Top 10 features in The City of Kings
The City of Kings is all about going on an adventure with your friends, giving you the freedom to do what you want and providing an immersive challenge. So we wondered, how would our playtesters describe The City of Kings to their friends?
We sent out a small questionnaire and here are the top 10 things people mentioned when describing The City of Kings and a description of what they are!
10: CONTROLLING MULTIPLE CHARACTERS
In The City of Kings you control your hero, workers and any creatures you encounter. The balance between spending actions on your hero or your workers helps to vary each turn and lets you focus on the experience you want to have.
By controlling your own creatures, it removes the need for a game master whilst reducing downtime between rounds.
9. QUESTS
There are so many different quests you never know what you’re going to get!
There are 112 quests in the game which introduce different challenges including race the clock, gambling, escort, defeat a creature, search for items and even quick dexterity games.
Most quests will offer 2 options as they have been designed to push risk vs reward discussions. Do you want a bigger reward for a more difficult challenge, or will you take the easy way out?
8. WORKER MANAGEMENT
It is not all about killing creatures, you will also have to send your workers out to gather resources and build structures. You have the option to gather ore, fish, wood and linen at various locations or to search enemy camps for items they may have left lying around.
7. REPLAYABILITY
No two games are the same
Board games are a big investment, not only is there an upfront cost but you have to spend time learning the game and then teach others how to play. With this in mind, we designed The City of Kings to be as replayable as possible, with a modular board, over 100 quests, countless ways to customise your characters and procedurally generated creatures you will continue to experience new challenges and have to find new ways to win.
6. MAP EXPLORATION
The first thing you’ll want to do when playing is move and explore, turning over tiles to discover what’s there. You’ll start in the Ageless Realms which is the easier area and when ready, enter Azure Rise where things will get really tough.
5. STRATEGY
It’s challenging but there should be always a way to win it! You just need to figure it out!
Adventuring wouldn’t be fun without puzzles to solve! So you’ll need to keep your eyes open and uncover the secrets of the game. We haven’t made it easy for you, you will be tested, you will have to work together and come up with a plan to move forward but we are confident you can always find a way to win.
4. STORY AND IMMERSION
The lore and world feed the game which makes a much more cohesive and enjoyable experience.
We are designing more than a game, we are creating a world filled with stories which we want you to experience. You will encounter characters that we want you to love and hate, places that you fear and others that you would happily call home.
3. COOPERATION
It would be hard for someone to alpha game this, it’s always different. You have to work together more than any other game I have played.
For those who haven’t played the game it may seem strange to see cooperation at number 3, but for those who have, there will be an understanding. You see The City of Kings makes you work as a team, you will have highs and lows, share in the rewards and create memories of your adventure. We wanted to create a true team experience where everyone plays a role which is vital to your survival, much more than any other game.
2. CHARACTER CUSTOMISATION
Levelling up together and navigating the skill tree.
Everyone is different, as you read this I have no understanding of what you enjoy when playing a game. Perhaps you love to explore? Maybe you’re interested in fighting, healing or managing resources? Do you prefer to organise and control dangerous situations? Or do you just want to experience a bit of everything!
At number 2, our character customisation system has proven to be a great success and really will offer you the chance to play however you wish. You can watch a video about it here.
1. CREATURE MECHANICS
They are different to any game I’ve seen.
When we first set out to create The City of Kings we wanted to design a combat system which didn’t involve luck. We wanted to provide puzzles where you could see all the possible outcomes but had to decide which was the best path to take.
We didn’t want you to require a game master or an app and we certainly didn’t want huge amounts of upkeep at the end of each round. We often hear combat is the worst part of many games and we want to change that.
So it was great to see creature mechanics taking the number 1 spot. In the coming weeks we’ll be releasing details about how our creature mechanics work and a video explaining combat.
Make sure you sign up to our newsletter to be notified of its release.
SUMMARY
We set out to create a highly replayable story driven cooperative adventure game with something for everyone, we wanted a great combat system and so far the feedback shows we are well on our way to achieving this.
We can’t wait to hear your feedback when you get a chance to play!
Frank West
Frank West is a gamer and designer based in Bristol, UK. He published his first board game, The City of Kings, in 2018 and now works on other games and organising events in the local area. His goal? To design and publish games focusing on immersive themes, fun mechanics and beautiful components. If you have any questions or would just like a chat, feel free to get in touch at any time!