It just so happened that winter, snow, north and Vikings are carefully loved by developers of all stripes and breeds. Snow interspersed with sparkling ice floes looks more advantageous than leaves and reservoirs with other graphic equals. In addition, Scandinavian folklore gives the authors of texts and other surroundings the opportunity to relax a bit. Because all these Odins, Frei, Valkyrie and Yotuna, despite the fairly praquicism, still did not manage to be seduced to the population in the same way as Zeus with Aphrodites, for example. Even despite Marvel with their peculiar interpretation of the northern mythological canon.

So it is not even surprising that the authors from Katauri Interactive turned to the Scandinavian topic in the process of creating the next King’s Bounty. This time – about the warriors of the North, Warriors of the North that is.

Olaf, this is undead. Undead, this is Olaf. And why there is a vague feeling that the acquaintance has passed slightly tense.

Return to the historical homeland

Already the Gamomirov version made an unshakable fact obvious: this is the same King’s Bounty. That is, without significant changes. With new cards, a fresh storyline, updated magic and a funny friendship system with Valkyrie, but in fact-the same product that players fell in love in 2008, which transmitted himself to an endless repetition with small variations.

Plot Warriors of the North spin around the fight against undead. Fresh, like “orbit” with the taste of a lying zombie, you know. The main character – Viking Olaf – first exterminates the crowds of the revived dead on the little northern island of Nordlig on behalf of his dad, the horseman Tormund fiercely, whose kingdom covers one small village. Having dealt with the task, the protagonist, as usual, discovers that evil spirits have flooded not only his native village, but in general the entire endory, which means that it is necessary to save the world.

The world, by the way, has not changed too much. We will again walk around Darion, visit the islands of freedom, we will meet the old NPC acquaintances, with whom in The Legend there were more than one pood of salt were ate the royal seeker Bill Gilbert. The north is represented by several small islands, between which our hero runs until the first battle with the Boss.

Generally Warriors of the North It looks like a “return to the origins”, rethought and supplemented by The Legend. Not only the new-old geography of the world leads to this idea, with the help of which the developers shamelessly sew up on the nostalgic tear of fans of the series, but also the revived “perfumes of rage” from the first part, which suddenly treated in some places, in others-became as old, became prettier and became agitatedValkyrie.

If I were a sultan ..

The Legend actively entertained the player by marriage games. In the sense of you could choose a bride, fulfill the quest chain and get a beauty in his wife. The wife brought the hero a constant bonus, and every contender for the hand and heart of Bill Gilbert had their own advantages.

Tormented by a choice, we still remember, thought about a harem – now, they say, how great it would be if we were allowed to take all the brides to my wife at once!

What is characteristic, only our hero constantly remembers his daddy when it seems. The rest are usually limited in name. Why not immediately call yourself Olaf Tormundovich, and?

The developers seem to have also considered this idea fruitful. Therefore, in Warriors of the North “In the wives” we will have a whole five Valkyrie. Officially, they, of course, appear as military friends who help us in the fight against evil on behalf of the Scandinavian gods. But we understand-no coincidence, oh, it is no coincidence that Olaf appoints one of the girls beloved wife Senior Valkyrie. The beauty, awarded such honor, gives our army an increased set of “buns”, while the rest “work” only in a quarter of strength.

However, warlike girls are not strong with bonuses. We can call the satellites to the rescue directly in battle, using a special amulet with the speaking name “The Anger of the Valkyrie”. This contraption is almost immediately given to us by a good daddy, who has no idea, and there is a Valkyrie.

You need more rage

Indeed, at first the talisman works on our own military traction. Having accumulated rage, Olaf can personally appear on the battlefield and distribute a set of subtitlers, without particularly understanding, his own or alien to his arm came across. Or bring up a hail of ice fragments on enemies.

Girls connect to the process later, one by one. We stumble upon a Valkyrie in the most unexpected places as the script moves and, usually not having completed a too complicated quest, we turn on a new girlfriend in our retinue.

Each lady can add to our arsenal in deadly ability, sometimes not even one. As a rule, we are talking about a massive defeat of enemies. Valkyrie named Krista puts a trap on the battlefield – a very attractive chest with gold, which causes damage to a greedy enemy seduced by treasures. Hilda amazes random “units” in the opponent’s army with arrows, and Regina sends a burning meteorite to the very thick of the enemy troops, from which the lava golem “hatch” with a “hatch”.

Not without funny incidents. Here the next flying beauty sets up Olaf for a difficult battle, the hero is interested in, for some kind of terrible business he was brought to him if he needed the help of several warriors at once, and falls into the den of the first “boss”. In battles with these, recall, all abilities associated with the use of rage are disabled. That is, all previous preparations

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with the collection of Valkyrie in one individual amulet are almost useless, because not one of them can intervene in the battle of the battle.

Giant spiders are a classic that is always in fashion. Or, more simply, to developers too lazy to come up with something new. A giant spider will come.

Northern rebranding

But enough about women. What does the hero himself represent himself?

