Just another medieval combat game, with attack helicopters
NEED TO KNOW
RELEASE 2024
DEVELOPER Redemption Road Games
PUBLISHER tinyBuild
LINK tinybuild.com
The first 22 seconds of a game trailer can tell you a lot. They set the scene, perhaps flash some publisher or engine logos, and establish the setting of the game in an easily digestible way. In Kingmakers’ trailer, we see armoured warriors clash on the field of battle.
Aha, you think. I know what this game is all about. With ManorLordsalso donning its armour and hefting its sword in this issue, it might be forgivable to think that PC Gamer has been taken over by fans of medieval warfare. And while that might actually be true, following the siege of PC Gamer Towers in 2020 that saw nasty trebuchet injuries all round, it’s the 23rd second of the trailer that shows Kingmakersisn’t ploughing the same ridge and furrow as its fellow feudal system admirers.
On the 23rd second, a truck drives into the struggling melee. It takes a run-up first, accelerating between dark-future ruined skyscrapers before some Back to the Future-style time travel flashes, then emerges for a spot of 15th-century roadkill as men at arms fly over its bonnet and are crushed beneath its wheels. Our intrepid protagonist, who seemingly has no sense of fair play, goes on to headshot someone with a pistol before blowing swordsmen into a fine red mist with a shotgun, and later stands on a castle wall with a grenade launcher and rifle, sniping a commander off his horse before dropping explosive little gifts into the swarming throng.
ON THE 23RD SECOND, A TRUCK DRIVES INTO THE STRUGGLING MELEE
FIRST LOOK
It’s quite a thing to behold, like a zombie horde game in which the undead are heavily armed and well trained, but the chaos is tempered by sections in which you’re able to switch to a TotalWar-style top-down view to position and command the squads under your control. There’s also a Fortniteflavour, with you placing buildings to build what could be a base that needs defending.
APOCALYPSE
What’s going on here is, apparently, simple. You’ve been sent back from the future to help avert the
