It seems that Warhorse Studios’ massive RPG project Kingdom Come: Deliverance had been in production for simply years. We remember back in 2014 news that the project was being worked on spread around the gaming world like an Australian bush fire. Fast forward four years to 2018 and the game has finally been unveiled. Was the long, nail biting, stomach churning wait been worth it? After some ten days immersed in the beautiful, barbaric and compelling world of Kingdom Come: Deliverance we can say without reservation, the wait was more than worth it.
With production values more closely associated to top drawer triple A Hollywood blockbusters, Kingdom Come: Deliverance presents a magnificent open world RPG experience that takes a leaf from The Witcher Wild Hunt’s book and raises the bar even higher. Based in the dark and turbulent years of the 1400’s, Kingdom Come: Deliverance is set in a Bohemia in the middle of dramatic and turbulent change. The good emperor Charles IV has died and his son, Wenceslas The Idle, is more interested in pleasures of the flesh than running a sprawling and diverse kingdom. Seizing the opportunity to claim the throne for himself, Wenceslas ‘s half-brother Sigismund of Luxembourg decides to kidnap Wenceslas, force him to abdicate and invade Bohemia. In the midst of all this turmoil you get to play Henry the son of a blacksmith whose fate is inexorably tied to the fate of the kingdom. After Henry’s village is sacked by Sigismund’s army, he is forced to join forces with the ragtag resistance and fight off the invading army.
The sheer depth of the historical backdrop is made all the more powerful by the fact that these were real events that happened to real people all those years ago. Playing Kingdom Come: Deliverance is the equivalent of stepping back in time and seeing the world through the eyes of a commoner. An ordinary boy who, had he been given the choice, might have been content to take a ring side seat and watch history unfold. Instead the fates force Henry to become a hero. Unlike many other character driven RPG games, Kingdom Come: Deliverance forces you to work hard to become the better version of yourself. Each skill or improvement in your abilities has to be acquired through painstaking work, repetition and trial and error. The game, just like life, isn’t about how hard you can hit; it’s about how hard you can get hit and still keep on moving forward. That’s how winning is done and that’s how you survive the tough no-holds barred world of Kingdom Come: Deliverance.
To say that this game could quite easily steal away months of your life would not be an exaggeration. There are literally hundreds of side quests, activities and distractions that will take hundreds of hours to complete. From learning to ride horses, to improving your archery, sword fighting, potion brewing or even just being more persuasive. It’s all here. And the attention to detail is nothing short of insane. For example, people will comment on the fact that you haven’t taken a bath for a while and now smell like do-do. Or they’ll be wary of you because you have blood on your shirt. Want to talk to someone of a higher social class? Better change your threads and comb your hair. Every single decision you make here matters. Perhaps not right away, but eventually. And sometimes with dire consequences. While playing Kingdom Come: Deliverance we realised we’d spent close to six hours just hunting and riding without making any impression at all on the main quest. And guess what? We loved every minute of it.
Graphically Kingdom Come: Deliverance is nothing short of breath taking. The vast open world is not the biggest we’ve seen, but it is by far one of the most realistic ever committed to a video game. Are you listening Wild Hunt? Every location is painstakingly detailed from the lush terrains to the wildlife and fauna. Just take a minute from reading this review and look at the screen shots. Now you can see what we mean. The game world also positively hums with the sounds of a living breathing medieval world. Every sound has been faithfully replicated down to the gurgle of a stream or the sound of NPC’s chattering away oblivious to your presence. And the voice acting has to be among the best we’ve heard in a very long time. It’s often said that practice doesn’t make perfect. Rather, practice makes improvement as perfect, sadly, doesn’t exist. Kingdom Come: Deliverance has taken the RPG genre, dissected every possible element and improved them beyond our expectations. Go play.
10 out of 10