KCD, 3 out of 10. Worst game i've played in years. Worst game i've played in 2020.

[Smkn-G1]

Ok so I just finished this game. Talked to capon, THE END. This has been the worst gaming experience I have had in YEARS. This will certainly be the worst game I played in 2020.

The combat was awful. It was clearly designed around 1 on 1 duels and in addition the controls and systems just do not work properly most of the time. I never wanted to initiate an attack myself cause it would be easily blocked or master struck. So I was stuck waiting to be attacked and then getting master strikes myself. Only master strikes were another thing that only wanted to work when it wanted to work. I play alot of mordhau and videogames in general so I know about timing... I'd angle right get the green shield and... not get master strikes 1/2 the time. Combos would only work when they wanted to, and even then were underwhelming. Much more reliable to just stab or hack your way through people without bothering about combos. I know what people will say... git gud, the combat system was immersive and realistic and complex.

Sure it was complex, even kinda immersive because you were all right there face to face and stuff... but it didn't work. Complex is good, great even... when it works. And the combat in this game was just clunky and awkward and broken. I spent 5 hours training with bernard only to have henry fall through the map before I saved so that was out... then I did so again, this time saving after intervals... so I did git gud, I got henry good... the combat itself isn't good, it's broken. It just doesn't work.

The save system, I really didn't like making my character drunk. I don't like drinking in general and absolutely refuse to drink myself. Forcing me to have this item for saving was stupid. It wasn't immersive, it was dumb. It also cancel'd out any self-insert I had into the role.

The alchemy, OMFG can't I just say how much I want to brew instead of having to go to the book prepare do the thing... OMFG what a time waster. Thank goodness they did autobrewing, but even that was clunky and required you to sit through animations and do alot of brewing yourself.

the sleeping to save, must I have to play the animation to get into and out of bed... stop wasting our time devs.

the first person pickup animation for every item... STOP WASTING OUR TIME DEVS.

The locked in 1st person animations in general outside of combat... STOP WASTING OUR TIME DEVS! At least make those ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ animations snappy.

The bugs. I had henry fall through the map during combat 3-4 times through my playthrough, losing several hours collectively. The first time it happened while fighting some cuman so I thought it was a fluke and I hadn't lost much time... the second time it happened after training with bernard for 5 real time hours. After that I decided to brew tons of saviour schnapps so I could save at intervals. During the quest "Run" Henry got caught in the ground and couldn't move at all leading to my first death in hardcore. Fortunately though that convinced me to not play on hardcore and I think I saved myself a ton of time and frustrations. I had a few quest lines bug on me, notably courtship with theresa, she kept telling me it was too late and I literally went and saw her at every hour of the day. When I was infiltrating the monastery the game forgot i talked to radzig about the gangs plans so I had no option but to kill pious. In ginger in a pickle the person I needed to talk do didn't spawn for several days. I asked every NPC up and down that river and forest about ginger and no one had anything to say. It was only after I came back after much play, frustrating play mind you cause henry couldn't train with bernard... that there was an NPC that wasn't present before... in cold steel hot blood headcracker triggered on an NPC and the game couldn't advance for several minutes until that person could be killed. All this in addition to other graphical glitches and numerous texture issues.

They often praise this game on the amount of ways you can complete quests... I think they included all those ways because things could break so easily they figured if they made a ton of ways through the quests would be less broken.

This was an entirely frustrating and horrible game, not because of what it set it out to do, because it does accomplish it's theme of making you just a guy in a maelstrom of events... but because it's systems are so broken and it's a damn mess to play.

I give it 3 out of 10, worst game I played in 2020 and I'm genuinely surprised it was a financial success. I will be extremely skeptical about anything this studio puts out in the future.

[AfLIcTeD]

Shame you didn't like it. I thought it was excellent.

[Kal]

I had more fun after completing the game than I did completing the game. Once you max out your combat skills, learn how to combo consistently and master strike, combat is good in 1v1. I still think its the worst combat for 1v3 or greater. I avoid this by kiting people on my horse with a bow, killing all but 1, then hoping off for a good bashing.

