5 Reasons To Play Kingdoms Of Amalur: Reckoning

5. Graphics

Kingdoms of Amalur is pretty, but in a brutal, comic book way that is sometimes seen as a gimmick in games but never as the central theme to the visuals. It's no surprise that it's this way seeing as one of the lead artists on the project was Todd McFarlane of Spawn fame. The Faelands are a sprawling kingdom that encompass territories including deserts, forests, icelands, and treacherous swamp areas where every slick and bog can spell the end to all but the most wary traveller. The environments are all bright and vibrant, and the architecture of the many dungeons is as dark and dank as you'd expect, but often lit by fluorescent plants that add a surprise amount of warmth and personality as you trudge, alone, towards your goal. Characters are big and bulky, and look as tangible €“ if not as realistic €“ as actors in a movie. Running, rolling, and most other actions are weighted beautifully depending on your equipment and what type of terrain you're making your way across, and of course they're all customisable in the grand tradition of all RPGs. Enemies are varied too, ranging from the usual goblins, trolls, and OMG how big must their webs be giant spiders, all the way through to less common fare. Panthers the size of busses, two headed monstrosities that pick at your shield and at your spine at the same time, and ghostly demons that erupt form the floor when you're not looking and work in tandem with each other to bring you down as they zip around you in a whirl of colour and pain. It's not a perfect looking game, and it sometimes suffers from bouts of slow-down that are far more irritating than they are game breaking, as well as some texture pop-in, but that's to be expected from a game so big, where the views stretch off into the distance, and every place you can possibly see can be reached if you have the courage to go wandering.