between being generally friendly and angry at your mere presence between interactions, or sometimes even in the same conversation.
This was literally 2 minutes after he hired me…
Kingdom Come Deliverance 2 seems like an uncompromising marvel. It’s slavishly devoted to realism and accuracy in a way that likely makes it a very niche game, as working out how to do things can be difficult and requires real attention and care. Then again, that was exactly what drew millions to the first game, and as those fans will attest, it’s also incredibly rewarding. The first time I finished a quest that involved combat without it feeling like too much trouble I physically punched the air in celebration, and when I finally reached the blacksmith, got a job, and forged myself a new sword I was grinning from ear to ear. This is a unique game that turns being a peasant in medieval times into an enjoyable experience. Ironically, perhaps.