All the animations are there for the immersion, so that honestly is just an opinion thing. You can get a mod to remove most animations.

[Smkn-G1]

The thing that made it hurt most is that I *WANTED* to like it. I really wanted to like it. I could not.

[nauzicaa]

Well I had a lot of fun playing it. Yes, bugs and glitches are frustrating and they exist. Combat isn't great, I agree. There are other things to enjoy while playing the game, for example well written side quests or exploring. This game is not a masterpiece.

While I can't deny your bad experience, and I don't need to convince you or change your opinion, I feel like you haven't taken into consideration that this game was developed by a small studio, with low budget, but with a clear vision. A fully working, glitchless, atmospheric and graphically pleasing, historically accurate Open World RPG with lots of different activities, a good written story line etc. is no easy thing to accomplish, especially for a small studio. It's also their first game. They can and will improve. With more budget, more personell and more experience +feedback, I am really looking forward to another game from Warhorse Studios.

I feel like they tried to create a good game with everything they had, and after all, with passion. Think about it or not, as you wish. It's one of the best games I have played this year.

[Smkn-G1]

Originally posted by chronic.:

Well I had a lot of fun playing it. Yes, bugs and glitches are frustrating and they exist. Combat isn't great, I agree. There are other things to enjoy while playing the game, for example well written side quests or exploring. This game is not a masterpiece.

While I can't deny your bad experience, and I don't need to convince you or change your opinion, I feel like you haven't taken into consideration that this game was developed by a small studio, with low budget, but with a clear vision. A fully working, glitchless, atmospheric and graphically pleasing, historically accurate Open World RPG with lots of different activities, a good written story line etc. is no easy thing to accomplish, especially for a small studio. It's also their first game. They can and will improve. With more budget, more personell and more experience +feedback, I am really looking forward to another game from Warhorse Studios.

I feel like they tried to create a good game with everything they had, and after all, with passion. Think about it or not, as you wish. It's one of the best games I have played this year.

I had fun in 3 parts, the rest was a damn chore.

1) Early on after neuhof raid, but before ginger quest finish... I made some noise around a camp and some cumans started looking around. I ran into one and somehow henry did an animation where he punched that cuman with sword in hand, the cuman flies back inside of a tree, and it's just his arms legs and head sticking out, and I chopped him down. That was the moment of Herr Clobbermeister Henry, carpenter of skallitz.

2) When drinking with the priest, I knocked the uzhitz bailiff out with a knee to the head and the headcracker activation after a clinch.

3) I killed runt with a single master strike.

Other then that I really disliked it. I wanted to fight and kill cuman invaders. I fought with them twice during the span of the game. Once at that camp I came across early on, then at pribyslazitz... and outside of those two instances I never saw any cumans. Super let down.

Also that final mission was it? No fight against someone I might have recognized from the skallitz raid? Missed opportunity.

There are some good moments and some good historical authenticity. But not many good gameplay moments to be had.

[wjpower2003]

I am at level 19 over all and have maxed out on defence and mace yet have only just managed to win the Rattay Tourney for the first time. I see what you mean about the combat being clunky and unpredictable, it works way to fast for me to be able to pull off combos and master strikes so I just tend to clinch, push opponent away then stab or slash like a button-basher possessed.

Out in the world I tend not to get into mele combat as it's designed for one-on-one and most of the people you face are brigands who have no honour and will happily surround you, push you around and ♥♥♥♥ you up rather than going one on one. I've pretty much just resorted to maxing out my bow skill, strength and agility, getting good at it (I was already good with the bow in Skyrim and I use the same controller and similar config) and then I simply ride my horse to a distance, turn and use the best bow in the game with better piercing arrows and kill the bandits that way. That's how I managed to take down Zoul and his four remaining men after they killed Cuno and his gang - good thing they had dismounted before the cut scene.......... that's another issue with the game: horse mounted NPCs are few and far between and make the game less immersive.

