Portal Knights Review – A Crafty Adventure Indeed

<p>For being one of the most popular games in the world&comma; <em>Minecraft<&sol;em> is one that I&&num;8217&semi;ve never been able to get into&period; Part of it is the blocky graphics&comma; which I&&num;8217&semi;ve never found to be that endearing&comma; the other part is not being interested in building things&period; <em>Portal Knights<&sol;em> is a game that at its base is a <em>Minecraft<&sol;em>-type game with farming materials and building things&comma; but is a bit more adventurous&period; <em>Portal Knights<&sol;em> came out earlier this year on other consoles&comma; but has brought some great co-op building and questing action to the Nintendo Switch&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><amp-youtube layout&equals;"responsive" width&equals;"500" height&equals;"281" data-videoid&equals;"IWOl1sGuiYY" title&equals;"Portal Knights Official Nintendo Switch Launch Trailer"><a placeholder href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;www&period;youtube&period;com&sol;watch&quest;v&equals;IWOl1sGuiYY"><img src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;i&period;ytimg&period;com&sol;vi&sol;IWOl1sGuiYY&sol;hqdefault&period;jpg" layout&equals;"fill" object-fit&equals;"cover" alt&equals;"Portal Knights Official Nintendo Switch Launch Trailer"><&sol;a><&sol;amp-youtube><&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>There is a bit of a story to the game set in a world which was once whole&comma; and then it was magically separated and all the realms split apart&period; The basis of the game is questing to find or craft pieces of portal stones to open up portals to move on to the next realm&period; You&&num;8217&semi;ll meet some NPCs here or there&comma; but the story is fairly minimal&semi; the quest to craft new gear and get to different realms is what you&&num;8217&semi;re playing for and it works for the most part&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;132348" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-132348" style&equals;"width&colon; 1000px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"size-large wp-image-132348" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2017&sol;12&sol;08133959&sol;portal-knights-official-nintendo-switch-release-date-trailer&lowbar;qgxu-1024x576&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"1000" height&equals;"563" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-132348" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">Portal Knights&comma; 505 Games<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>When the game first starts you get to pick one of the three classes&semi; warrior&comma; mage or rogue&period; You can pick if you want to be male or female&comma; and then go through a number of options in regards to skin and eye colour&comma; hair style&comma; and so forth&period; The game doesn&&num;8217&semi;t have a huge mix of options in regards to making your character&comma; but you don&&num;8217&semi;t really need them and the designs look cute enough you&&num;8217&semi;ll be happy with what you&&num;8217&semi;ve come up with&period; The first location you load in will be your tutorial level more or less&comma; where you&&num;8217&semi;ll learn the basics of combat&comma; crafting and more&period; Once you have a good grasp on the basics&comma; you create your first portal and then head off to the next realm&period; One thing to note is that the levels themselves are randomly generated when you load into them&comma; however they do seem to follow certain themes&comma; like deserts&comma; or ice worlds&comma; etc&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The crafting in the game works pretty well for the most part&comma; and is similar to those that have played games like <em>Minecraft<&sol;em> or <em>Terraria<&sol;em>&period; Go around and chop down trees&comma; dig up dirt&comma; attack enemies&comma; and then gather the resources that you get from them&period; Then you can either craft things on the spot&comma; or you need to go to a workshop table and craft items there&period; You can also build structures to your hearts content&colon; building little houses&comma; or large castles&comma; the sky is the limit&period; However&comma; since the game is so focused on progressing through realms to get to the end of the game&comma; you don&&num;8217&semi;t tend to stick around long enough to really warrant building things&comma; unless you really want to&period; I can see some people enjoying the crafting and building though and being content to build up their own creations and show them off&comma; but that just seems counter-intuitive to what the game wants you to be doing&period; Regardless&comma; I&&num;8217&semi;m sure there are a lot of really great things that have been