What happens when you combine a rogue-like with economic management and tower defense? Kingdom happens. Pixel-based leadership has never been more difficult.
Kingdom
Developer: Noio, Licorice
Price: $9.99
Platform: PC
MonsterVine was supplied with PC code for review
Kingdom dares to be different. It borrows elements from a number of other games, like the minion management of Overlord and the mystery around hidden mechanics in The Binding of Isaac. Nonetheless it combines them into what is most assuredly a unique experience. Beginning with our Queen/King on horseback wandering the forest with crown in-tow, it is not long before we settle our new town and start our adventure.
Kingdom is first and foremost a management game. Your success completely relies on your ability to make money; then make the correct decisions with what to do with said money. You pick up coins and can spend them on upgrading your town, building infrastructure, hiring recruits and building weapons and tools. When you recruit a peasant they become one of your minions, wandering the camp in all their finery, however it is not until you build a tool, and the recruit picks it up, that they gain a role. For instance creating a bow allows one of your recruits to become an archer, a hammer to be a worker and so on.
Once you have workers, you will be able to construct walls and lookouts that defend your budding kingdom from the nasty monsters who charge you at night. The monsters throw themselves at your walls in a desperate attempt to steal your stuff. The enemies don’t actually hurt anyone, they simply undo the work you have done. If they run into a worker, they’ll steal his hammer. If the recruit gets hit again, the gold coin you used to recruit him is taken and the peasant wanders back into the forest.
It is natural in the early game to simply stay in your town and reinforce your meager defenses, however you are doing yourself a disservice by not getting back out into the forest and discovering its mysteries. From totems that allow the use of stone, to shrines that buff your workers; getting out and finding these upgrades are key to you and your kingdom’s survival. Your environment is randomized with each playthrough making exploration an important mechanic.
The game ends if your crown is stolen, which is very likely due to the high difficulty. If you get attacked without any coins on your person, your crown flies off your head and you’ll need to quickly re-capture it, otherwise your kingdom is no more.
The pixel art is beautiful, with an excellent use of lighting. From the dark woods, to sunny fields, each environment is filled with life. An interesting element of Kingdom is its minimal UI. Most management games relish in their numbers, statistics and graphs. However Kingdom takes the opposite approach, everything is done visually and simply. The amount of coins displays as a pouch filling with gold and if you want to know how many workers you have at your disposal, you need to take the time to count them. While this keeps things simple and streamlined, I did ache for more information at times.
The enemies are channeling the voice’s of Terraria‘s zombies; their groans sounding almost identical, but generally the use of sound effects is quite simple and minimal. Music occasionally rears its head with a soothing tune for forest-walking, or a battle-beat when the beasts are raging at your walls. The rest of the time can feel slow and ponderous due to music being completely absent.
As much as Kingdom gets right, I found that I have a lot of concerns with almost every aspect. First of all is the lack of control. You can’t designate roles, recruits simply pick up the first tool they see, which is a bad thing when your merchant has just restocked your bows and you need workers. The AI in general is pretty daft; say you have two archers, and two lookouts,it’s very possible that when night rolls in they are both standing on one side, while the opposite side of your kingdom is being attacked. Additionally, the workers have a bad habit of standing on the outside of a wall they have just finished. If you completed the job just as the enemies arrive, he is done for.
Your horse has a limited amount of sprint, which is also very frustrating. I understand that it exists as a mechanic so you can’t simply run from enemies forever; but with the incredible amount of back and forth required to play the game, slowing down every 10 seconds for a break is maddening. You can increase the sprint distance by resting your horse, but this changes little when your kingdom takes most of the day to traverse. Additionally, the camera is set to have your character on either the left or right hand side of the screen when facing either direction, so when you turn quickly (quite a regular occurrence when trying to pick up coins) the screen sweeps wildly from side to side. I ended up with quite a headache at the end of my play session.
I understand this is a management game, but you are also a character in this world. Something is lost when all the action takes place and you are just standing there with nothing to do, watching the archers painstakingly attempt to murder monsters. At the time when tension should be at its highest, I found myself sitting back and watching, simply hoping that what I had done was enough; and that AI wasn’t doing something dumb off-screen.
The Final Word
Kingdom is clever and definitely a fresh experience. A solid management system is held back by a lack of control and stumbling AI. Growing your kingdom is a satisfying feeling, however you’ll be pulling your hair out by the time it comes crashing down.
– MonsterVine Rating: 3 out of 5 – Average
