Alien Kingdom - review

Alien Kingdom is a game that has been available on Steam since the end of July. It belongs to the adventure-strategic genre, which attracts attention because usually these types of games are not very well made and are daunting. Is this also the case with Alien Kingdom?

About the game

In the game, we play as an unspecified character whose adventure begins on the planet Aesa. The player's task is to build his kingdom while finding and saving villagers who are scattered throughout the map. Unfortunately, the ubiquitous monsters will make it difficult, because they will attack anyone who is near them.

It is worth noting that Aesa is just one of the four worlds available in the game. Each of them differs in atmosphere and monsters. We can unlock them only if we defeat enemy bases in a given world.

Control and rules

In the game, we control our character from the first-person perspective, which allows feeling much more into the game. Moving around is quite intuitive and simple.

In addition to the standard W, A, S, D, the player can activate the shield, which temporarily absorbs the damage dealt to us, but also he can use the rapid movement of a short distance in a given direction. It is also worth mentioning the option of returning to our base after pressing the appropriate button. This is important because there is no minimap in the game, so it's easy to get lost.

The gameplay on Aesa can be varied by changing any of the options in the game, including:

By clicking the first icon in the attached picture, our hero shoots a plasma that deals quite low damage, but it significantly renews our energy. The second icon allows you to attack with two saucers that deal damage and apply bleeding, which allows you to quickly eliminate the enemy. Unfortunately, it renews much less energy.

The first of the icons in the above image allows you to attack with fire, in a short distance in front of our character. It deals huge damage and is crucial in quickly eliminating enemies. After clicking the second icon, we can repair building elements that have been slightly damaged.

The last and most interesting icons are those shown in the picture above. They allow you to change the weather depending on your needs. After clicking the first icon, the sky on the planet is cloudless, and our hero gains additional health points.

Clicking the second icon causes rain all over the planet, which heals our character from time to time.

Unfortunately, only one of the icons in a given category can work at a time, which forces the player to constantly customize them according to own needs. In addition, the player has an impact on the type of gameplay itself by increasing/reducing the following options:

Difficulty significantly increases the health and damage of monsters found on the planet. The benefit for the player is that he gets much more experience for defeating them.

Intensity, on the other hand, increases the number of monsters, which gives the player the opportunity to quickly obtain the raw materials that we receive after defeating them.

I have already mentioned that by defeating monsters, you gain experience. It is needed to gain the next level, which allows you to build more interesting buildings. In addition to character level, you need the right resources, which can be obtained by defeating the monsters. Unfortunately, in terms of building structures, I was disappointed a lot. It turns out that the individual buildings constructed by us, as well as those encountered during exploration, are just for the appearance and there is no way to enter them. This significantly limits the gameplay and kills one of the most interesting elements, such as furnishing the buildings.

Overall impressions

I must admit that the game developers pay attention to the problems presented by players and every week they add a new update that improves the gameplay. Unfortunately, it's still easy to find a lot of bugs. One of them is using the button that allows you to quickly move in a selected direction over a fairly short distance. With it, you can even go through the walls, but if we do it on the edge of the map, then our hero will be outside of the map and the only way to return is teleportation in front of our house.

Another quite significant drawback is saving the game, which must be done manually. Most games have a built-in autosave feature for a long time, so the player may forget to save, which results in the loss of the progress he has made in the game.

The positive aspect of the game is the player's huge impact, both in terms of weather and the strength of the creatures. The game is quite interesting, although it requires many improvements to encourage the player for longer. It has been available on Steam since July this year, so if you are looking for a strategy adventure game, maybe you will give Alien Kingdom a chance?

Review written by our moderator: KappaHype