Kingdoms of Amalur: Re-Reckoning

THQ Nordic had at some point acquired the rights to the third person action roleplaying game Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning from EA and commissioned Kaiko to remaster it. (Kaiko had previously put together the Darksiders Warmastered Edition.) The remaster, Kingdoms of Amalur: Re-Reckoning, was released in 2020 and came with all its old downloadable content, which include two expansions I had never bought nor played. Kaiko also set out to develop a whole new expansion for the game: Fatesworn, which came out in 2021.

Re-Released

I think the remaster was largely just a minimum effort re-release with minor touches. I couldn't tell if anything had changed visually apart from there being camera and field-of-view options: you no longer need to view the game right from behind your character. The camera does still get locked there inside of most buildings -- and that feels quite claustrophobic when you've gotten used to it being farther away when outside and in dungeons.

There is also new Very Hard difficulty and supposedly adjustments onto how regions used to get locked to the level you first entered them, which could have led to them lack any challenge. I was specifically trying to avoid discovering areas too early this time so I can't say how well the adjustments were working. But I did have a lot more even experience; never having to kill effortless enemies for a quest.

In fact, I found Re-Reckoning to be quite challenging just on Hard difficulty. However, it may have been because I was leveling as a jack-of-all-trades -- Might, Finesse, and Sorcery skill trees evenly -- and using daggers, which are not great for fighting multiple enemies -- which the game's combat tends to be. And I'm not sure if challenging is the correct word either: frustrating might be more fitting. Using a healing potion is an instantaneous, no-cooldown activity so avoiding death isn't too hard. The game also has this hidden mechanic of adding certain items (like healing potions and lockpicks) to loot drops if you're running low on them.

With (mostly) the same old problems

The frustration comes from being staggered constantly. Dodge roll has very few i-frames -- if any -- and shield parry tends to have peculiar timing. I don't think the latter even works against the bigger enemies. Halfway through the second continent of the game, I did a slight respec, just like on my first run years ago. I did stay as a universalist spec but started using faeblades instead. Things got considerably smoother after that. That's also when I did the old expansions, The Legend of Dead Kel and Teeth of Naros.

(Re-)Reckoning is still way too long for the low enemy variety it has. You've soon seen about all opposition the game has to offer. Even with abilities from all three trees, it gets monotonous. The expansions do at least have few new foe types to kill.

It's hard to care about the game's story too. Characters keep changing per region like in any recent Ubisoft open world title. (Non-)Engagement to the narrative is on the same level as in questing in World of Warcraft. And it sure still is amusing how much the regions and art style too are reminiscent of that game.

One big issue the re-release doesn't fix (either), is inventory space and its messiness. There is a workaround in the game: the bag-selling merchant in Mel Senshir can be killed and he respawns after 4 days with another bag to sell. That is a lot of work for just 10 inventory slots per repeat: on PC you're better off just downloading the save game editor and increasing your inventory size to how ever high you want it, to be done with the headache once and for all.

A new expansion played by few

The Fatesworn DLC increases character level cap to 50 from 40. The cap however changes only once you get into the expansion, which takes places after the base game's story has concluded. I believe you can access the new tier 6 skills even in the main game already but because of universalist build, I never got to them.

Fatesworn introduces a new element: chaos. Chaos enemies have a special chaos health bar that needs to be destroyed first using chaos damage. That happens mostly by using chaos weapons which you need to craft yourself -- having maxed Blacksmithing will be very useful. On the post for the original game, I wrote that a lot of the game's skills are not needed but some of the ones I listed do in fact have their uses. Blacksmithing (and being able to make Epic gems with Sagecrafting) can make very potent items.

Chaos weapons have all manner of additional effects: the more chaos portals you close, the better chaos weapons you craft. The expansion requires you to close 5 but there are more scattered across the whole of Amalur. It's quite the chore to clear all of them: about as stimulating as Oblivion gates in The Elder Scrolls IV. At least there are only 25 chaos gates instead of 100.

I was approaching this NPC (as part of Fatesworn's main quest line), and just from the name alone got a sudden, odd feeling that I was about to be hit by a telltale sign the expansion was made in the current times. I guess her name 'Wynn Ashman' reminded me of the offscreen character Wyman in Dishonored 2 who gets a gender-neutral they treatment.

Then I talked to her and was greeted with a low voice. And she had a wife too. Quelle surprise.