Review for Kingdoms of Amalur: Re-Reckoning. Game for PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, the video game was released on 08/09/2020
Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning is an Action RPG released in 2012 on PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 and PC. It should have fit into a ambitious project of 38 Studios, which consisted of an MMORPG (codenamed Copernicus) and of this game (developed mostly by Big Huge Games, purchased for this purpose by 38 Studios in 2009), both set in the same fantasy universe conceived by RA Salvatore became famous a few years earlier thanks to his numerous sagas and his most famous character Drizzt Do'Urden, charismatic dark elf of the Forgotten Realms universe, which you will have also seen in Baldur's Gate and sequel.
In addition to Salvatore, other important names were included in the project: Ken Rolston (lead designer of Oblivion), Grant Kirkhope (in Rare from 1996 to 2008) for the soundtrack and Todd McFarlane for the artwork. For the publication, 38 Studios had signed an agreement with the giant Electronic Arts.
Despite this and despite having a huge budget at its disposal - the company moved to Rhode Island to receive a funding of 75 million dollars - the game was not successful enough to keep 38 Studios afloat: in the first ninety days of marketing it placed " only ”1.200.000 copies, far from the three million that would have allowed the return of development costs. Thus, in May 2012, the firm filed for bankruptcy. It seems that Schilling (the founder) has lost something like 50 million dollars.
Everything fell into oblivion until September 2018, when it was unleashed THQ Nordic - which in previous years had acquired THQ and many of its IPs, in addition to those of the very old Free Radical Design (Timesplitters!) - declared that he had purchased the IPs of 38 Studios, included Copernicus: this makes us think that THQ Nordic's ambition goes far beyond the mere remaster for Kingdoms of Amalur: Re-Reckoning, subject of this review, out tomorrow on PlayStation 4, Xbox One and PC. On the other hand, a 'brand new expansion (Fatesworn) for next year.
Kingdoms of Amalur: Re-Reckoning was developed by Kaiko, a German team that has already remastered Legend of Kay, Red Faction: Guerrilla and the Darksiders for THQ Nordic. The features are just the usual ones of this kind of products. First, all the DLCs released in 2012 by Electronic Arts have been included: The Legend of Dead Kell, which adds an island corresponding to 15% of the original map to the game world; Teeth of Naros, which adds - among other things - a new region and a new race; a negligible weapon and armor bundle for each of the three classes.
On a technical level, frame rate (which in the PS3 and Xbox 360 versions had been set at 30 FPS) and resolution have been increased, reaching 4K + 60 FPS on Xbox One X. In general, however, we can say that the steps in forward were not epochal so that the general yield, net of the aforementioned increases and the improvement of the textures, is not too dissimilar from that of the original title played on a good PC, even if some of the worst defects have been filed (such as aliasing), while others remain (such as the pop up). Loading times are not exactly lightning-fast they are a nasty surprise, since the game loads not only in the event of a change of region or fast travel, but also when entering the various clubs of the cities.
That said, it's time to talk, albeit briefly, about the game in and of itself. Kingodms of Amalur: Re-Reckoning is a third-person Action WRPG that, in the eyes of Schilling himself, marries the battle system à la God of War(complete with sporadic Quick Time Events) to a plant that follows that of Oblivion, even if it cannot be called fully open world, in the sense that the world is divided into macro areas connected to each other by connective zones, in a way more similar to Fable than to The Elder Scrolls. Even the chosen style, more comic / cartoonish than realistic, brings him closer to the game of Lionhead Studios rather than the Bethesda saga.
What is usually allowed in terms of party customization in Kingdoms of Amalur: Re-Reckoning is condensed into the protagonist, the only playable character. He (or she) is created at the beginning of the game through an editor that is not very rich but certainly sufficient, which allows first of all to choose between one of the four breeds available: we have the humans Alman (civilized men) and Varani (nomadic men), and the elves Dokkalfar (dark) and Ljosalfar (clear), according to the ancient classification of Snorri Sturluson; this choice is reflected - even if not too incisively - on the initial statistics.
Our hero is the only one who can save the world, as he is the only one free from a predetermined destiny. This is also reflected in the character growth system, characterized by great flexibility: at each level up you get points to enhance your role-playing skills (persuasion, burglary, alchemy, etc ...) and combative ones, the latter organized in three different skills tree (strength, dexterity and magic), which follow the three available classes (warrior, thief and magician), freely interchangeable - and mind you that even when your character is a warrior he can learn and use skills related to a different skill tree.
On the content level, the offer is remarkable: taking into account the two DLCs, the main quest alone will take you away at least forty hours, which will easily triple for completists, considering the dozens of subquests (complete with post games) scattered around the world. of game. You don't reach the numbers of The Elder Scrolls and Dragon Age, but you don't go too far.
Kingdoms of Amalur: Re-Reckoning is a good remaster of an equally good RPG from last generation, which had been a bit unlucky, so to speak. We hope things are better this time, so we can see how the Amalur universe develops.
► Kingdoms of Amalur: Re-Reckoning is an Action-RPG type game developed by 38 Studios Big Huge Games Kaiko and published by THQ Nordic for PC, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, the video game was released on 08/09/2020