built&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;132349" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-132349" style&equals;"width&colon; 1000px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><img class&equals;"size-large wp-image-132349" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2017&sol;12&sol;08134123&sol;PK&lowbar;Combat-1024x576&period;jpg" alt&equals;"" width&equals;"1000" height&equals;"563" &sol;><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-132349" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">Portal Knights&comma; 505 Games<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>What I did enjoy in <em>Portal Knights<&sol;em> over <em>Minecraft<&sol;em> though&comma; is the combat and RPG elements&period; The game does have a leveling system&comma; so when you are killing monsters&comma; or heading down through mines underground&comma; you&&num;8217&semi;ll get experience&period; After leveling up&comma; you can spend points to build up your stats and so forth&period; Additionally&comma; you&&num;8217&semi;ll often end up in new realms facing off against monsters that can be incredibly tough&comma; so there can be quite a bit of grinding in the game&period; Grinding to level is normal in the game&comma; but you can also find some materials to craft yourself some new gear&period; The combat as well I quite enjoyed&comma; as it feels a lot like <em>Legend of Zelda<&sol;em>&comma; where you can lock onto enemies and strafe&comma; move in for the kill&comma; and so forth&period; It&&num;8217&semi;s actually quite enjoyable and when playing with others&comma; it&&num;8217&semi;s fun to set up strategies when fighting tougher enemies&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Speaking of playing with others&comma; the game was definitely meant for that&period; You can play through the game with local co-op play&comma; or online with up to three other people&period; It&&num;8217&semi;s actually a really great experience&comma; and again&comma; fun when the warriors are tanking enemies while the mages and rogues DPS from afar&comma; and that&&num;8217&semi;s just combat&period; Working together to build things is also enjoyable&comma; much like working together and building things in <em>Fortnite<&sol;em>&period; You can play through the game solo&comma; but the game is a lot more fun when playing with others&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p><amp-youtube layout&equals;"responsive" width&equals;"500" height&equals;"281" data-videoid&equals;"O6ZZ4YUvHkc" title&equals;"Portal Knights Official Nintendo Switch Release Date Trailer"><a placeholder href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;www&period;youtube&period;com&sol;watch&quest;v&equals;O6ZZ4YUvHkc"><img src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;i&period;ytimg&period;com&sol;vi&sol;O6ZZ4YUvHkc&sol;hqdefault&period;jpg" layout&equals;"fill" object-fit&equals;"cover" alt&equals;"Portal Knights Official Nintendo Switch Release Date Trailer"><&sol;a><&sol;amp-youtube><&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Visually&comma; <em>Portal Knights<&sol;em> looks great&period; The worlds are often very vibrant and colourful&comma; and populated with all sorts of cute&comma; yet dangerous creatures&period; Also&comma; the game runs great both either docked or in handheld on the Switch&period; When I was playing in handheld&comma; I rarely noticed any framerate dips and the game remained looking very crisp&period; My only complaint though was the game has a day-night cycle&comma; and when I was playing in handheld mode&comma; it was often hard to see the game world when it was night time&period; I would crank up the brightness but it was still a bit too dark&period; The music in the game is also great&comma; with some nice ambient and tiny symphonic pieces&period; After clearing out enemies in some realms&comma; I would wander just to listen to the music and take in the game world&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>I quite enjoyed my time with <em>Portal Knights<&sol;em>&period; It had just the right amount of crafting and building things <em>Minecraft<&sol;em>-style to shake things up&comma; but the focus on RPG stat building&comma; gear crafting and fighting was spot on&period; As well&comma; if you have a family member that is moderately interested in this to play co-op with&comma; or friends far away to play online with&comma; the game is even better&period; <em>Portal Knights<&sol;em> is a cute adventure that is a bit of a mixed bag of game parts&comma; but they all come together to make for an enjoyable experience for those that like to craft and quest&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p style&equals;"text-align&colon; center&semi;"><strong>A review code was provided by 505 Games<&sol;strong><&sol;p>&NewLine;