Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 Lead Slams Repetitive RPGs

Ever feel like every RPG these days is just another chosen-one power fantasy? You're not alone—Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2's lead feels the same way.

Martin Klíma, co-founder of Warhorse Studios and executive producer on Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 and its predecessor, told PC Gamer he's "bored and tired" of RPGs where you're the chosen one with a grand task of saving the universe. He calls them "really straightforward power fantasies" and says, "It's not that I think it's somehow wrong in principle. There is nothing bad about a good power fantasy. It's just, it's so repetitive."

He's got a point. Final Fantasy 7, Oblivion, and Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 all lean into that weight-of-the-world epic. Klíma says he plays a lot of RPGs, and even he needs a break from the stereotypes sometimes. His penny-drop moment came while playing Progress Quest, a self-playing satire of EverQuest and similar fantasy MMORPGs. "It's really a distillation of what the common RPG is," he says. "So I found that there must be many, many people who are really tired of this formula and who want something new and different."

For Klíma, the core issue is who these games are made for. "The games that were, and sort of are, being made are still the games for teenagers," he believes. "If you are 16, 17, you love playing these power fantasy games because it's something that you need. But the audience is much older today."

He knows Expedition 33 might come to mind for many. "Everybody's going to think that I am hating on Expedition 33 right now, but that's definitely not the case," he states. Instead, he points to Ubisoft's lineup—Assassin's Creed, Watch Dogs, and Far Cry—as examples of cookie-cutter elements, even if they aren't strictly RPGs. "Once you play the same game for the 10th time, it sort of becomes stale," he muses.

Clair Obscur's success speaks for itself, and plenty of players still love inventive, well-made games. The historical realism of Kingdom Come offers a different kind of escapism than, say, the Final Fantasy 7 remake trilogy—and that variety is a good thing.

Meanwhile, Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2's Hans actor has finally opened his medieval tavern-inspired bar in Prague. What do you think—are you tired of the chosen-one formula too? Will you be picking up Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2?