Real-Time Strategy games! I have always loved these game types. From LAN parties on Warcraft II, to swearing at all the people who can build rush-armies faster than me on Dawn of War, RTS games have always been my fallback when I have nothing else to play. My own personal love is building impenetrable base defences, and laughing maniacally as enemy troops get mown down at my door.

King Athur during the snow torn mountains

I was, therefore, slightly disappointed upon loading up King Arthur: The Roleplaying Wargame, and discovering that this is the other kind of RTS, where there is no building to be done, and your forces are determined prior to battle, rather than created on the fly. But never mind, on with the game!

Immediately King Arthur gives an exciting intro, where you feel thrown straight into an authentic-feeling, mystical, medieval time. The cinematic is exciting, the visuals, whilst not stunning, are certainly pleasing, and the narrative is dramatic. But can the game live up to its own promises? Yes, and no.

At first glance, listening to the tutorials and viewing the campaign map, King Arthur seems to be a truly in-depth game, going to levels and depths not yet reached at least by any main-stream RTS, involving army management, careful recruitment, gold and food stock management, finance and tax planning, and thoughtful placement of fiefdom leadership. Unfortunately, this is not quite the case. Army management and recruitment consists of recruiting pretty much as many units as you can afford, and making sure your army is full to the brim at all times. Not much thought required there. As soon as you control enough to be able to tax fiefdoms, the money comes rolling in, making managing your gold pretty redundant. The game is split up into four seasons, each turn constituting a season. Taxation happens once a year, so if you find yourself low on gold, just skip a few turns, and Hey-Presto, problem solved! With regards to food, I can honestly say I have not really paid much attention to it at all, and have not yet encountered any issues with running low.

So a slightly disappointing start, as this game does not seem to deliver what it implies.

The strategy aspect of the game is played on a campaign map; a large map of Britain with oversized camps and people representing cities and armies. Armies can be moved around in any season except winter (where the weather is too harsh, and they have to camp where they are). Each army can move a certain distance within one season, and once all armies have been moved as far as they can (or at least as far as you want to move them), you have to End Turn, and enter a new season to continue. When you send your army up to an un-allied army, the fight begins.

Ah it's warmer!

Again, I found myself somewhat disappointed by this aspect of the game. The tutorial goes into depth about morale, army health, and Victory Locations, however I can honestly say that every battle I have won so far has been by dint of selecting every unit I have, and throwing them all at the enemy army. This makes for somewhat tedious battles, as you sit and wait for either your morale/health to drop to zero, or theirs. The only blessing there is the ability to speed the game by up to 4x (a well-needed option, since the normal speed of the game is terribly slow).

This is improved slightly, at least, by Knight units having their own special abilities that can be used in combat, though none of these are particularly interesting.

What does make this game more interesting, and more in-depth than most of its genre colleagues, is your ability to choose your path, pick sides in certain battles, and progress your own way. The game works with an alignment system, whereby your decisions decide if you are a tyrant, or a righteous king; a Christian, or a follower of the Old Religion. You are often faced with decisions, and your choice of action will not only affect your progression, but also give different rewards, and affect your alignment. For example, on of the first instances of this is between two brothers. One is the rightful leader of a settlement, and the other is a bloodthirsty brute intent on taking it for himself. The choice is entirely yours which brother you choose to help.

I found this to be very refreshing and added extra required thought to the game, on a level that is not common in RTS games.

Linked to this is what I feel to be the true saving grace of the game. The one thing that really sets it apart from the par: Quests.

We’ve all seen, if not played them. Those text-adventure books; “You are standing in X, there is Y and Z. If you wish to do A, turn to page B …etc”. That is basically what these are. You need to position your army at the start point of the quest, and choose a knight to undertake the mission. Once done, you commence in a text-adventure, where you are faced with various situations and issues, and your choices of action can determine not only your success, but the specific outcome afterwards (making allies, making enemies, starting wars, etc…), the rewards you will receive, further actions you need to take, changes to your alignment, and even gaining or losing units. I can truly say that, to me, this is by far the best part of the game.

Dark and mysterious chapel

Whilst most of these quests are not necessary, completing them will give undoubted advantages, like allies, control over new areas, new knights, and new items. There are some quests, however, that do seem to be necessary for plot continuation, for instance the search for the Lady in the Lake, who will re-empower Excalibur, the mythical sword that lost all its power when taken from the stone by Arthur. Completion of this quest will reward you with another dramatic cut-scene with more well-done narrative.

Overall, I find this game to promise a lot more than it delivers, and in terms of combat, could do with a lot more thought put into making the fights more interesting. However, this is a good start at making something more than a typical RTS. The combination of different types of play – the campaign map, the battlefield, the text-adventures – makes this a nicely varied game. Despite its faults and lackings, I find myself drawn to this game, and truly hope that a sequel is in the line, with plans to bulk up what is a good starting point. If this could be made to do what it initially suggests it can, this would be a truly stunning game.