As for the game being a financial success, I'd hardly say that. They recently sold their 3 millionth copy ............. after more than 2 years of release. Skyrim in 2011 sold 3.4 million copies in the first 2 days. The only reason I think the game has sold as well as it has (on Steam at least) is because you can only get a refund if you have played less than 2 hours of the game - the tutorial before even leaving Skalitz is mostly cut scenes and they account for much of that 2 hours. You have to get out of the tutorial to even experience the gameplay and open world properly by which time it's too late for a refund. I'm not sure if WH Studios did that on purpose as a cynical marketing strategy but it left a bad taste in my mouth.

[wjpower2003]

Originally posted by _Harbinger:

agree with the long tutorial taking longer then 2 hours for a refund, such a rip. Resolved to finish this rotten game because it was mine now.
I don't enjoy the game a lot but it has grown on me, the scenery/ambience is the best coming over a hill for example and greeted by a beautiful sunrise or reach a summit and pan/view half the entire map or walk out of a dense forest and spot Rattay sitting prominently off in the distance.

Yeah it has grown on me too.......... but only because I had no other choice than to put down a game I spent £34.99 on. I'm still having issues with my build version because on the main menu it says I am running v1.8.1 when all evidence shows I'm running v1.9.4.0 so for that reason I can't run a lot of mods I've downloaded off nexusmods. That is terrible because it's the mods and customisation of a game that will guarantee it's continued sales and longevity going forward. I spent a lot of time on Skyrim and had almost 200 mods running at once to get the flavour I wanted but at least mods actually worked (load order notwithstanding).

Problem is, before you can grow a mod-creating community (which make up a small % of the fanbase) you first need a fanbase and this game has very little fanbase to start with relative to other, more successful games because the initial momentum of release seemed to fizzle out very quickly due to the glitchiness and overblown, bait-and-switch publicity of what this game was intended to be. WH Sutdios after-sales support and social media presence is also atrocious.

WH Studios are amateurish as ♥♥♥♥ and it shows. They may have spent 7 years developing this game but like all other modern game devs, they released it in an incomplete state, then released patch after patch but still have a sub par game which they arrogantly seem to think is not just finished; but perfect.

A huge roadblock to improving this game is the gatekeepers - and by that I mean the sycophantic, toadying, fawning, snobbish, elitist, esoteric fanboys who seem to be over-represented on forums and threads such as this and offer cover for the game, it's many flaws and the game devs.

If you have any gripe with the game and bring these issues to light in a forum? Well then you are either "stupid, don't understand the game, are unsophisticated, should git gud or should go back to fighting dragons in your not-a-proper-RPG Skyrim-Boy!" It's tiresome and it's counter-productive because I want this game to succeed and get better but that can't happen whilst WH Studios are being arrogant and complacent all whilst having their self-delusions about this game being reinforced by a bunch of belligerent fanboys blowing smoke up their arses.

I'd just like to point out that although this reply to your comment turned into a rant, it was not aimed at you.

[Ray]

Originally posted by SmokeMcCloud:

The thing that made it hurt most is that I *WANTED* to like it. I really wanted to like it. I could not.

hearing this sentence makes me want to puke every single time

[CalicoJack]

Originally posted by つRay:

Originally posted by SmokeMcCloud:

The thing that made it hurt most is that I *WANTED* to like it. I really wanted to like it. I could not.

hearing this sentence makes me want to puke every single time

https://youtu.be/O4AfA_lebIg

[Mountain King]

If barely second-long animations are a "waste of your time" then I'll just remind you that Fortnite is still free.

[nauzicaa]

Originally posted by wjpower2003:

Originally posted by _Harbinger:

agree with the long tutorial taking longer then 2 hours for a refund, such a rip. Resolved to finish this rotten game because it was mine now.
I don't enjoy the game a lot but it has grown on me, the scenery/ambience is the best coming over a hill for example and greeted by a beautiful sunrise or reach a summit and pan/view half the entire map or walk out of a dense forest and spot Rattay sitting prominently off in the distance.

