Kingdoms of Amalur: Re-Reckoning

Overall, Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning isn't the perfect game. Its random technical hiccups and inconsistent art style certainly holds it back from even higher levels of greatness. But no matter what you're looking for, whether it be amazing gameplay, good storytelling or perhaps a riveting new world to explore as you fully customize and re-customize your character at will, Reckoning has it all

It's an unglamorous kind of success story, admittedly. And perhaps it's worrying for 38 Studios that the bland fantasy world it's hanging its future on is the least enticing aspect of its debut game. But it's not all elbow grease - Kingdoms of Amalur adds a splash of colour and a lick of polish to the open-world RPG, and they couldn't be more welcome.

Kingdom of Amalur has had a bit of a tumultuous life which saw developers 38 Studios and Big Huge Games suffer from financial troubles, staff lay-offs, and years of court cases. The IP was eventually sold off to THQ Nordic and after a couple years of silence we are finally getting a remaster of this often-overlooked action-RPG. While KoA has its faults, it does so many things right, including a flexible leveling system, fluid combat, and a gripping story.

Kingdoms of Amalur's combat and character advancement are fantastic enough to overshadow how bland everything else is.

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Divorced from its original chaotic development, Kingdoms of Amalur: Re-Reckoning feels like a remix of old gaming trends that are pleasant, if a bit generic.

While ultimately disappointing and generic, Reckoning is a fun and deeply engaging game with one of the best combat systems around.

Kingdoms of Amalur is still a solid game even to this day. It’s just too bad that as a remaster, the game is quite frankly disappointing.

Republished on Wednesday, 28th October, 2021: We're bringing this review back from the archives following the announcement of November 2021's PlayStation Plus lineup. The original text follows.

Taking off the rose-colored glasses of nostalgia can lead to facing some hard truths. With Kingdoms of Amalur: Re-Reckoning, we have an initially underrated game that feels outdated by today's standards.

You can make the argument that, if Skyrim can relaunch about a dozen times since 2012, then Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning — which is also a very good game — deserves to get away with it too. But when they don’t even bother to update the title in the opening shot of the game, I wonder if there’s any reason to dive into this if you’ve already had the experience. There is a planned DLC release called Fatesworn that will add an additional five or more hours to the over-100-hour experience, but such a small addition doesn’t excite.

On some levels, Kingdoms of Amalur: Re-Reckoning is still a worthwhile RPG to hack and slash your way through, even if this remaster doesn’t go above and beyond the bare minimum expectations. But while the ideas and mechanics that make games like Red Faction: Guerilla and Burnout feel special are still largely singularly unique to them, almost everything that made Amalur stand out in its day has become standard fare for just about any RPG to come out in the past decade. Its fast-paced action still entertains, for the most part, and there’s plenty to see and do in its big world – but after almo...