Best Game Ever.
Knights and Merchants: The Shattered Kingdom (shortened TSK) is a medieval-time based Real-time strategy game. It has been developed by Joymania and published by TopWare Interactive in 1998. You take the role of the captain of the palace guards and lead your soldiers and tell your people what to build where, in order to defeat your enemies. If you enjoy the medieval theme, you'll probably have fun playing the game. The game did not receive a strong critical or popular reception in the UK and the US, but elsewhere it was more popular, consequently a follow up game was released called Knights and Merchants: The Peasants Rebellion. Recently it has also been made available in the US as a value game.
Contents [hide]
1 Overview 2 Economy 3 Sounds & Music 4 Technology 5 Battle 6 Soldiers 6.1 Archers 6.2 Infantry 6.3 Cavalry 7 Buildings 8 Sequels 9 External links [edit] Overview
Knights and Merchants: The Shattered Kingdom has a single player campaign that consists of 20 scenarios with scenario length ranging from around 30 minutes up to 7 hours depending on its difficulty. There's also a pair of tutorials. One that teaches you how to build and manage your base and also a battle tutorial which teaches which units you should use to counter each other.
The game is not without its flaws. The road system gets easily congested, leading to deadlocks lasting for several minutes. Unfortunately this usually occurs near resource points meaning porters with critical goods ( food , weapons ) cannot get to their destination on time. In addition, the dragging pace of the game cannot be altered which greatly extends the time spent on the resourcing part of missions.
The game also offers a multiplayer mode by using either IPX, TCP/IP or Modem where up to 6 players can play. There's 10 different scenarios to choose from including a number which focus specifically on the combat element of the game.
[edit] Economy
The economy is very complex in Knights and Merchants: The Shattered Kingdom, more so than most other RTS games, with a greater range of resources and a need to combine basic resources in a number of ways to create a functioning economy. For example, in order to get loaves you must build a farm to get corn, then a mill to get flour and a bakery to bake loaves of the flour. The many different resources in the game require a large amount of corresponding buildings and units in order to fully utilize them requiring greater than usual micromanaging for an RTS.
Every citizen and soldier must eat in the game meaning that you need to produce a great deal of food creating a more naturalistic limit on army size. There is no population limit in game, instead population is limited by how much you produce food. If a unit is not fed for a sustained amount of time it will die.
The every day life aspect of this game is considered a notable feature. You can place many different structures, forcing the player to consider where and when to place each structure. However for new players this greater complexity can lead to a process of trial and error but once experience has been gained it becomes an interesting take on RTS economics.
[edit] Sounds & Music
The sounds and music in game is relatively authentic for the medieval period contributing to the atmosphere. Every unit talks when selected and make appropriate sounds in battle or when killed. The soundtrack includes around 20 different tracks.
[edit] Technology
While you are playing the campaign you'll constantly gain knowledge on how to build new buildings. In the first mission you can only create militias because your citizens don't know how to build armory workshops yet, but they gain the knowledge when you advance to the next mission, so you get new buildings over time.
Usually the opponents have better technology than you so you'll have to think a bit how to beat them as they have more powerful units. However the AI is not very intelligent so it shouldn't be any big problem to defeat them.
[edit] Battle
The battle-aspect of this game is not designed really well, the units are controlled rather unhandy. You can for instance not select more than 1 group of units at a time, in battle this can be really disturbing. Also when your units get to a fight you can't retreat as all their commands get disabled. There is not much variation in units either. Also its very difficult to make even the most simplest units in the game. Thats almost every unit needs at least 3 different rescources. And it takes pretty much time just to get these rescourses, so building an army takes a tremendous amount of time.
The strongest type of soldiers in the game are the archers, and attacking without them is useless as you will lose more soldiers than your opponent. Infantries and cavalries are mainly used for defending your archers and killing the opponents archers.