Yeah it has grown on me too.......... but only because I had no other choice than to put down a game I spent £34.99 on. I'm still having issues with my build version because on the main menu it says I am running v1.8.1 when all evidence shows I'm running v1.9.4.0 so for that reason I can't run a lot of mods I've downloaded off nexusmods. That is terrible because it's the mods and customisation of a game that will guarantee it's continued sales and longevity going forward. I spent a lot of time on Skyrim and had almost 200 mods running at once to get the flavour I wanted but at least mods actually worked (load order notwithstanding).

Problem is, before you can grow a mod-creating community (which make up a small % of the fanbase) you first need a fanbase and this game has very little fanbase to start with relative to other, more successful games because the initial momentum of release seemed to fizzle out very quickly due to the glitchiness and overblown, bait-and-switch publicity of what this game was intended to be. WH Sutdios after-sales support and social media presence is also atrocious.

WH Studios are amateurish as ♥♥♥♥ and it shows. They may have spent 7 years developing this game but like all other modern game devs, they released it in an incomplete state, then released patch after patch but still have a sub par game which they arrogantly seem to think is not just finished; but perfect.

A huge roadblock to improving this game is the gatekeepers - and by that I mean the sycophantic, toadying, fawning, snobbish, elitist, esoteric fanboys who seem to be over-represented on forums and threads such as this and offer cover for the game, it's many flaws and the game devs.

If you have any gripe with the game and bring these issues to light in a forum? Well then you are either "stupid, don't understand the game, are unsophisticated, should git gud or should go back to fighting dragons in your not-a-proper-RPG Skyrim-Boy!" It's tiresome and it's counter-productive because I want this game to succeed and get better but that can't happen whilst WH Studios are being arrogant and complacent all whilst having their self-delusions about this game being reinforced by a bunch of belligerent fanboys blowing smoke up their arses.

I'd just like to point out that although this reply to your comment turned into a rant, it was not aimed at you.

It's really sad to see, that some fanboys can't get over the fact that the game has many flaws, and they try to defend even the most obnoxious glitches or bad game mechanics. As I mentioned above, I really love the game, but I get that other people don't have as much fun as I do. I also experienced many glitches and frustrating moments while playing, but something about this game was addicting.

If you try to discuss e.g. the flawed combat system (combos don't work properly, master strikes are stupid) you will get a basic answer that you have to git gud or what not. This combat system isn't like Sekiro or Cuphead, where you actually can get better long term. Of course you can improve a little bit, but spamming master strikes doesn't make it interesting. It's flawed, not hard.

There are many other aspects that I dislike about this game, definitely. I could also go on and say what I really loved about the game, but I don't think I need to do that. I don't know if your comment was targeted at me, but I just wanted to clarify that I can understand that many people hated the game, and especially the elitist attitude you mentioned in this forum ist just stupid. In my previous comment I just wanted to adress the fact that you have to remember that WH Studios is still a fairly small developer. If you love the game, it should be also your task to point out the bad parts of the game and take part in a productive discussion, to see what can be improved in the next game for example.

[DobbyBaby]

There is this whole codex section with all sorts of boring historical tidbits on medieval life. That tells you the kind of game this is. I mean WTF, info about the POPES?!?! What is this, I’m supposed to read this crap, it’s like SCHOOL!! And the tidbits in the books, I mean seriously, there are actual WORDS in the books?? Who actually would read that??

So, as soon as you see that codex you should understand what kind of game this is.

[wjpower2003]

Originally posted by chronic.:

Originally posted by wjpower2003:

Yeah it has grown on me too.......... but only because I had no other choice than to put down a game I spent £34.99 on. I'm still having issues with my build version because on the main menu it says I am running v1.8.1 when all evidence shows I'm running v1.9.4.0 so for that reason I can't run a lot of mods I've downloaded off nexusmods. That is terrible because it's the mods and customisation of a game that will guarantee it's continued sales and longevity going forward. I spent a lot of time on Skyrim and had almost 200 mods running at once to get the flavour I wanted but at least mods actually worked (load order notwithstanding).

