Knight Squad 2 is a fantastic party game for 1-8 players to play locally, online, across four controllers on any of the platforms its available on. It is built from the ground up to be accessible to all in so many ways that it almost trips over itself to entertain you. It is easily one of the best party games I’ve played in recent years and I’ll explain why.
Across its 15 mini games, all of which take place on a single screen, your coloured knight is easy to control. You move with the analogue stick and then attack and block with a button each. These mechanics carry over all the games but what you do in each mini game is different. One is a race, another is soccer, another is a capture the flag, another is to stay inside a golden area or another is to paint the floor with your colour. Each game is about doing a task and to do it well, you’ve got to keep killing everyone else.
Scattered around each mini game and its four maps are weapons. These are collectable and upgradable in three tiers so if you can survive long enough to build up your weapon of choice, it’ll be a beast. Being killed sends you back to your respawn and out of the action for a couple of seconds and that’s enough to swing the balance of power for many of the games. The weapons are well balanced too. A sword is fast but melee only whilst a bow is fast but requires precision. Bazookas are strong and can be fired from afar but with a decent reload time and a drill is a melee weapon that can break through trees, ice and rock to change the level layout. Others like magic spells work like ranged attacks mostly too – just try to upgrade them for better attacks. Only one mini game is a out and out kill fest – the rest use this strategically.
Playing online or offline is simple and easy with AI bots of 4 difficulty levels filling out any of the 8 slots not taken by humans. You can join any room with a code and that allows crossplay to be easily pulled together. More surprisingly, on PC only one person needs to buy the game! The other seven can download Knight Squad 2 Trials which allows them to join online games completely free of charge. It’s a bold move that is exceptionally rare in gaming and should be applauded. Thankfully the game is so addictive, fun, chaotic and enjoyable you’ll want to pick it up anyway!
To spice up the 15 mini games, modifiers are available too. They may change what weapons are available, how characters move and so on but be careful of the randomiser as sometimes you can get crazy combos that really don’t work well. You can save presets for your own amusement though. Completing challenges unlocks additional knights to play as and although they all handle the same, the amount of character shown in their winning motifs are great. What’s also fun is that almost all mini games can be played in free for all, duos (4 teams of 2) and teams (2 teams of 4). A few are only available in teams such as soccer and two castle defence games but aside from that, you can play the game just how you want.
I had a blast with Knight Squad 2 even with just bots playing. It is so enjoyable to pick up a game that has been made for pure fun in a way that’s simple to understand but requires skill to really excel in. This is a game that is going to be a firm favourite on my multiplayer rotation and I’ll be enjoying it for years to come. Definitely a top tier local multiplayer experience.
Review copy provided by publisher.
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