Blood Knights Review

Recent title from developers Deck 13, Blood Knights, has the potential to be a half decent action RPG. Unfortunately, it falls disappointingly short in a few areas that are crucial to a good gameplay experience.

Blood Knights follows the story of a vampire hunter recently turned vampire due to his link with the second playable character of the game, Alysa. Jeremy, our protagonist, has received orders to retrieve the Blood Seal buried deep inside some sort of cave, however, the knowledge we have about this is limited, as the game appears to throw you in at the deep end with not much prior explanation or backstory.

The Diablo and Torchlight-esque visuals of the game, although probably not at their best, are nothing to complain about. My first issue with the game lies with the camera movement. Jumping in, you’ll notice that you have no control over the camera, which becomes infuriating at times, especially if you’re familiar with using different angles in other games to obtain full control over your character. Zooming in or out to get a better grasp on where you’re going is pretty much out of the question, and if you need to hop between platforms, you’re sometimes required to do this at an unhelpful, slanted angle. These are all elements that you can get used to when you’re mindlessly hack ’n’ slashing through enemies, however; it seems quite unnecessary that you should have to.


As previously mentioned, the storyline and how it’s portrayed has a lot to answer for. The voice acting and dialogue from most characters in the game comes off as fake and unenthusiastic a lot of the time. You’re presented with multiple choice questions throughout the story, although these won’t bear much difference over the outcome of the situation, and are just used as a way to obtain extra information that isn’t always necessary.  

Cutscenes seem to pop up frequently in the game, and often when they’re not needed; on the first level you will be faced with an enemy, and if you’re not completing the objective fast enough, you’ll be reminded of this every ten seconds by means of these cutscenes that you’ll find yourself ‘escaping’ out of.

Although I have primarily touched upon a few negative points, the game isn’t all bad. Once you familiarise yourself with the camera bearings and persistent cutscenes, it can be quite enjoyable and addictive. If you’re looking for something slightly more simplified than what we usually find in the action RPG genre, Blood Knights also has it’s advantages.

The combat in this title is very basic and doesn’t seem to be something that has been thought too deeply or creatively about. Although the lack of attacks ensures a minimal learning curve, it would have been nice to see a few more attacks put in place.

Upon launch you will be talked through the different attacks for each character in a simple tutorial: Jeremy uses sword attacks and his combo moves are most likely the ones you’ll be using to wipe out groups of enemies whilst Alysa, on the other hand, takes a completely different style, with her bow and arrow she’s capable of blowing up barrels which have an exploding grenade-like effect on the enemies around her. It’s fair to say that both protagonists are effective and are required equally as each other to pass certain levels, although it appears that Jeremy is slightly faster and more powerful than Alysa, the character you attack with the most will depend entirely on your personal play style. Characters are switched between quickly and seamlessly with the use of “Q”.

The enemies that you will find don’t bear much difference over each other and most of their attacks are similar therefore defeating them is, the majority of the time, straightforward. You’re more likely to die from making a silly mistake such as walking in water or falling off a platform. The armor and weapons you carry are always upgradeable, and you’ll find these dotted around certain levels, whether the items you pick up are superior to the ones you’re already wearing is indicated by a simple green arrow, so there is no need to go searching for your statistics, which definitely makes for a quicker transition into new gear.

The save points in Blood Knights appear few and far between at first. They don’t glow or shine in any colour unless they’re walked through, at which point your game is saved, up to that time they could potentially be mistaken for just another decorative object in the level. The advantage of the way they’ve been designed is that saving your current progress is extremely quick and simple, no menus involved, allowing you to jump in and out of the game as frequently as you wish.

It’s clear to see that Blood Knights definitely has some problem areas which could hinder your experience with the game, though for a price of only £11.99, a flawless finish isn’t to be expected. After half an hour with this title a couple of issues will go unnoticed, and some enjoyment can be found, however I wouldn’t go as far as recommending it if becoming engaged with a storyline and characters is something you look for in a game.