Pathfinder: Kingmaker

1. Tiradentes

   Sep 7, 2023

   10

   Not immune to bugs, Pathfinder: Kingmaker brings one of the best cRPG experiences I've ever participated in. With extremely interesting andNot immune to bugs, Pathfinder: Kingmaker brings one of the best cRPG experiences I've ever participated in. With extremely interesting and charismatic companions, be ready to dive into this quite complex but captivating and surprising story.… Expand

   • 0 of 0 users found this helpful
2. jseph1234

   Dec 2, 2018

   10

   This game is quite an enjoyable CRPG with complex decisions and situations along with great game-play and wonderful animations. I like thatThis game is quite an enjoyable CRPG with complex decisions and situations along with great game-play and wonderful animations. I like that your choices have significant repercussions to your companions, NPC's and the world in general. Great writing as well.… Expand

   • 5 of 13 users found this helpful
4. SDaemon

   Sep 25, 2018

   10

   It is just our beloved and awaited Bauldur's Gate v3.0!
   just throw your money right into the monitor and enjoy!

   • 47 of 85 users found this helpful
5. St0rmCr0w

   Nov 10, 2018

   8

   This is a must play for any fan of the golden age of computer role playing games. I'ts a hard nut to crack, admittedly, but that's part of the appeal.

   • 2 of 9 users found this helpful
6. Whiskeyjacker12

   Sep 29, 2018

   6

   Pathfinder: Kingmaker is a faithful adaption of the pen-and-paper that seeks to emulate the old golden age of isometric RPG's such a Baldur'sPathfinder: Kingmaker is a faithful adaption of the pen-and-paper that seeks to emulate the old golden age of isometric RPG's such a Baldur's Gate and Neverwinter Nights, and in this it is successful for better or worse. The game definitely gave me a nostalgia trip, the writing and combat are very much reminiscent of the games it seeks to idolize. But as a fun CRPG competing with the like of Pillar's of Eternity and and the Divinity: OS series it kinda falls flat on its face. The difficulty level is extremely variable between instances, you can easily carve your way through two dozen bandits without one tactical pause but god help you if you run into a spider swarm or any creature with poison or level drain because the incredibly fast stacks of these effects will wipe out even a high level party in a few paltry seconds. And in explaining these effects and how to counter them, the game does an extremely poor job. I found myself trawling through game books and bestiaries just so I knew what exactly the my poor characters was rolling against as the in-game bestiary is all but useless leading to more than a few frustrating moments where spamming healing spells and potions were all that got me through a 5 minute slog of a fight. Which brings another weakness of the game, a poor combat UI. Oh, you can easily see when your own characters health is going down, but trying to see if that wyvern you're attacking is nearly dead or if you're spell had any linger effect on it and it turns into a guessing game. In comparison to Pillar's of Eternity and it's open and helpful stream of information, I felt like i was flying in the dark for most fights. In this it definitely sticks close to it's pen and paper roots, but in a modern computer game it feels dated and a little cruel, though I'm sure old CRPG fans and Pathfinder fans will beg to differ. The only thing more frustrating than getting a party wipe are the quest bugs that prevent you from finishing a quest in the first place, twice now (30 hrs played) i've seen questlines break or otherwise railroad me into a decision just so I finish them without the game glitching out. The counter intuitive usage of the kingdom management section also irked me. Several timed missions may give you a year to complete it's conditions but will only lay down the quest strings for it's completion 3 weeks before quest failure, the lack of side quests in between these sporadic bursts of questing are a dull drone of aimless exploring and waiting for events and projects to complete improving a kingdom stat that... really doesn't change anything but does mess up the tension and pacing of the story. In conclusion, the game has promise. It's balancing issues and bugs aside, the aesthetic of the game and writing are beautiful but are dragged down by balancing issues, bugs and poor implementation of the kingdom management feature. I'll aim to complete this run through but I can't see much of a draw after to turn around and do another run through.… Expand

   • 7 of 16 users found this helpful
7. kt6193

   Sep 27, 2018

   4

   There's no huge fundamental issues with P:K, just a bunch of small things that begin to add up to a less than enjoyable experience at times.There's no huge fundamental issues with P:K, just a bunch of small things that begin to add up to a less than enjoyable experience at times.
   
   I'm about 2 to 3 hours in the game (not counting the 2 hours I spent making my character), and have experienced just as much frustration as enjoyment. Overall I can't give this game a bad rating as there are definitely fun and awesome things about it. Like I mentioned, I spent 2 hours making my character, but that was completely by choice. You can blaze through the character creator super quickly if you want (even by just choosing a pre-made character), or you can sit back and read about everything and choose, change your mind, consider other options, etc etc.
   After the creation I noticed one of the very trivial issues with these types of games: while the voice acting is great, there is no narrator. This results in having only part what's typed out said. You'll have typed out dialogue that features speech, narration, and then more speech, but due to the lack of a narrator you'll just hear the voice actor, and tiny pause about a second, and then the voice actor again. This causes the player to either have to read the narration super quickly (often while the voice actor is speaking) or waiting till the audio is done so they can go back and read the narration. I resorted to turning off voices to fix this issue as I'd like to get the whole picture of whats happening...not just what's being said.
   The next two issues are somewhat related to each other. The camera is fixed to an exact angle. I've personally always hated this as it quite literally hides things. Specifically this fixed angle—along with the fog of war—effectively hid the only way to progress out of the building my party was in. We walked down a hall way and into a room with a puzzle involving swords (don't worry I won't spoil anything) and couldn't see the door we could open due to it being hidden by the fixed camera angle. In similar isometric CRPG where you can rotate the camera this problem would never have happened for obvious reasons: the rotation of the camera! Because of this not only did I think we HAD to complete this surprisingly tough puzzle to progress, but I also became completely lost and confused when I eventually finished the puzzle and still was stuck in this building. Eventually after watching a few youtube let's plays, I found the door that was hiding in plain sight. This would be fine if the door was supposed to be hidden but when you spend 20 or 30 minutes looking for a door that you'd see in 0.1 seconds with a rotating camera that's no longer the player's fault....
   Lastly, and very briefly I experience a camera lock issue where I couldn't pan the camera in any direction and the only way to move it was to double click a character's portrait. So if they ran off the screen you'd have to double click each time they ran off the screen... A complete restart of the game fixed this issue though.
   
   All in all It's roughly worth it's base asking price of 39.99. I personally wouldn't bother with the more expensive special editions you can buy, but at the end of the day it's your money.… Expand

   • 13 of 26 users found this helpful
8. ottohahn

   Jun 12, 2021

   0

   Played the most recent patch in June 2021.
   The Kingdom Management Minigame is boring and sucks.
   The balancing is horrible. Some Enemies arePlayed the most recent patch in June 2021.
   The Kingdom Management Minigame is boring and sucks.
   The balancing is horrible. Some Enemies are Paperweights and some are just unbeatable.
   Additionally the difficulty is increased by throwing mob after mob at the player.
   Last act is incomprehensible and has also horrible balancing.
   Story is the generic "ancient evil destroys the lands".
   There are also technical difficulties. What can take approx 1min to save the game on a 8-core cpu with 32GB RAM and fast SSD?
   I had to force myself to finish the game.… Expand

   • 1 of 2 users found this helpful

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