izigame.me

Kill Knight is finally here! After 6 months and dying to play the game after heavily enjoying the demo, was it worth the wait? I’d say so. Does it set the twin stick genre on fire and take it to a new realm of game design and arcade action? Not exactly, but it does offer a lot to fans of the genre.
———————
It’s sad that this needs a disclaimer, but first it should be mentioned this is NOT a vampire survivors type game or a roguelite, and NO, that does not make it worse. This is an arcade game and arcade games live and breathe via their gameplay systems, score-chasing potential, tight and polished gameplay and level design, and a deemphasizing of fluff, including hundreds of useless guns/upgrades and randomized/procedurally generated levels. This is a skill based genre that rewards mastery, not getting lucky via the right perks.
Now onto the actual review.
———————————
At its core, Kill Knight like all twin stick arcade games share DNA with games like robotron and smash TV. The first thing that sets it apart is its loadout system. Your knight is compromised of several aspects to their kit such as primary and secondary weapon, sword, armor, cape etc. each category has different gear that you must unlock, and you can mix and match the gear to make a build that suits you. There are no other alternate characters, but the loadout system lets you make many combinations. The first critique is some gear seems to invalidate others and sometimes feel like direct improvements of previous gear. Some of the weapons don’t seem to change playstyle too much either. It’s solid but could have been better.
The next thing that sets kill knight apart is its mechanical depth. There are a lot of options and attacks available compared to a typical twin stick shooter. There’s a gears of war active reload system with a 3 forked choice of what attack to do during the reload. You have a primary and secondary fire with a doom eternal style ammo system for secondary weapons. You can absorb enemy orbs at any time with a button to pull them towards you magnetically. Your secondary weapon also has a special shot once you absorb enough enemy orbs. You also have a sword that can be used any time. Your sword can also parry certain attacks and do execution style kills on staggered enemies. There’s also bayonetta style witch time that can be activated after a parry as well as a hyper attack once your sword meter is fully filled. While at first it seems a lot to keep track of (and it is), it doesn’t really take long to get a grasp of the gameplay loop. It essentially boils down to knowing what active attack to do to keep your resources in equilibrium and also to maximize damage per second. The positive of the gameplay systems is in giving the player more options, there’s more opportunity for meaningful player decisions and there’s a constant resource and weapon management aspect while also fighting the enemies. This requires the player to develop situational awareness in order to help inform their decisions. The downside is while the breadth of mechanics does add to the strategy, at times it can feel like the actual depth of the game isn’t quite parallel to the breadth of attacks, sometimes making the game feel mechanically bloated without adding much. Again, there’s a lot of good here, but the game doesn’t quite take full advantage of its mechanics.
The level design follows a similar trend, and by now you may be noticing the overarching pattern. The level design is pretty good, but can feel like a bit of a one-trick-pony in that the game relies too heavily on a single aspect of the level design for being a condensed arcade game; that aspect is the arena lasers. Basically, the arena sizes and shapes are constantly changing, and eventually the game starts adding in these lasers that you must dodge through while fighting enemies. It seems like a mechanic that you’d expect occur in a part of the run then move onto something else, but this laser system once it is introduced in level 1 becomes the bread and butter for basically the rest of the entire run. The laser patterns do change constantly, and each level does introduce new enemy types and some level specific mechanics. It just feels at times that these new introductions from level to level take a back seat to the arena lasers and I feel the game was too heavy handed with this system as a way to try to force difficulty rather than through more fundamental bullet-hell aspects like complex bullet patterns or enemy types.
Speaking of enemy types. Again there’s a lot of good here but don’t quite live up to their potential for me, and that is mainly because many of the enemy types have very direct and easy solutions, such as just waiting for the chance to parry and kill them, or another example is the game basically wants you to always use special shot on armored enemies (armored enemies are purple and your special shot is purple and causes explosions when shot into armored enemies). Essentially, what could otherwise have been great ways to pressure the player into scary situations via enemies at times can feel like the game gives you too easy methods to dispatch even what are supposed to be the most tanky and threatening enemies instantly.
I’ll begin to wrap up my review with a collection of assorted thoughts.
-I personally think the health system is too generous. You can go from basically on the brink of death to back to full health pretty quickly in some scenarios, undermining the typical arcade aspect of your mistakes having long term consequences (often the main consequence of getting hit is lowering your score).
-The bosses (or lack thereof). Not to spoil anything, but the game was underwhelming with its boss design, however this is basically a staple with twin stick shooters as really none of them have great bosses and they all generally use the same general bullet patterns with straight shooting bullets that fan out in circular shapes.
- the game feel of kill knight is excellent and perhaps its defining feature. It just “feels” good. Very smooth, you move fast but not too fast. Weapons feel fun. Killing enemies is fun. You’re a knight. You kill. What’s not to like?
-circle strafing seems too powerful in the game. To those who don’t know, circle strafing is where you run in a circle around enemies while also shooting enemies by rotating your aim as you strafe. Because the game relies heavily on fodder type enemies and enemies that chase you, you can at times breeze through certain arenas with almost no challenge or strategy circle strafing. The game could have done a better job at times to force the player into more complex movement patterns via enemy and level design/hazards.
-the game also has a kind of issue where harder difficulties don’t feel particularly much harder, due to the overall setup of the game design. The game essentially rewards the player as much as punishes the player when you introduce more enemies, because more enemies = more orbs = lets you do your special attack more often = more health. It also means you can restock your secondary weapon easier because sword attacks will kill more enemies with each sword swing, and secondary weapon is designed to be able to clear a ton of enemies quickly. Basically there’s a kind of positive feedback loop within its game design that somewhat nullifies how much the difficulty can be increased simply through introducing denser enemies, because sometimes it can actually help you rather than pressure you more.
————————
In conclusion, Kill Knight is an impressive game that adds a hot new title for fans of the genre to pick up that boasts great and intense game feel, visceral aesthetics, and a nice blend of enemies and weapons. It falls short of its potential in some areas, sometimes trading depth for breadth. While it doesn’t take the genre to new heights in my opinion, I’d still say give it a try, especially if a more casual player.