Problem is, before you can grow a mod-creating community (which make up a small % of the fanbase) you first need a fanbase and this game has very little fanbase to start with relative to other, more successful games because the initial momentum of release seemed to fizzle out very quickly due to the glitchiness and overblown, bait-and-switch publicity of what this game was intended to be. WH Sutdios after-sales support and social media presence is also atrocious.

WH Studios are amateurish as ♥♥♥♥ and it shows. They may have spent 7 years developing this game but like all other modern game devs, they released it in an incomplete state, then released patch after patch but still have a sub par game which they arrogantly seem to think is not just finished; but perfect.

A huge roadblock to improving this game is the gatekeepers - and by that I mean the sycophantic, toadying, fawning, snobbish, elitist, esoteric fanboys who seem to be over-represented on forums and threads such as this and offer cover for the game, it's many flaws and the game devs.

If you have any gripe with the game and bring these issues to light in a forum? Well then you are either "stupid, don't understand the game, are unsophisticated, should git gud or should go back to fighting dragons in your not-a-proper-RPG Skyrim-Boy!" It's tiresome and it's counter-productive because I want this game to succeed and get better but that can't happen whilst WH Studios are being arrogant and complacent all whilst having their self-delusions about this game being reinforced by a bunch of belligerent fanboys blowing smoke up their arses.

I'd just like to point out that although this reply to your comment turned into a rant, it was not aimed at you.

It's really sad to see, that some fanboys can't get over the fact that the game has many flaws, and they try to defend even the most obnoxious glitches or bad game mechanics. As I mentioned above, I really love the game, but I get that other people don't have as much fun as I do. I also experienced many glitches and frustrating moments while playing, but something about this game was addicting.

If you try to discuss e.g. the flawed combat system (combos don't work properly, master strikes are stupid) you will get a basic answer that you have to git gud or what not. This combat system isn't like Sekiro or Cuphead, where you actually can get better long term. Of course you can improve a little bit, but spamming master strikes doesn't make it interesting. It's flawed, not hard.

There are many other aspects that I dislike about this game, definitely. I could also go on and say what I really loved about the game, but I don't think I need to do that. I don't know if your comment was targeted at me, but I just wanted to clarify that I can understand that many people hated the game, and especially the elitist attitude you mentioned in this forum ist just stupid. In my previous comment I just wanted to adress the fact that you have to remember that WH Studios is still a fairly small developer. If you love the game, it should be also your task to point out the bad parts of the game and take part in a productive discussion, to see what can be improved in the next game for example.

No my post was not a response to you, don't worry. It was a response to _Harbinger who I believe actually agrees with me largely.

To your points about the game, I actually do really enjoy it and do find it addictive as well (now that I got past the point of no refund) the fact is though, that I shouldn't have had to be forced to enjoy the game through dint of not being allowed to get a refund..... that I take issue with.

I have sent an email to WH directly regarding the issue with my Steam install build version........... no resolution as yet sadly.

[wjpower2003]

Originally posted by Jonnie:

There is this whole codex section with all sorts of boring historical tidbits on medieval life. That tells you the kind of game this is. I mean WTF, info about the POPES?!?! What is this, I’m supposed to read this crap, it’s like SCHOOL!! And the tidbits in the books, I mean seriously, there are actual WORDS in the books?? Who actually would read that??

So, as soon as you see that codex you should understand what kind of game this is.

I detect a hint of sarcasm in your post my child. Do you understand that sarcasm is the work of the devil and undermines the authority of the Holy Church and of the Nobility?

[nauzicaa]

I personally don't think WH Studios did the intro on purpose to rob you of the refund. Sure, I agree that you don't really get much gameplay and can't get a good understanding of how the game is gonna be, but it doesn't seem like they did it on purpose. If you consider that they released the game on console too, another big market, where you can't refund (to my knowledge) that easily, I just think they didn't consider the "refund mechanic" and therefore didn't account for it. But that's just speculation, so i don't really know.