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An army of undead makes its way towards the unsuspecting village. Suddenly, out of the sky there appears a hot air balloon, which makes an abrupt turn and heads back to the village. A loud roar and thundering noise fills the air. The noise gets louder and louder until finally in the distance you see something bright and shiny racing towards you. A whistling sound fills the air ending with thuds and the sounds of pain. With swords drawn, the army of knights charge through the front line of undead as the archers launch a barrage of arrows into the heart of the battle. Will Good prevail over Evil?

Kingdom Under Fire follows a very well put together storyline in single player mode. You follow the adventures of a knight who turns to the dark side, stopping at nothing to take over the world in which he presides, or you follow a knight trying to defend the world from the evil knight. Either side you chose, the characters and creatures you command are unique and fit into the storyline. As you complete each of the thirteen missions, the next portion of the story unfolds giving you a new mission to complete. At certain stages of the story, a movie plays between missions to lead into the next set of missions that you will face. The movies help keep the storyline connected along with setting up the next couple of missions. If you are a fan of the fantasy genre of books then this game follows the classic storyline followed by many of the authors.

Most of the missions are in an RTS format. In each mission you start with a minimal army and a few of the basic buildings that are needed. You need to balance the collecting of resources (gold, iron, and mana) with the construction of new buildings and the creation of your army. As you get deeper into the game you are able to build more types of buildings and classes of fighters for your army, but you start with less and less. This makes each mission a little more challenging then the mission before it. The RPG missions fit seamlessly into the storyline. The missions are just as challenging, if not more challenging than the RTS missions, since you only control one or two of the main characters in each of the missions. It’s you mano a mano against whatever you run into.

The installation was very easy. There were no problems encountered while installing. There is a patch available, which I would highly recommend downloading and installing prior to playing the game. I started playing the game prior to downloading the patch and did encounter a couple of glitches, nothing so devastating I could not play the game without the patch. The glitches disappeared after installing the patch. Either the patch corrected the problems or my computer just decided to quit being flaky. I will lean towards the patches corrected the problems.

The controls in the game are very easy to use and learn. The mouse can control all activities within the game. However, if you are more prone to use the keyboard, you are able to use the keyboard for most of the controls. Using the keyboard in combination with the mouse is the most efficient and best way to go since most options are set up with an easy to remember hot key, such as ‘A’ for attack mode. The controls for the army units are very easy to learn and understand. You have the ability to control each member of the armies independently if so desired or an entire unit at a time. Spells and movement options can be selected from icons on the screen. The icons used are very easy to figure out and remember.

I had no problems with the sound. Some of the sounds got a little repetitive, but they were not so repetitive that they became obnoxious. At the start of each mission a narrator would tell the portion of the story that leads up to the mission that is about to begin. Then once the mission starts, the main characters would talk to each other to help set up the objectives of the mission and possibly point out the locations of some of the enemy forces. By listening to the sounds in the background and the warning messages, it was easy to know what was happening all around you. The warning messages were very helpful since I tend to spread myself too thin and have armies attacking in multiple locations. I don’t have the patience to concentrate on one particular area of the map at a time.

I spent many hours playing this game to do the review and plan on spending a lot more hours in the future. I intend to complete all 13 missions as both good and evil forces. I also plan on taking advantage of the online play and challenge the CEO of Wewp! to a competition to see who is the superior RTS mind.

Overall the game is a very well planned and designed game. It keeps your interest with a multitude of options and a very interesting storyline. Even if you have completed the missions as the evil alliance you can then try it from the other side as the good ole boys. I would recommend this game if you enjoy RTS and/or RPG games, as this is a good mix of both genres. It does not break any new ground that will make your mouth drop, however it is a very solid game with plenty to offer. Kingdom Under Fire is an intriguing battle between the forces of good and evil, which hooks you and reels you into its clutches.