The Knightling is an Adventure with Great Heart and Complex Combat

I’ve been super excited to play The Knightling since it was announced because it just seemed like a really heartwarming and fun adventure. And it definitely delivers. Though I haven’t been able to spend as much time as I’d like with the game, I have played quite a few hours so far and have been really impressed. 

The Knightling from developer Twirlbound is an open-world action-adventure where you play as the young knightling of the great Sir Lionstone. When Sir Lionstone suddenly goes missing while fighting a monstrous beast, his knightling takes it upon himself to try and find him and to help anyone along the way that might need it. 

Thankfully, Lionstone protected his knightling with his powerful shield before disappearing so you’re able to use it to protect people in your mentor’s absence. Lionstone’s shield contains an element called Callyrium, which you can collect in order to upgrade the shield. Upgrades include new moves, abilities and more. You’ll also use the shield as your main weapon and it can block, parry and more to take out some of the foes waiting to ambush you. 

One of the first things I noticed about The Knightling’s combat system is that it’s surprisingly complex. Normally in adventure games like this, you have one or two buttons that you spam to take down enemies, but here you have to actually learn how to block and parry if you want to be able to stand up against some of the harder enemies you’ll encounter in the game. The more you level up the more complex your shield’s combos will be and the more confident you’ll find yourself before heading into dungeons. 

Speaking of dungeons, not only does The Knightling have complex combat, but it has complex puzzles too. I found the first few to be pretty simplistic (though admittedly still took me a bit of time to solve) but the more you progress the more they feel akin to some of the harder puzzles in The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild or Tears of the Kingdom. You’ll do some platforming, making your way around the dungeons, connecting lights together to collect more Callyrium with the ultimate goal of upgrading your shield again and again.

Traversal is also a big part of the game as you can use your shield to slide around the regions of Clesseia. With the game being open world, there are lots of folks that might ask for your help with certain tasks, sometimes involving fighting or platforming, and you can move quickly from quest to quest by sliding along on your shield. It works beautifully and is the best way to travel, in my opinion. 

The Knightling makes a great first impression. It’s cute, fun, and has a lot of game mechanics I was surprised to see. It reminded me of Breath of the Wild mixed with beloved platformers like Spyro the Dragon. If you’re a fan of adventure games, this open world is full of action, heart and lots of monsters to throw your shield at. 

The Knightling is available now on Steam, PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S.