There are some movies and TV shows that I'm convinced only really "hit" if you watch them at a certain age. It is my firm belief that if you haven't watched Star Trek, Mean Girls, or The Breakfast Club before the age of 18, you will never understand or enjoy these things (at least, I did not)*. Similarly, I think some games are appreciated more if they come at a certain time in your life.
Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning is one of those games. This game would have been really cool if I had played it when I was 10-12 (it was not out in the mid-00s, and there was no way the graphic violence would have gotten past my Mom's one-woman censorship board). It would probably be pretty cool if I was in college and played it while listening to lectures or something. However, as a grown man, this game feels very basic and boring.
First offender is the combat. The combat is in real time, and feels close to Dragon's Dogma or Scarlet Nexus, if you are familiar with those games. The combat in Amalur has the twin drawbacks of being barebones and stiff. There is only one basic attack (no light/heavy attacks or parries), a dodge that feels awkward to use, a range attack that quickly runs out of ammo and seems quite pointless, and a set of spells that can be customized. The spells are kind of cool, but they, can't really be chained into combos,. There is also a Super Saiyan mode that can be built up by filling up your rage/devil triggers/whatever; instead of making you superpowered for a small amount of time (like DmC) or giving you access to a massive attack that can curbstomp multiple enemies at once (like Blades of Time), it gives you the change to attack one enemy with a super special attack that gives you extra EXP. Combat in this game has no depth and feels like a repetitive chore; the lack of a parry, a decent dodge, or any combos beyond your basic "tap X" sequence is keenly felt. The swift, exciting, and somewhat open-ended combat of Devil May Cry has spoiled me, I suppose.
It is true that there are some combos that you can unlock in the game, but I didn't find the ones that I unlocked useful. Additionally, you also have to use perk points to unlock them only for specific weapons. Realize that the hammer sucks and want to use a greatsword? Too bad, you've put all of your points into the hammer. It is true that you can respec later on, but this kind of game would have benefitted from a Skyrim-style system where you level up weapons ability based on using the weapon.
The story is your usual high-fantasy bafflegarble; it's not great, but I'm usually fairly lenient on bad stories as long as they aren't shoved in your face by "cinematic" cutscenes. The dialogue choices tend to be pointless and apparently you can use persuasion skills to steamroll past everything. I highly dislike dialogue choices in games where they do not make a difference or make very little difference; developers and writers need to have confidence in the story that they are telling.
The "open world" is a series of poorly-disguised corridors with the occasional boring dungeon. The game feels less open than an N64 Zelda, and even the map clearly shows the corridors. Thus, there's no real exploration in the game; not that there is any real point to the exploration anyway. I found nothing about the enemy designs, world, or other art to be at all interesting. The semi-cartoony art style clashed with the occasional graphic violence of the game. Every NPC has a thousand dialogue keywords that you can choose from, and none of them are interesting. The loot system was not engaging or addicting; there was no way to easily compare stats for new items vs equipped items, and given the fact that combat felt like a chore, I didn't really feel excited to upgrade my gear. I am barely interested in smithing, crafting, alchemy etc. in most games, and in any case Skyrim did all of these better than Amalur.
Everything about this game just felt like busywork. I could probably forgive one or more mediocre elements of this game if they combined to create an immersive and interesting whole, but Amalur just feels like Fantasy Game: The Game. Everything in the game feels very much like a video game element. I don't know if this makes sense, but it describes the sense I felt while playing it. It was the opposite of Skyrim, a game that, while it contains clunky and repetitive elements, really feels like living in a fantasy world. Amalur feels like playing a fantasy game (quite appropriately, since it was originally intended to be an MMO) and nothing about it grabbed me. In my earlier years I may have been able to ignore its many flaws, but at this point in my life, with so much experience gaming and so many superior choices available, I can't justify playing this game.
Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning is one of those games. This game would have been really cool if I had played it when I was 10-12 (it was not out in the mid-00s, and there was no way the graphic violence would have gotten past my Mom's one-woman censorship board). It would probably be pretty cool if I was in college and played it while listening to lectures or something. However, as a grown man, this game feels very basic and boring.
First offender is the combat. The combat is in real time, and feels close to Dragon's Dogma or Scarlet Nexus, if you are familiar with those games. The combat in Amalur has the twin drawbacks of being barebones and stiff. There is only one basic attack (no light/heavy attacks or parries), a dodge that feels awkward to use, a range attack that quickly runs out of ammo and seems quite pointless, and a set of spells that can be customized. The spells are kind of cool, but they, can't really be chained into combos,. There is also a Super Saiyan mode that can be built up by filling up your rage/devil triggers/whatever; instead of making you superpowered for a small amount of time (like DmC) or giving you access to a massive attack that can curbstomp multiple enemies at once (like Blades of Time), it gives you the change to attack one enemy with a super special attack that gives you extra EXP. Combat in this game has no depth and feels like a repetitive chore; the lack of a parry, a decent dodge, or any combos beyond your basic "tap X" sequence is keenly felt. The swift, exciting, and somewhat open-ended combat of Devil May Cry has spoiled me, I suppose.
It is true that there are some combos that you can unlock in the game, but I didn't find the ones that I unlocked useful. Additionally, you also have to use perk points to unlock them only for specific weapons. Realize that the hammer sucks and want to use a greatsword? Too bad, you've put all of your points into the hammer. It is true that you can respec later on, but this kind of game would have benefitted from a Skyrim-style system where you level up weapons ability based on using the weapon.
The story is your usual high-fantasy bafflegarble; it's not great, but I'm usually fairly lenient on bad stories as long as they aren't shoved in your face by "cinematic" cutscenes. The dialogue choices tend to be pointless and apparently you can use persuasion skills to steamroll past everything. I highly dislike dialogue choices in games where they do not make a difference or make very little difference; developers and writers need to have confidence in the story that they are telling.
The "open world" is a series of poorly-disguised corridors with the occasional boring dungeon. The game feels less open than an N64 Zelda, and even the map clearly shows the corridors. Thus, there's no real exploration in the game; not that there is any real point to the exploration anyway. I found nothing about the enemy designs, world, or other art to be at all interesting. The semi-cartoony art style clashed with the occasional graphic violence of the game. Every NPC has a thousand dialogue keywords that you can choose from, and none of them are interesting. The loot system was not engaging or addicting; there was no way to easily compare stats for new items vs equipped items, and given the fact that combat felt like a chore, I didn't really feel excited to upgrade my gear. I am barely interested in smithing, crafting, alchemy etc. in most games, and in any case Skyrim did all of these better than Amalur.
Everything about this game just felt like busywork. I could probably forgive one or more mediocre elements of this game if they combined to create an immersive and interesting whole, but Amalur just feels like Fantasy Game: The Game. Everything in the game feels very much like a video game element. I don't know if this makes sense, but it describes the sense I felt while playing it. It was the opposite of Skyrim, a game that, while it contains clunky and repetitive elements, really feels like living in a fantasy world. Amalur feels like playing a fantasy game (quite appropriately, since it was originally intended to be an MMO) and nothing about it grabbed me. In my earlier years I may have been able to ignore its many flaws, but at this point in my life, with so much experience gaming and so many superior choices available, I can't justify playing this game.