[edit] Soldiers
[edit] Archers
Name Attack Defense Special Requirements Bowman 35% 50% Ranged Longbow, Leather Armor, Recruit Crossbowman 100% 70% Ranged, slow attack speed Crossbow, Iron Armament, Recruit [edit] Infantry
Name Attack Defense Special Requirements Militia 35% 0% Charge Attack (2x Speed) Hand Axe, Recruit Axe Fighter 35% 50% Charge Attack (2x Speed) Hand Axe, Leather Armor, Wooden Shield, Recruit Sword Fighter 55% 70% Charge Attack (2x Speed) Sword, Long Shield, Iron Armament, Recruit Barbarian* 75% 0% Charge Attack (2x Speed) Can't be trained Lance Carrier 25% 50% Attack bonus vs. cavalry Lance, Leather Armor, Recruit Pikeman 35% 70% Attack bonus vs. cavalry Pike, Iron Armament, Recruit Barbarian is only seen a couple of levels (lvl 8, 9, 10). [edit] Cavalry
Name Attack Defense Special Requirements Scout 35% 50% Mounted (2x Speed) Hand Axe, Wooden Shield, Leather Armor, Horse, Recruit Knight 55% 70% Mounted (2x Speed) Sword, Iron Armament, Long Shield, Horse, Recruit [edit] Buildings
Name Requirements Occupation Description Storehouse 6 Timber
5 Stone None Needed to store all of your goods that you produce. One of the most important buildings in the game. (One of the opponents buildings that have to be destroyed to win.) School House 6 Timber
5 Stone None Needed to train (make) all the different kinds of workers. E.g. serfs, stonemasons, woodcutters, carpenters, farmers, bakers, butchers, blacksmiths, miners, and recruits. All of these are necessary in winning the game. Inn 6 Timber
5 Stone None Needed to hold your food so citizens may eat and stay alive! Quarry 3 Timber
2 Stone Stonemason Needed to make stone for building your buildings and for making roads. Woodcutter's 3 Timber
2 Stone Woodcutter Needed to make timber for eventually making wood for your buildings. Sawmill 4 Timber
3 Stone Carpenter Needed to make wood for your buildings. The carpenter takes the timber from the woodcutter's hut and makes it into wood. Farm 4 Timber
3 Stone Farmer Needed to make corn for your mill to eventually make bread and for the swine farm to eventually make sausage. Mill 4 Timber
3 Stone Baker Needed to make flour for the baker who makes it into bread. Bakery 4 Timber
3 Stone Baker Needed to make bread for the inn to feed your town. Swine Farm 4 Timber
3 Stone Animal Breeder Needed to make pigs for your butchery which will eventually turn into sausage. Butcher's 4 Timber
3 Stone Butcher Needed to make sausage for the inn to feed your town. Tannery 4 Timber
3 Stone Butcher Needed to make leather to eventually be made into armor. Vineyard 4 Timber
3 Stone Farmer Needed to make wine for the inn to feed your town. Coal Mine 3 Timber
2 Stone Miner Needed to produce coal for the iron smithies to eventually be made into armor and also for the metallurgist shop to be made into gold. Gold Mine 3 Timber
2 Stone Miner Needed to produce gold ore for the metallurgist shop to eventually be made into gold. Iron Mine 3 Timber
2 Stone Miner Needed to produce iron ore for the iron smithy to eventually be made into iron. Metallurgist's 4 Timber
3 Stone Metallurgist Makes gold for your school out of gold ore and coal. Iron Smithy 4 Timber
3 Stone Metallurgist Needed to produce iron bars for the armor smithy and weapon smithy to eventually be made into armor and weapons. Weapon Smithy 4 Timber
3 Stone Blacksmith Needed to make iron weapons for the barracks. Armor Smithy 4 Timber
3 Stone Blacksmith Needed to make iron armor and iron shields for the barracks. Weapons Workshop 4 Timber
3 Stone Carpenter Needed to produce weapons for the barracks. Armory Workshop 4 Timber
3 Stone Carpenter Needed to produce leather armor and wooden shields for the barracks. Barracks 6 Timber
6 Stone Recruits Needed to produce armies to battle the opponent with. Stables 6 Timber
5 Stone Animal Breeder Needed to produce horses for the castle with. Watchtower 3 Timber
2 Stone Recruit Needed to help protect your town from invaders by throwing stones at them. [edit] Sequels
Knights and Merchants: The Peasants Rebellion (TPR) (2001)
[edit] External links
Dutch Fansite German Fansite English Fansite Official website Official forum Knights and Merchants: The Shattered Kingdom at MobyGames Knights and Merchants: The Shattered Kingdom at Home of the Underdogs Developer Joymania Development Linux port Stardock line of products Object Desktop Products DesktopX | IconPackager | ObjectBar | SkinStudio | WindowBlinds | WindowFX TotalGaming.net Games (developed, published) BreakQuest | Chrome SpecForce | Corporate Machine | Disciples II | Earth 2150 | Flatspace | Galactic Civilizations | GalCiv II: Dread Lords - Dark Avatar | Gish | Jets'n'Guns | Knights and Merchants | O.R.B | Pizza Frenzy | Political Machine | Reaktor | Society | Trash | Uplink | WordWars | Xeno Assault II WinCustomize Products BootSkin | Desktop Pet | Natural Desktop | ObjectDock Other Products DirectSkin | Stardock Central | TweakVista | StyleVista | ThinkDesk (Multiplicity) | DeskScapes