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The "New Xbox Experience" system update on Nov. 19, 2008 introduced several upgrades to the Xbox 360's dashboard, and one of the biggest was the ability for players to create customized Avatars of themselves. A Kingdom for Keflings from NinjaBee Studios (who also brought us the Xbox Live Arcade games Outpost Kaloki, Cloning Clyde, and Band of Bugs), is the first game that lets players use their Xbox 360 Avatar as the main character.
A Kingdom for Keflings is one of many building sim games on the market these days. How does Kingdom of Keflings separate itself from the other building games out there? Read on to find out how it sucks you in to a world of a giant and his Keflings.
Thanks to the Avatar system, you literally get to play the game as “yourself” (or more accurately whoever your avatar portrays). You are a giant helping out an elf-like race known as the Keflings. Your ultimate goal in the game is to build them a castle, but it will be a long road filled with many other buildings before you can achieve that goal.
At the title screen you are given the option of a game with or without a tutorial. I would recommend doing the tutorial, as it will guide you through any learning curve that there may be. The game itself is simplistic in its control scheme: the controller’s right bumper will show you the buildings that you can build through the blueprints you unlock. The “A” button will be your main action button, and allows you to assemble the necessary pieces to complete blueprints and buildings. Anyone familiar with games like Build-a-lot or Warcraft I through III will understand the building concept. For those that aren't, the tutorial is there to guide you along the way.
Gameplay consists of build building “A” and “B” to get what is needed to build building “C,” and so on. There is an increasing level of difficulty with each new blueprint you unlock, and with each new blueprint comes an increasing sense of addiction – you say you’re just going to finish that one blueprint , but then just as you complete it you unlocked three new ones that just have to be built. The 10 hours or so of gameplay can go by quickly if you like this genre, or it can be slow if you do not like to build four buildings to finish one. Overall, the control layout is easy to learn, and building and harvesting quickly becomes instinctual.
A Kingdom for Keflings’ use of Avatars is, to me, the highlight of the game. It was truly amazing to see my Avatar in action rather than just being able to put clothes on it and change its hairstyle on the dashboard. Your Avatar’s main responsibility is to pick up things, such as building materials and pieces, and put them where they belong. When you first start the game and see your alter ego, it can be both surprising and rewarding to see it perfectly rendered as if it was still on the Xbox 360 dashboard.
The multiplayer feature, courtesy of Microsoft’s Xbox Live subscription service, is also great because it allows there to be multiple avatars on the screen at the same time. Every player in the multiplayer mode is working on building the same town, and there is a sense of teamwork as everyone has the same goals.
One gripe I had with the game is that the camera only rotates 90 degrees. I would have loved to have been able to go a full 360 degree rotation to look at my buildings and their pieces from all sides. I was also a little disappointed that you could not build sideways rather than straight up and down - it made for some challenging building placements at time, and is hopefully something that will be considered if there's ever a sequel.
In the end, if you are a fan of the sim-building genre than by all means download A Kingdom for Keflings today. If you are not a fan of the genre at all, it’s still worth downloading the demo and giving it a test drive – if only to get a kick out of seeing what else your Avatar can do besides cute poses on the dashboard.
If you have an Xbox 360 and gamertag, you can purchase Kingdom of Keflings through Xbox.com and it will download directly to your console. Click here for more information.
