Whenever you hover over an item inKingdom Come: Deliverance 2, an adorable icon that looks like parchment paper unfurls, displaying the name, weight, and purpose of the thing you’ll soon be adding to your inventory. It’s a cute touch, and this otherwise harrowing action RPG is full of them. Warhorse Studios has created a larger, more ambitious sequel it hopes will respect history while also using it as a playground for all manner of hijinks.
Last month I visited Prague to play several hours of the game at a fanciful building in Kuttenberg, a humble city which has been completely recreated as it was in the Middle Ages for the sequel in an exhaustive amount of detail. It was fascinating to walk the streets of the city myself as I saw local people, shops, and government buildings before going back in time with the game as I then kicked chickens, robbed random houses, and generally caused a massive ruckus.
Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 has a pretty heartfelt and serious narrative at its core, but that doesn’t mean you’re able to’t approach it like an utter barbarian - something which I naturally did. You once again play as Henry, the son of a blacksmith who is determined to avenge his parent’s sudden passing. He is now serving under Sir Hans Capon as squire, a spoiled little brat who naively believes the entire world revolves around him.
Those who played the original game will know it’s a charming albeit unconventional RPG with unusual combat mechanics and funky world design, but this time around there is considerably more polish without losing that unique sense of character.
Things are going swimmingly enough in the first couple of hours, until a group of soldiers attacks your unit and Henry and Hans are forced to run with nothing but the clothes on their backs. You have to start over, but hope still burns bright for the duo as they seek to win back their honour and make it home in time for tea.
Before you are forcefully reverted to the peasants your stewardship so despises, you’ll spend time chatting with fellow squires by the campfire, spar with Hans, and learn about the man you are, whether you played the first game or not. It’s a fun introduction, although there is a lot of clumsy exposition before the training wheels are finally taken off. Not to mention a number of quests that follow which involve you helping out local townspeople, and having a spat with Henry, before finally being unleashed into the vast open world.
A large chunk of Europe has been recreated here, and it sucks that Warhorse takes so long to show it off. The vocal performances can also be a mixed bag, which makes it hard to feel invested in certain parts of the story. Henry and Han are wonderfully depicted, but side characters range from fine to obnoxiously monotone. Part of me hopes that some of the roles I heard are placeholders.
Once you’re set free, though, the sheer scale of Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 is magnificent. In essence, you can go anywhere and do anything, taking on missions that hold curated stories or hitting the open road to create your own. There is an immersive sim quality to how you can go about completing quests in countless different ways, and so long as you get the job done, it’s fine. There might be consequences for setting off alarms or leaving bodies behind, but this is an RPG where freeform experimentation is paramount, matched only by Warhorse’sveryprecious dedication to accurately depicting European history.
There is definitely some sort of toxic yaoi vibe between Henry and Hans as well, to the point that the story isn’t that far from veering into Ye Olde Brokeback Mountain territory. But that’s a theory for another piece…
And to be perfectly clear, it sure seems accurate. By that I mean weapons are terrible to control and being stabbed is an immediate death sentence if you don’t have the right tools at hand to heal yourself. Making potions and tonics is depicted through witchlike alchemy, while the inventory system has you equipping layers of armour and other pieces of clothing one at a time, as if you’re truly gearing up for battle and need to consider every decision you make.
It’s what makes the slapstick nature of its combat and exploration so darling. Later on in the preview, we were loaded into a save file that was roughly 50 hours into things smack bang in the middle of Kuttenberg. The developer urged us to go on a quest and not run into the open world with no plan in mind, so obviously I ignored them and did the latter. I found myself in a random cottage stealing cheese from a poor family’s dinner plate before I sprinted into a big piece of farmland to fistfight a herd of cows. They won. It turns out, those buggers kick hard.
My favourite little quirk was punching a chicken to death and watching as it swiftly defeathered itself before leaving the mortal coil behind. Rest in peace little dude.
Don’t let me loose into an open world with infinite possibilities in a confined preview and then expect me to play by the rules. This girl doesn’t, but it only allowed me to have more fun than I ever expected to with a game like this. I’m no history buff, classical fantasy bores me, and Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 is trying to serve a very specific audience that loves both.
But somehow the game has cast a spell on me and I want to see more from it, both in its surprisingly poignant main narrative and absurdly freeform open world. There is a lot to love here in spite of many rough edges, and to be honest, that lacking refinement is part of its signature appeal.
I’m somewhat worried it will be too long, however, especially because this excursion into the city of Kuttenberg took place by the time most games of this ilk would have hit credits. There is a chance Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 will either outstay its welcome or simply lack the momentum in its narrative and mechanics to justify an 80-hour journey, but there will be no way to know until it arrives in February 2025.
Concerns aside though. I’m pretty smitten. It strikes this unorthodox balance between respecting history and understanding that players also want the past to be transported into a virtual playground of infinite possibilities. The freedom to travel anywhere and do anything combined with a strong central character and a narrative worth caring about is a winning combo, and one I think Warhorse might have nailed here.
