King's Bounty II Dev Diary #1 showcases exploration, hero management, and tactical combat

1C Entertainment has released the first in a series of developer diary videos for tactical RPG King's Bounty II. The footage focuses on the three core aspects of game: exploration, hero management, and tactical combat.

You can check out the video and description below via 1C Entertainment. King's Bounty II is set to release on PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC some time in 2020. For more information, you can check out the announcement trailer and details.

This new entry in the series adds core RPG elements and a fully branching narrative adventure to the strategic combat King’s Bounty is known for. The developer team say that players can expect roughly one third of the experience to be combat with exploration, puzzles, and new characters expanding greatly on the world introduced in past installments of this in the series.

The dev diary also explores the 4 main ideals Order, Power, Finesse, and Anarchy. Players can put talent points into each of these ideals, granting different bonuses and changing how characters in the world interact with your hero. Player’s choices and quests throughout their journey shape who they are and what people think of them. A character’s disposition will directly affect how they are perceived by people in the world of Antara, leading to different outcomes throughout the entirety of the game. A bandit, for example, will respond more favorably to a follower of Anarchy than someone who upholds Order.

King’s Bounty II combat stays true to that of past games, however players can expect advancements to match modern tactics based encounters with some unique additions that are completely new to the series. Hex-based battles will play out across a 3 dimensional battlefield in the games open world setting, creating seamless transitions from exploration to combat and add purpose to placement in terrain. Army composition has also changed in King’s Bou