GC 2004: Knightshift 2 First Look
Myrthos, 2004-09-06

In 2003/2004 we saw the release of Knightshift, an RPG/RTS with a humorous touch. In all likelihood it is the only game that has a mother-in-law unit in the RTS part of the game. In the RPG part there are no units of course, but you could hire people to join you in your fight. The graphics of the game were very good, but for hardcore RTS and RPG players the game didn't offer what they want. In both areas it could be considered to be a ‘light' game. But for the not so hardcore players the game offered good graphics, humor and some nice gameplay.

And now Knightshift 2 is in development. They dropped the RTS element and focused on the RPG part, a hack and slash RPG part to be precise, similar to its predecessor. I've played around with Knightshift 2 in the booth of Deep Silver, the German publisher of the game. It has been a while since I played the first game, but I could not see much difference between this game and its predecessor. The user interface felt the same, the graphics didn't look much different and the gameplay felt like the original also. If anyone would have told me this was Kinghtshift 1, I would have believed it.

Here is what little info I gathered about the game from the press kit (translated from German):

What is good, what is bad - you have to decide. All roads lead to fights with dangerous and terrifying monsters. Also a meeting with Death in person and a philosophical discussion is unavoidable. Choose one of the nine different characters, each with their own specific abilities, to master this incomparable, large adventure in a vivid 3D world. After an endless amount of quests and heroic deeds it leads to the inevitable destiny of all heroes: Saving the world. Hack and Slash combined with a compelling story for a once in a lifetime gaming experience.

• 9 characters with 8 unique skills each and more than 4000 weapons and items.
• Day and night cycle that influences the behavior of NPCs and monsters.
• The strength of the monsters is adapted to match the strength of the player.
• Untypical story in the Pratchett style, with references to many of the fantasy clichés.

There are some bold statements in there, but then again if you want to go somewhere then why not do it boldly. To be fair, there was no way that I could have checked the above statements in the little time I had to play the game, so the statement can be correct, so for now I just take them as being correct. Knightshift 2 is being released one year after the release of the original. There is just so much that you can do in one year, so I do hope that this is not an add-on being promoted for marketing purposes to a brand new game and that there really is a lot of new things to discover. Only time will tell.