I really want to like King Arthur: A Knight’s Tale, but I find the experience of playing the Steam Early Access release so trudging as to almost be a chore. It’s a shame, because there’s promise in a lot of the features, and I’m very much on board with the idea of being Mordred, who’s usually the villain, chasing down Arthur, who’s usually the hero. We’re all brought back from the dead – magical stuff: don’t ask – and because of it, everything is cast in a graveyard hue, all grey and misty, moody and murky. But what it forgets along the way, or what it doesn’t have yet – because I have to remind myself this is early access and there’s plenty of time for things to change – is life.
King Arthur: A Knight’s Tale previewDeveloper: NeocoreGamesPublisher: NeocoreGamesPlatform: Played on PCAvailability: Out now on Steam Early Access for £27.29. The plan is to be there for three to seven months. PS5 and Xbox S/X releases are planned.
It lacks energy, that kind of snappiness and charisma the best turn-based games have. Games like XCOM, games like Divinity: Original Sin 2, which, given King Arthur has RPG exploration and dialogue, seems an apt comparison. And it suffers all over because of it.
When you’re in the RPG layer, wandering around environments, it’s slow. And it feels empty, devoid of life in the surroundings, devoid of music or companion banter, devoid, really, of anything much to do. You can loot a body, loot a chest, maybe do a very simple sidequest for a very wooden NPC, but that’s it. All there really is to do is fight.
Thankfully, fighting is OK. I particularly like the heft of the animated sword swings and axe chops, and sorting out positioning and attack-type occupies the mind. But the XCOM comparison developer NeoCore mentions is curious, because what King Arthur doesn’t have in any great amount, and which XCOM has in abundance, is ranged combat, hence the whole cover system. In King Arthur, there are a few archers, and I’ve seen a few spells, but that’s it. What does it need a cover system for? I haven’t seen it in use at all.
And, again, combat is lethargic. It’s not boring, it’s perfectly playable, but there’s very little to raise your heartbeat or surprise you. It’s only really when you start uncovering some of the undead enemies, a few hours in, things pick up. The question is, will you even want to make it that far?