Knights Of Honor, a good but old idea done well (Knights Of Honor (PC))

Member Name: Shorrtybearr

Product:	Knights Of Honor (PC)
Date:	17/05/09 (8 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Depth without confusion, addictive, easy to master

Disadvantages: Certain aspects are simplistic at times, suprisingly not much replay value

Knights of Honor is a strategy/battle sim. And a fairly good one at that.

Its not quite in the realm of say the Civ series or in fact the Age of empires series but it doesn't really try to rival them directly. Its more of a mixture between the two without the depth each "specialized" series has, which to be fair could be taken the wrong way but this is not the case with KoH because i feel its has enough in each to hold its own.

The managerial side of KoH is very important to the game, in fact i would say it was probably designed around it, it has a good amount of depth without being overly complicated and rushing the player with a thousands options to early.
The city building if you can call it that is quite limited and even more so by the surrounding resources and building early on can be a bit of a chore (as with most builder sims) but once the game gets going you can really start turning small towns into serious military/religious/tax powerhouses to fund your growing empire.
For example if playing as Good ol' England and after taking over the British isles (including the whole of island :) ) you really begin to need military power to start your European conquest, this is where picking a target city with enough resources, few alliances, little military power and ease of access comes into play. A strong city that consistently produces military power can make or break your conquest.

The music to KoH is good and atmospheric but can get a little repetitive, but then again the amount of time you spend on sim games makes that point moot as that length of time with anything will make it a slight bore.

The battles are a good but slightly novel addition to KoH, i like out witting a more powerful army but to be honest the same formula will work time and time again. Its hardly a battle sim worthy of any awards.

Negotiations are very limited in KoH, the opposing countries either agree straight away or will do eventually, you can easily make enough money to up your favour with any of them to make them accept deals.

Rebels in the game are very annoying and quite repetitive, they seem to pop up at the most irritating times and in the most hard to reach places of your empire. Its realistic i suppose but very very annoying.

The Royal family and hiring of Knights is quite well done, you can hire (or employ a member of your royal family) to become a Knight, Merchant, Cleric, Builder, Spy, and Landlord.
Its done quite well with the exception of Landlord and Builder and to some extent spy as they become pretty redundant late on in the game.
I would like a bit more control over the royal family though, deciding who to marry etc.

That being said Knights of Honor is a good game, and you will loose many hours with it if you take a shine to it. Its not great but it is good.

Summary: Knights of Honor is a good game, you will loose many hours with it if you take a shine to it