Lego Knights' Kingdom was very interesting to me as it was not only released a few months before the first TT Lego game and the subsequent redirection of Lego games, but also because it is based on an obscure Lego theme; being the second season of Lego Knights' Kingdom sets and these sets were really weird on their own.
Unfortunately the game itself is not nearly as interesting as its source material.
Lego Knights' Kingdom at its core is an isometric action adventure game. There are four playable characters, which all share the same basic actions and therefore have no differences in gameplay except their character models.
The gameplay loop alternates between combat- and find the button sections.
Despite being the games main focus the combat feels incredibly sluggish.
While there are in theory more than one way to go about fighting enemies, as in not only normal attacks and the shield, but also combos and any of the 5 special attacks, which can be performed by holding the A button and one hit most enemies. It will actually just end up as holding up the shield and listening for the sound queue of it being hit by the enemy and subsequently counterattacking, as there isn't enough time between the enemy being hit and your character being able to attack again, for combos to be even possible, some enemy attack animations being deceiving and not actually representing its hitbox' active frames and there usually not being enough time to execute a special attack.
The find the button portions of the game aren't much better.
Now let's start with the positive. The placement of the button is usually very clear, same as how to activate them, so finding them is no problem most of the time, but that is pretty much everything positive I can say about it as there is a severe lack of an indicator for if you have hit all buttons to open the door connected to them. Now I have to preface that said lack of an indicator is very inconsistent, but there where multiple situations where this really hampered the already not amazing experience.
This problem gets even worse considering the excruciatingly slow movement speed and sometimes deceiving background making it unclear as to how to actually get to the button.
There was also an example in the final stage of the game where the game laid five buttons in front of the player and they just had to guess the order in which to activate them. The chance of someone actually guessing the right order first time is around 0.83% by the way (the order is 32514 if you for whatever reason want to play through this game).
The game peaks at its last stage, which is actually pretty fun (outside of that one incident), as it marks the first time of the game being actually challenging.
Unfortunately there is another occasion around 3/4s through this around 20 minute long level, where the two hardest sections of the game take place one after another. This wouldn't be a problem if there were any checkpoints, but there aren't, so you have to play the whole level again for 15 minutes, if you don't get defeated before that, just to probably fail again. Fun fact: I spend most of the last three days of my journal in this level. Now these playing sessions where mostly just me failing once or twice and then getting unmotivated, but I thought it could still be interesting.
This should probably be the moment where I mention the lack of in game saves, but much rather a password system to save your file.
The level ends with this games only boss fight against Lord Vladek, which can be cheesed using the tried and true strategy of shielding and counterattacking their attacks.
There is also a second and third mode, being the tournament arena and last man standing.
The tournament arena is basically a mix between 1v1s of the four main protagonists, which can be won with the already explained cheese tactic, and jousting, which isn't properly explained and I couldn't bother finding out how it works, as you should still win the arena every time due to the points you accumulated in the 1v1 matches.
I also couldn't access the last man standing mode even after beating the game.
Now the ost is the best part by far (take a listen if you want) and definitely the reason for at least one of this games stars.
Another reason why I didn't absolutely hate this game was because its problems mostly only get really apparent in longer sitting. This game is sometimes able to provide short bursts of fun.
Which is actually my final verdict. If you still want to play this game, for whatever reason, restrict the time you spend with it and you might not regret it that much.
Unfortunately the game itself is not nearly as interesting as its source material.
Lego Knights' Kingdom at its core is an isometric action adventure game. There are four playable characters, which all share the same basic actions and therefore have no differences in gameplay except their character models.
The gameplay loop alternates between combat- and find the button sections.
Despite being the games main focus the combat feels incredibly sluggish.
While there are in theory more than one way to go about fighting enemies, as in not only normal attacks and the shield, but also combos and any of the 5 special attacks, which can be performed by holding the A button and one hit most enemies. It will actually just end up as holding up the shield and listening for the sound queue of it being hit by the enemy and subsequently counterattacking, as there isn't enough time between the enemy being hit and your character being able to attack again, for combos to be even possible, some enemy attack animations being deceiving and not actually representing its hitbox' active frames and there usually not being enough time to execute a special attack.
The find the button portions of the game aren't much better.
Now let's start with the positive. The placement of the button is usually very clear, same as how to activate them, so finding them is no problem most of the time, but that is pretty much everything positive I can say about it as there is a severe lack of an indicator for if you have hit all buttons to open the door connected to them. Now I have to preface that said lack of an indicator is very inconsistent, but there where multiple situations where this really hampered the already not amazing experience.
This problem gets even worse considering the excruciatingly slow movement speed and sometimes deceiving background making it unclear as to how to actually get to the button.
There was also an example in the final stage of the game where the game laid five buttons in front of the player and they just had to guess the order in which to activate them. The chance of someone actually guessing the right order first time is around 0.83% by the way (the order is 32514 if you for whatever reason want to play through this game).
The game peaks at its last stage, which is actually pretty fun (outside of that one incident), as it marks the first time of the game being actually challenging.
Unfortunately there is another occasion around 3/4s through this around 20 minute long level, where the two hardest sections of the game take place one after another. This wouldn't be a problem if there were any checkpoints, but there aren't, so you have to play the whole level again for 15 minutes, if you don't get defeated before that, just to probably fail again. Fun fact: I spend most of the last three days of my journal in this level. Now these playing sessions where mostly just me failing once or twice and then getting unmotivated, but I thought it could still be interesting.
This should probably be the moment where I mention the lack of in game saves, but much rather a password system to save your file.
The level ends with this games only boss fight against Lord Vladek, which can be cheesed using the tried and true strategy of shielding and counterattacking their attacks.
There is also a second and third mode, being the tournament arena and last man standing.
The tournament arena is basically a mix between 1v1s of the four main protagonists, which can be won with the already explained cheese tactic, and jousting, which isn't properly explained and I couldn't bother finding out how it works, as you should still win the arena every time due to the points you accumulated in the 1v1 matches.
I also couldn't access the last man standing mode even after beating the game.
Now the ost is the best part by far (take a listen if you want) and definitely the reason for at least one of this games stars.
Another reason why I didn't absolutely hate this game was because its problems mostly only get really apparent in longer sitting. This game is sometimes able to provide short bursts of fun.
Which is actually my final verdict. If you still want to play this game, for whatever reason, restrict the time you spend with it and you might not regret it that much.
TheQuietGamer
1 year ago