The upside to its exotic origins is the game’s intriguing dark-ages Europe milieu, which the publishers describe as “Scandinavian.” (The Duffer thinks it looks more Slavonic, but what do I know? There are Vikings running around the world too … maybe it all depends on which part of Scandinavia you’re looking at. …). Magic is low-key, with magicians being mysterious and aloof creatures that hang out in the deep woods waiting for you to drop in for a chat.

The downside is probably familiar to anybody who’s spent any time exploring the smaller releases from overseas. There’s adequate but unimpressive graphics and sound, comically mistranslated in-game dialog, minimal documentation with no in game help whatsoever. Lots of the game’s most important features seem to be completely undocumented. All these half-measures are only partially redeemed by budget pricing.

The Duffer found this game tough. So tough that he never got beyond the early levels, despite multiple attempts. Careful consideration has been given to the question of whether the Duffer stalled out because he’s a lazy, weak capitalist American girlie-man, or whether the game’s just badly designed. The Duffer’s verdict – it’s maybe a little of both, but mostly it’s bad design.

In Konung 2 you play a hero (there are six to choose from) with supernatural powers inherited from your ancestors, the legendary Titans. The King of “Scandinavia” (or wherever you’re supposed to be) has been taken over by an evil bracelet, or something, and you’re supposed to set things right. You wander around, exploring the map, solving quests and gathering a party of companions to help you.

The map is strewn with plenty of random monsters for you to run away from. Notice I do not say, “fight.” While it must be possible to fight the wilderness monsters eventually, the Duffer never got to that point. He advanced by solving non-combat quests in the villages he found, but that didn’t seem to have much of an impact on his survivability. This is a significant problem, because in this game death is serious. There’s no resurrection, and healing is tough to attain. Poison is invariably fatal, unless you have purchased or can make one of the rare Antidote potions.

All this dying and running is not particularly fun. It’s just annoying, and the Duffer considers it bad design.

Along the way you have the option of accepting rulership over several of the towns you’ll find on the map. You have some limited powers to develop the towns, but the most important element of rulership is that once you accept a town’s allegiance, it will give you cash tribute every time you visit, providing you with a steady and fairly generous income source. You’ll need more than one fiefdom, however, because wandering bands of the King’s thugs will tend to move into your cities and destroy them at random intervals – yet another example of excess Slavonic sternness on the part of the developers.

Obviously, Konung 2 turned out to not be the Duffer’s cuppa tea, but I have to admit that the game may not be a total loss for every gamer. For those who have the patience to hack the game’s lethal foibles and discover the one true path to absolute mastery (whatever that is, but the Duffer assumes one exists) they might find this game rewarding or even enjoyable. The Duffer, however, doesn’t tend to play that way, preferring quaint concepts like clear, attainable goals and challenges calibrated to his current level of experience.