Well, I’ve gotten the opportunity to play quite a few new RTS games lately, all of which have had me doing everything from wiping out alien civilizations to playing historic battles and looking to expand and conquer empires. Well, it’s nice to get back to medieval fantasy times once more in the latest RTS that I’ve sat down and run through called Kohan II: Kings of War … the latest entry to the RTS market by Timegate and Global Star Software.

Kohan II opens up with a cool scene in which a human army is seizing a stronghold owned by the dark and demonic Shadow forces who have ravaged the lands (end of the first game I would presume since I never actually got to sit down and play it). Well, a hero’s work is never truly done, especially when a sequel is made, and Kohan II picks up with attacks by bandit hordes becoming more and more frequent. Lo and behold, it appears that the dark world of the Shadow is at it again, and you of course pick up the role of an awaken Kohan hero and rally the people to head out into battle once more to vanquish the darkness and restore peace to the land.

In typical RTS format, players can expect to manage resources and recruit heroes to do their bidding. The way that K2 does this though is pretty unique in itself, since there are six different races to select from (human, undead, shadow, haroun, druaga, and gauri) and each one will rely on different variations of resources to bring out more troops or add new buildings to their encampments to help increase stockpiles or do new research into bigger and better troops or armaments. In addition, there are different factions that you can elect to put your people into, each one adding different unique strengths like advanced sight or better production to help in building strategy.

With the six unique races also comes a variety of troops to use and command or unlock as you upgrade and add new structures to your encampment, which really helps out in customizing gameplay and the armies that you wish to control. For example, the human races will get foot soldiers for swordsmen, or men on horseback for cavalry, while the undead forces will use zombies and ghouls to represent footmen or cavalry. This also plays in variation to siege weapons if you are attempting to destroy a wall or claim an enemy town, since you can have things like catapults or big Leviathan creatures that will take care of this for you. It depends on what race you select, but it’s nice to have in there to make your army unique.

Another thing that K2 does to help set itself apart from some other RTS titles is to give you full control over units by simply selecting the main commander. If you have an outfit that consists of say four swordsmen and two archers, it can be a little tough trying to drag and select or pick all of them if they happen to be a bit scattered … so it makes it a lot easier to simply click on the commander to rally them all back together and send them out as one unit. Have no fear though … you can select and move multiple armies by left clicking and dragging, but as long as the commanders are selected in the shaded area that you have made their armies will tag along with them.

One of the biggest things about K2 that really makes this game enjoyable (but may wind up being frustrating for others) is the fact that the game really does use and emphasize some actual strategy versus just marching a big group of things across the field and trying to kill everyone. Using woods or entrenching will give defensive bonuses, and the enemy AI will attempt to do the same thing as well even on the normal difficulty level. There were many times where a bad decision that I made caused me to get flanked shortly after suffering heavy losses and costing me the game, and it really forced me to try and play a little smarter rather than just coming out and using brute force tactics. While this is a good thing for many people, gamers who may not be really RTS savvy may just find that to be too difficult.

Graphically, Kohan II does a great job in representing the medieval fantasy world that it was designed to portray. The game is bright and colorful, and whether at a distance or zooming in close units were well animated and looked great either in or out of battle. Whenever characters converse with one another, a picture window will also appear in the bottom of the screen (similar to Warcraft III) to help add some life to the people involved. There were also some neat effects added in like sparks flying off of clashing weapons or cloud shadows rolling over the terrain … and even some animal herds like rams or sheep will occasionally run by to add a dash of neutral wildlife to the war conflicted landscape.

The sound in K2 was also pretty decent, with a good musical score that emphasized the timeframe involved and some good weapon clashing and clanking. The voiceovers were there to help move the story along of course, but at times seemed a little too scripted or read off and it was hard to really listen to them and get into what was being said.

Overall, Kohan II provides a good medieval RTS title that fans of the sword and sorcery games will more than likely appreciate. Gamers who don’t have a lot of previous RTS playing experience may find it to be a little difficult as they progress due to the AI and the tactical part of the game, but it still deserves a look anyways if you like good sized army battles complete with flying fireballs, arrows, and the occasional demonic horde involvement. Overall I enjoyed K2, and I’ll probably go and try to find the first one at some point here in the next couple of weeks.     

Gameplay: 8.4
While there is resource management present, the game has simplified it to building and upgrading structures to help keep it simple and balance between that and action. The unit selection is also much simpler since you can click on the commander versus having to drag around each person. While this may seem like it takes some individuality out of it since units cannot be used one at a time, it makes it easier to move and keep track of what is going on out on the field.  

Graphics: 8.6 
The world and everything in it is very colorful, and the battles (which can contain probably well into 100 or more troops) are well animated and look great. There are also some good additions that were added in looks wise, like collapsing walls or cloud shadows moving over the land.

Sound: 8.2
The music has a good medieval tone to it, and helps set the game up well. There are voiceovers, but they do tend to sound very scripted at times and were hard to really get into. The battle scenes did a good job though, and players will get to hear all of the clanging and clashing of troops as they clash in battle.

Difficulty: Hard
While strategy veterans may not find this game to be as difficult as “Hard”, players that are a little newer to the RTS world may find it to be a little difficult due to the good AI and strategy tactics that are emphasized like entrenching and flanking.  

Concept: 8.4 
While RTS games have obviously been done before, K2 does a good job in offering what makes them fun while keeping all of the areas involved in a good balance to help with overall enjoyment.

Multiplayer: N/A

Players who are tired of always going up against the computer can get online and play with many different factions warring with each other at one time. I was not able to actually play an online game though, since either all games were booked up or no one else was on to join when I created one. 

Overall: 8.5
While it’s hard to say that this is something brand new, it is an RTS title that has its own unique presentation and good emphasis on what these games are supposed to do, which is be strategic. RTS fans looking for a good title to get into will have fun with Kohan II, and newer players will get a kick out of it, but may find it a little frustrating at first.