Kingdom Come: Deliverance II: Legacy of The Forge DLC Review (PS5) – More Than a Forgery
“Ah, I’ll quickly hop on and complete a couple of quests for an hour” I naively stated, before losing 6 hours of my evening to Kingdom Come: Deliverance II: Legacy of The Forge DLC. Blacksmithing in the base game had been one of my few Zen experiences, hammering away to Henry’s whistling as I crafted weapon after weapon when I needed a breather. Doesn’t happen often for me in games, but that’s exactly why Kingdom Come: Deliverance II struck such intensive sparks with me.
Legacy of The Forge places blacksmithing back at the forefront. However, that’s not all it has to offer. A main questline that promises to take Henry back to his roots, a heap of repeatable side quests to endlessly replay, and even some personalising of your very own home base. While Brushes with Death offered a short-and-sweet storyline with a single focus, Legacy of The Forge is a much more expansive DLC.
Clocking In
To kick off the main questline, Henry must travel to Kuttenberg and wander past the burnt out remains of an old blacksmithing forge. As it turns out, this was Martin’s first apprenticeship all those years ago. Partnering up with the widow of the original owner of the forge, you endeavour to restore your father’s heritage, become a member of the master blacksmith guild, and complete Martin’s magnum opus project – the astronomical clock in Kuttenberg square.
Instantly, the heart of this quest chain has its emotional hooks into both you, as the player, and Henry. You’ll meet some larger than life characters, rescue a drunk from depravity, mingle with a defamed Italian designer, and most importantly, help Henry tap into the memories of Martin most precious to him. The conclusion has a genuinely heartfelt moment that stacks up against the base experience’s best moments too.
While the chain of missions I embarked on to get there weren’t always the most thrilling or bombastic, they served nicely within the theme and feel of the DLC. Once again, Warhorse manage to excel in their writing and humour, which carries much of the by-the-numbers quest design as you clean up a broken down building and acquire the resources to hopefully restore the clock itself.
Forge Your Legacy
Side quests are rather interesting in Legacy of The Forge, owing to how they’re endlessly repeating sets of a half dozen mission types. Only, they all have a storyline attached to them. Once finished, you can continue the activity type at will anyway, but it’s nice that they serve thematic and story purposes too. Go to bandit camps to recover items, beat awful sharpshooters in archery, steal various items from locals – nothing here is especially fancy, but the attached questlines make them interesting, as do the rewards.
The biggest boon of the design is the loop it creates. Completing jobs gains prestige and Groschen, which you can then invest to restore your forge, which allows more customisation, quality-of-life ease, and more resources for further blacksmithing. I’d often plan to do just another mission, only to end up bursting through an in-game day, finishing 3-4 side quests, forging 2 swords, building a new garden, and totally forgetting to feed poor Henry.
Are the missions repetitive? Yes. Are you likely to continue them once your forge is fully upgraded? Probably not. However, for someone like me who loves the blacksmithing system in Kingdom Come: Deliverance II, it delivers more of what I like so much. I cannot comprehend why there isn’t a materials chest inside the forge though. Bafflingly, you’ll have to either make continuous trips to and from your room to not over-encumber yourself, or treat your horse as nothing more than a mobile mine of stones and minerals.
Forging The Issue
As you build up your thriving forge’s prestige, you’ll unlock more and more options for restoration. This isn’t a Fallout 4 settlement type deal where you can Sims out your building with a mess of contraptions, though. Instead, there are three distinct sections of your forge, each with incrementally better and more expensive upgrades or cosmetic visuals. Going from a backyard of nothing but rubble and gravel to a haven with beehives, a laundry tub and even an armourer and craftsman’s sheds (with accompanying apprentices) is great.
I think there could have been scope for a little more depth here, but I’m not going to scream a Bohemian obscenity about it. The Legacy of The Forge made a smithing request for me to hammer more weapons together and I am more than happy to oblige. Most pertinently, it adds a significant and replayable aspect to Kingdom Come: Deliverance II which I deeply appreciated.
Your milage will of course vary depending on your love of blacksmithing and having a base to establish and glowingly restore. The main quest is a heartwarming tribute to Henry’s roots, if relatively standard in design, while the side-quests offer even more content in a game already overflowing from the chalice of hours of fun. It also took me roughly 15 hours to see most of the main quests available, taking my total to an eye-watering 105 in the game overall. If you want bang for your buck, this is a DLC worth its weight in superheated steel.
Kingdom Come: Deliverance II: Legacy of The Forge is available now on PlayStation 5 (review platform), PC and Xbox Series X|S.
Developer: Warhorse Studios
Publisher: Deep Silver
Disclaimer: In order to complete this review, we were provided with a promotional copy of the game. For our full review policy, please go here.
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