King’s Bounty: The Legend Previews

Both GameSpot and GameSpy have cranked out a new hands-on previews of Katauri Interactive’s King’s Bounty: The Legend. A snip from GameSpot’s article:

After passing Richard’s tests, we entered the kingdom proper and met the king and his young daughter. We were enlisted as the king’s treasure hunter for our ability to rustle up gold and told to go forth and collect the king’s bounties. But first, we used the contents of our purse to replenish our unit slots with swordsmen and archers. As mentioned, Darion is a dangerous place.

On the adventure map, red dots indicate enemies. You can simply ride your horse around them and try to pick up crystals and gold littering the roadsides, or you can engage the enemies in battle. Then again, they may choose to engage you. Either way, the top-down adventure map reverts to the turn-based battle screen and you’ll be forced to slay the enemies or perish. If you lose, you’ll be returned to the castle, where you can purchase more units and replenish your ranks.

And a snip from GameSpy’s article:

Though it’s based on a classic, many of the game’s elements will appear familiar to anyone who’s kept abreast of RPGs for the last 15 years; it even draws some key parallels with Japanese tactical console RPGs like Fire Emblem and Tactics Ogre. Perhaps even more striking are the ways that it cannily incorporates some of World of Warcraft’s notable contributions to the RPG lexicon, like talent trees (three of them, of course), clearly-demarked quest-givers, and a bright, welcoming look.

The three classes don’t differ so much in capabilities as they do in areas of strength: The Knight is generally better able, due to a confluence of the rights stats and abilities, to field more and stronger units, while the Mage is better at using magic. The Paladin, meanwhile, lies somewhere in between. Your character’s primary role in the turn-based battles isn’t that of an active combatant; rather, you’ll influence the outcomes by casting spells from on-high, or summoning powerful “Spirits of Rage” that blast enemies on the playfield with devastating effects. As you complete key missions, your character’s rank will increase, which increases the pool of units available to you, and as you traverse the real-time overworld map, you’ll acquire “Runes of Talent” with which you can pump points into individual skills in your tree.