A KNIGHT'S TALE

How KINGDOM COME: DELIVERANCE II, the most ambitious medieval RPG ever made, is taking in-game realism and player immersion to wondrous new heights.

- Robert Jones

Kingdom Come: Deliverance did something that no other RPG had tried to do before when it released back in 2018: create a game based in a fully-realised medieval world that prided itself in depicting the times and the lives of its characters in a very realistic way.

Here was an RPG in which Henry of Skalitz, the game’s raised-by-ablackmith peasant protagonist, was no ‘chosen one’ superhuman fantasy hero, cutting down foes with ease left, right and centre, but instead a regular guy who needed to approach medieval life and the decisions he made in it with both eyes open to the world around him. Insult a noble? Then there’s going to be genuine consequences for the lowly Henry. Get caught stealing bread? Henry’s going to be branded, imprisoned and tarred reputationally as a thief. Take on a bunch of three heavily armed soldiers when all Henry is holding is a rusty sword, with which he has no training? Then there are going to be very swift, deadly consequences.

And, what’s more, this was an RPG that had no compunction in stripping away many of the softer features of the genre, such as guided waypoints, or from telling a detailed and complex narrative about politics, economics, and warfare. Henry may eventually rise to do great deeds like a traditional warrior hero, but Kingdom Come: Deliverance’s story is a knight’s tale that is grounded as much as possible in reality.

The effect of this approach by Warhorse Studios, the maker of the Kingdom Come: Deliverance series, on the RPG genre was refreshing, so much so that the original KC:D, despite launching notably rough around the edges, immediately became a classic and showed that Warhorse Studios was one to watch.