Knights of Honor II: Sovereign

Whichever path you choose, any can lead you to absolute control of Europe, and therefore the endgame. [Issue#324]

As accessible as I’ve ever seen serious strategy gaming, Knights of Honor is still strategically interesting, gorgeous to look at, and still offers plenty of challenge. It hasn’t been compromised in any significant way for the sake of accessibility, and really, this is just a very good example of a publisher finding a genuine and worthy niche to occupy within a very mature and saturated genre.

As it stands, Knights of Honor II: Sovereign is a massively impressive feat that will delight many strategy fans. The medieval setting is beautiful and immersive, and the different paths to victory are a great mechanic keep players on their toes. Since some victory paths, like securing resources for a kingdom advantages victory, can take time and effort to achieve, this also adds a healthy dose of challenge and flexibility to the overall experience. You’ll often find yourself having to re-think a strategy mid-playthrough as wars break out and foes close trading deals. While this type of gameplay may not be everyone’s cup of tea, it will certainly be challenging and energising to those that don’t shy away from some statistics and resource management.

A rich, complex and ultimately satisfying grand strategy game, one that will keep you company for dozens upon dozens of hours while you lead your favourite medieval civilization towards victory.

Overall, Knights of Honor 2: Sovereign is a fun and well made addition to the grand strategy market. It was always going to be tough to stand up to the leaders in that genre, but the game makes a good case for itself, and I enjoyed my time playing it overall. With a few additional quality of life features over time, and hopefully more content moving forward, it can live up to its full potential and maybe even rise to the throne itself.

Knights of Honor 2 inherits a lot from its predecessor, both its strengths and shortcomings. But as Total War light it is convincing.

Knights of Honor II: Sovereign is by no means a perfect game, but it’s refreshingly original. Some of its concepts deserve to be adopted even by renowned studios like Creative Assembly. [page 48]

Knights of Honor II: Sovereign does quite a few things right, though it could use more polish for many aspects of the game, starting with the voice lines that generals get.

Knights of Honor II: Sovereign is a medieval real-time grand strategy that does something to perfection, but also fails to deliver in some other important aspects. While the game does feel fresh, it's also far too similar to its predecessor, that got released almost 20 years ago. As an older player, it feels good to play the game again, but it’s also disappointing that the studio didn't add many new features that were, and still are, missing.

Exactly what a sequel should look like. There are better graphics, sure, but also various changes and improvements. Nothing groundbreaking, no – but this solid strategy game doesn’t exactly need to reinvent the wheel.

I think as long as you know what to expect going in… this could well be a fantastic game. If you like fiddling over the minutia of your empire then you will probably love this game. If like me you’d prefer a bit less worrying about the small stuff to your rule… perhaps give it a miss.

A decent alternative if you want something in the style of Total War. It is characterized by comparable, quite complex management, but poor AI in the campaign and less successful battles. It offers some interesting options, but on the other hand, several elements are underdeveloped and unbalanced.

Sovereign is not the next big entry in the grand strategy horizon and it isn't even trying to be: simpler and more approachable than most of its rivals, the game feels a bit hasty in some of its core mechanics and in recreating the historical context, but it's enjoyable nonetheless.