Defender of the Crown: The Legend Returns

das alte Defender nochmals in neu.... dachte ich, Retromodus ist super! Das alte Defender halt, aber Klassikmodus ist echt nicht meins! Wie soll man bitte das Turnier gewinnen? Wer hat sich das ausgedacht? Die Lanze zappelt über den Bildschirm, bevor man was machen will ists schon vorbei... naja Das Truppen bewegen usw. ist ungewöhnlich aber ich denke das bekomme ich noch hin, vielleicht. Werde es jetzt erst nochmal im Retromodus spielen, der alten Zeiten wegen! ;-D

Habe das Spiel auf dem Amiga und auch auf dem C64 geliebt. Spiele es auch heutzutage immer wieder auf Emulatoren. Ich finde vor allem den neuen Königreich-Modus gelungen, mal was ganz anderes. Der Klaaik-Modus überzeugt mich auch. Nur der Retro-Modus sieht auf dem Emulator besser aus. Für mich absolut sein Geld wert.

I was really looking forward to this, even though I never played the original on the Amiga. However, I did play Robin Hood: Defender of the Crown on the PS2 back in the day (more than 20 years ago, Jesus) and I loved it. This game has the potential to be just as enjoyable, however in its current state its flawed. It feels like there weren't enough play testing (if any) before release and the game really needs some polish in order to be worth recommending it. Nostalgia won't carry it far. The game currently gets really repetitive and the AI of the enemy kingdoms could really use tweaking. In my second playthrough the first few rounds were filled with back and forth battles between me and the other kingdoms. However, once there were only three kingdoms left, the other two kingdoms stopped invading me and all they've done is build forts on the territories they controlled. I thought they were turtling, but most of these new forts were barely manned and it didn't seem like their main castles were housing large armies either. Even though the other two kingdoms controlled most of the map and they had plenty of resources to build up armies. So the rounds are mostly filled with me building up my army and taking out their territories one by one in a slow grind. I might actually prefer this to what actually happens. Which is that there's a round where I invade a territory, then a maiden gets kidnapped and I have to rescue them. Then there's a round of jousting, which I still haven't figured out how I'm supposed to win at and it's never really explained. Then there's another round of sieging, then a rescue mission, then a joust. On and on, always the same schedule. Medieval lords really should invest in some home security to keep their daughters being kidnapped on a weekly basis. I also don't understand why the kidnappers would try to kidnap the maidens time and time again only to get cut to pieces each time. It's a pretty high risk, no reward game. The controls are also a bit of a mess. Everything is bound to the mouse keys and movements, without the ability to rebind them to keyboard keys. This might not be that big of an issue, but I have two monitors and the game doesn't properly capture the mouse in the game window. So the mouse often escapes to my second monitor, especially during jousting making it even harder to perform at a mini game I already struggle with. All in all, the original Amiga game is a solid foundation for a remake like this and visually the game does look great, but unless the devs put in the work to address the bugs and adjust the AI I can't recommend this game. Hopefully they will.

3/10 I suppose my reasons for requesting a refund are best explained as a collection of issues rather than one single problem. The tutorials do a reasonable job of explaining what the various options and features are, but they largely fail to explain how the core game mechanics actually work in practice. For example, there is little to no useful instruction on how to properly use the catapult, how jousting works, how soldiers function, or how the different soldier types affect your performance in battle. The same problem extends to combat itself. Tactics seem to have little apparent effect, and without understanding how the available options actually influence the outcome of battles, it often feels like I'm simply guessing at what I'm supposed to do. These are not minor features. They are fundamental mechanics of the game, and without a clear explanation of how to use them or how they affect gameplay, it becomes very difficult to meaningfully engage with the game beyond trial and error. Bonus misleading trailer information: The jousting in the trailer shows what equates to a targeting recital with score values. This did not exist in game for me.

Excellent... Nice piece of gaming history. Enjoying the past and new upgrades.

I mean its pretty cool. Its just that usually your memory of the game is way better than the reality of what it really was. Thanks for remaking this!

Der Retro-Mode zeigt schön, wie man die Vergangenheit romantisiert. Im Vergleich dazu ist der Klassik-Modus top: Bessere UI, moderner Pixel-Look. Komplexität des Spiels bleibt natürlich überschaubar, aber das hat auch seinen Charm. Was allerdings gar nicht geht, weder im Original noch im Klassik-Remake: Das Turnier.