Frankly, Olaf does not shine with intellect. No, not the intelligence that the magician needs – here is how lucky. The guy’s problems, roughly speaking, with brains. Everyone can cut a mighty viking. We, alas, cannot help a hefty simple. Even when it carries a trap from the proposal of the next NPC per mile away, we are often forced to get into this trap, because other options in the dialogue are not provided. Having subscribed to the completion of some task, we usually cannot change our mind in the process, having consisted new circumstances, nor invent a certain alternative solution. Olaf is simple like a stool and just like a tank. By the way, the guy, by the way, is not inclined to the excessive manifestations of mercy and peacefulness: he strives, just to attack the interlocutor, despite the fact that the interlocutor may be the only supplier of rare troops for the entire location.

Olaf aggressiveness does not depend on the class, and the class, in turn, does not depend on the name. All the same “warrior-mag-pauline” from previous issues reign here King’s Bounty, Only these development branches are called differently: Viking, magi and scald. A set of talents of the “Scandinavian” spill also is a modified version of the kit to which we are accustomed to the Legend. The runes, a long time ago used for pumping the character, just led one himself “as it was”, because the runic magic and Scandinavian mythology always go hand in hand.

We owe runes to the runes ..

In general, the role of runes in the life of the hero and his wards significantly strengthened, adding, among other things, a new school of magic, completely dedicated to the old Northern alphabet. Not that all the spells in this set were really new for us. Partly, the fresh section of the book of the charms was stuffed with slightly modified, but, in fact, long -familiar tricks, such as “energy”, for example, colored balls distributing mana or rage. However, there is a funny. Using the magic of runes, you can “plant” a giant egg on the battlefield, from which lizard -like warriors – Scrages will be hatched to the next round.

In addition to spells, we were given new combat materials of northern origin – runes of defense, attacks and good luck. Before each stroke of the fighter, we can use one of these bonuses to strengthen the defense of the detachment, increase the damage or give soldiers a chance to strike an additional blow. The number of runes is limited. Like the number of decent troops in the first four islands.

This time the developers decided to go alternatively. The usual variety of soldiers from whom their eyes scatter is “turning on” only after the victory over the first “small evil”, when we leave the northern homeland and fall into Darion. Until then, only local inhabitants will be at our services – a variety of vikings with broken horns on helmets.

In the northern army, of course, there are interesting personnel. The magi, for example, can force the enemy’s detachment to fight on our side for some time. The northern warriors resurrect the fallen, and the berserkers, surprisingly, are furious and inflict repeatedly increased damage to everyone around. The problem is that strong warriors are not only roads – we would have coped with this – but also in extreme shortage. The northern warriors must generally be protected as the apple of an eye – they are categorically lacking. Only pirates, spiders and snakes with which you can’t get a lot are a lot of you can do as an alternative.

At the same time, the number of enemy detachments, wandering on the map here and there, clearly exceeds the boundaries of the necessary and even desirable. By the middle of the game, you can begin to catch yourself on deaf irritation at the moment when the hero is running into another portion of brainless evil, despite the fact that the combat mechanics in itself is still diverse and multidimensional. That’s just what is the variety and multidimensionality in battles with the same enemies of the same? In addition, endless clashes with ordinary monsters are distracted from the performance of quests.

Ay vaz orca and herring

And the quests come across very funny. When a certain old man sends us behind herring to a neighboring village – to the cellar of his allegedly died at the hands of the undead of the fumes – we do not even realize that as a result we will have to go to two more islands, dug a treasure, take off the curse and fight with greedy to the jewelry of maritimefish.

Even ordinary tasks like “go and kill” are sometimes decorated so that it is impossible to perform them without a smile. Just kill the team of three ships – boring. To kill the team of three ships so that the artist Ai VAZ Orcsky draws brilliant battal marina – this is a completely different matter! King’s Bounty Still opposes the dominance of pathos in computer games, because even in the most pathetic situations, developers find an occasion for irony. Despite the fact that their humor is sometimes unpretentious, it looks much more pleasant than the bored with “serious” howls on the topic of heroism, duty and struggle of different animals with a donkey.

However, along with miraculous tasks, “talking” names and living dialogs, we are often slipped by traditional bastard quests, groovy quests, and sometimes even repetitions of instructions from previous games in the series. After all, we have already brought Kirki smugglers in due time! And with the spells of demonitsa they sorted out. It seems, Katauri I did not accept the offset at that time and now wants to send us to the retake.

Fights with Gremlins take place in a truly amazing territory. Although we better not know where these places are geographically located and how an entire army was placed there.

We will be frank: Warriors of the North – Not the best game from the clan King’s Bounty. The script could be more interesting, and the gameplay could be enriched with a large number of innovations. On the other hand, when it comes to such an epic game series, one is the fact that we had a fresh, long campaign at our disposal – already a reason for joy. After all, now we will be able to plunge into the world beloved again, find out how to do Princess Amelie, let in a nostalgic tear with the old friends of Bill Gilbert – in a word, experience magic King’s Bounty again. But hardly Katauri Interactive will be able to continue to “milk” the once created world for a long time, no matter how good it is by itself. The resource is coming to an end – Warriors of the North This is eloquently evidenced.

Pros: Funny tasks;Squeezed game mechanics;continuation of Amelie’s story;several unusual innovations;Irony feed of story collisions.
Cons: overloaded with ordinary monsters of maps;not too original script;There are few gameplay updates.