Kingdoms Of Amalur: Reckoning is a game developer by 38 Studios and published by both 38 Studios and EA. It hit stores in February 2012, but for some reason nobody seems to have played it.
It was met with a positive reception, but not a financially giant reception. Because of this, the entire company went under, including R.A. Salvatore, who wrote most of the games script and lore. The games site now features rules for Blackjack, Poker and Slot Machines, possibly having been bought out by a spam site since none of the three feature in the game.
The games art was designed by Todd McFarlane, the man who first drew Venom. If you look him up, you'll find that he's pretty much a big deal to any American kid who spent most of their teenage years hooked to a flag from their underwear or getting pushed into lockers.
I bought the game new, complete with an added bonus. This wasn't a season pass. Just an extra tidbit for purchasing the game new instead of second-hand or during later waves and iterations.
That extra tidbit was around two and a half hours of extra content. The game itself is massive, and you will not complete it within a week unless you rush the entire thing and skip half the optional content, which is plentiful.
It's basically set in a Lord Of The Rings style universe. I'm not gonna bullshit you, this game wears its mantle of MAGIC/SPELLS/POTIONS/MONSTERS without the slightest bit of shame. And that's great. It asks you to come on in, kick off your shoes and take a staff. Or a sword. Or daggers. During the tutorial section of the game, you are literally presented with rogue weapons/mage weapons and warrior weapons and the game flat out goes "Well, which one do you like? Do that then."
You can play as the Almain (Civilised Humans), The Dokkalfar (Dark n' Edgy Stabby McRoguey Elves.), The Ljosalfar (Elves but in blue instead of pale green) and The Varani (Nomadic Humans.) What's the difference between Almain and Varani? Slightly differing options for facial stubble, and the Varani look like potatoheads whilst the Almain look fairly normal.
The game starts with you being killed on a battlefield, being pushed along on a gurney, dropped down a hole and then waking up on a pile of corpses in a bunch of pre-animated cutscenes. There are quite a few in the game, which impresses me, given the number of character options.
Your character then discovers he is the "fateless" one and goes about to go and kill the big bad guy who runs an evil cult of winter elves called the Tuatha Deohn which dress in red. Unlike the good elves that dress in blue and are called Fae. This big bad man is a crazy elf guy called Gadflow who has somehow become political leader despite one of his policies being "lets totally resurrect a dragon that's destined to be responsible for an oncoming Armageddon."
Crazy, but still doing more than our current government.
Yes, we like to get political in this blog.
It's very contrived, it's very "Muargali is my second cousin and stole my best Murglegugle lamp, from the relatives of the late Huah tribe. Please help me, my name is Yuhergha" There's literally enough text in the game to span the length of fourty Tolkien-ish novels.
But this is why I give this a free pass.
I should probably explain. Since Reckoning is an action-adventure RPG, there's something called reckoning mode. After your character has built up enough "fate points" from various kills they can enter Reckoning mode. Reckoning mode slows the combat down to reaaallllly slow for the enemies whilst you remain at full speed, enabling you to go on a murder spree. Whilst you're doing that, your full bar will deplete. If it runs out, Reckoning mode ends. Or you can fateshift an enemy.
When you fateshift an enemy, you perform a brutal execution move on the target with a random weapon you've shifted out of the air whilst mashing a button to build up more power behind it. It's the first quick time event that I've ever looked forward to in a game. Because it ends with smashing a hammer down on an enemy, throwing a ten meter lance through their face, chopping them to bits, stabbing them through, stabbing them in the chest and kicking them fourty meters over a cliff edge.
This was the selling point for me. It was a marriage of God Of War and The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion. And for some reason, some horrible and unknown reason, it worked.
It's a fun game and whilst there are serious balance issues in the later parts of the game, in which it's almost impossible to die even on hardest difficulty, the game has visuals that stuck with me.
It's also got crafting, player housing, bosses and you can hit a gnome through the window of a cathedral in the middle of the desert with a sledgehammer.
If that doesn't sell you, nothing else will.
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