More than one reviewer has suggested that this game will be the sleeper hit of 2012. While I believe it may have gotten more than it’s share of exposure to make it a standard sleeper, I believe it will far exceed most individuals expectations. So I guess I disagree and I firmly agree.
Amalur is an interesting idea that is both extremely cool and quite ambitious in what it is trying to do. Curt Schilling (of Red Sox fame for you LGOD locals) has assembled an all star cast including: Ken Rolston (Lead designer for Elder Scrolls III and IV), R.A. Salvatore (Best Selling fantasy writer and the mind behind Drizzt Do’Urden) and Todd McFarlane (comic writer and creator of Spawn). There are certainly more creative minds behind this endeavor but these folks represent the cream of the cream of the crop involved in the development of Amalur.
What makes Kingdoms of Amalur so ambitious is that it is not just the demo and subsequent game coming in February, but is a new IP that will also encompass an MMO and I would also expect to see figures from McFarlane Toys based on the series success. Recent interviews have also suggested that there may be plans for table top gaming and beyond. I would say that if this IP is successful, I wouldn’t be shocked to see a pen and paper RPG or other spinoffs. Curt is a shrewd businessman and hardcore gamer. On off days when he wasn’t pitching he was known to play World of Warcraft for 14 hour sittings and has been hard core raiding since Ultima Online and EverQuest.
I was a little unsure of what to expect from Reckoning despite following it for months as I was wondering exactly what the combat and gameplay would deliver with a lead designer of two Elder Scrolls games and with a release so soon after Skyrim. For better or worse, this is not an Elder Scrolls game. It really is an action RPG with what I hope will grow to be a robust fighting system that I found myself really enjoying once I started to level up and unlock new moves.
The character creation offers the familiar modification to gender and facial features, build and hair but also allows you to choose a fate to follow which directly influences how you might chose to play your character, each offering different bonuses. You can choose from one of three classes; fighter, mage or rogue but can later specialize or mix the classes to better suit your style of play. I am unsure just how deep this complexity will be due to the demo limitations but I did not leave the demo disappointed.
The few quests I was able to complete were nothing that breaks the mold but I appreciated having multiple quest objectives available on my map, while highlighting the main one I was pursuing in yellow, leaving others in white. If I happened to get close to one I wasn’t directly working on I could stop by and make progress which was a nice touch.
I played the demo on XBox and would say that no matter what your platform of choice, this is a game controller experience. Item use was easy enough to map to hot buttons either on a wheel with about 10 slots or with pre-programmed slots on the d-pad. Spells were trigger activated with a spell mapped to each face button while holding the trigger. It appeared to be auto targeting as I seldom missed with my spells but the demo is short and timer based so my playtime is very limited.
If I have to find fault it would be with the controls and camera. The controls are extremely, if not overly, responsive which took a little getting used to and the fixed distance camera may have contributed to some of my consternation. It did not appear that the camera could be permanently zoomed in or out which felt to be somewhat limiting at times and did not always suit my preferred view. This is of course probably very purposeful and by design and greater time spent in the world with more varied encounters will likely justify the decisions.
Overall I enjoyed the demo quite a bit and found myself wanting more when the timer ran out. If you have any interest in this game I absolutely recommend trying the demo as it not only may help your decision it also offers you some in game rewards in the full retail release for completing certain milestones and also awards some armor and other items for Mass Effect 3. The demo takes a little over an hour to get through and does a great job of giving you just enough to want more. Reckoning launches on February 7, 2012 in North America.
