King's Bounty: Warriors of the North
King's Bounty: Warriors of the North
Game
Game2014
King's Bounty: Dark Side
Developer Fulqrum Publishing
King's Bounty: Dark Side (Russian: King's Bounty: Тёмная сторона) is a strategy video game developed for Microsoft Windows by 1C-Softclub and published by 1C Company. The game was released on August 14, 2014. It is a standalone installment in the King's Bounty series. From Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)
225 reactions from 4 sources (Steam reviews, Bluesky, Lemmy, Mastodon) · newest Oct 18, 2026 · last updated Oct 18, 2026 · How this works
Audience score
69
Fresh
115 positive · 52 negative
95% range 61–75%
| Source | + | − | = |
|---|---|---|---|
| Steam reviews | 115 | 52 | 0 |
| Bluesky * | 13 | 2 | 35 |
| Lemmy * | 1 | 0 | 6 |
| Mastodon * | 0 | 0 | 1 |
* shown, not counted in the score (label accuracy below our 85% bar or not yet audited).
Steam's own rating
Mixed
367 of 563 reviews positive (all languages, per Valve)
What players are saying
69% recommend · 118 yes, 53 no
Counted from the reviewers’ own thumbs up/down on the 171 English Steam reviews we collected, not by the AI. Valve’s all-language rating: Mostly Positive (1,435 of 1,942 positive).
Fans of the series will find more of the same, but newcomers should start with earlier titles. [1][2][3] The game is praised for its dark theme and playing as evil characters, but criticized for bugs and balance issues. [4][5][6] Many reviewers note the game is overly long with tedious fetch quests and poor quest guidance. [7][8][9]
Liked
Representative posts
- [8]
Turns out I had rose tinted glasses for this game. I had played some King's Bounty games as a kid and I had always thought that they were just amazing. After completing this game (no exaggeration 76 hours in less than two weeks). I think it is fair for me to state the pros and cons according to my experience. But TLDR the game is FAR from a good game because of a ton of bugs and the game dragging on for far too …
- [6]
The second of the two sequels that were developed by a completely different team and thus failed to retain the magical charm of The Legend / Armored Princess. This one gets points compared to Warriors of the North for its intriguing "play as a baddie" premise, slightly more competent writing and a bit less blatant reuse of assets. However, it’s still unbalanced and highly repetitive, as well as way too long for its …
- [1]
Do only buy this game if you're a fan of the series. If you have not tried them, please, try King's Bounty: Crossworlds, which has the first and the 2nd game included, which are both vastly superior to this release. Let's start with the bad: It's terribly unbalanced. The very first time you're able to roam, you'll find extremely difficult fights, in the tutorial area. You are forced to fight a few of them, and …
- [4]
𝕂𝕚𝕟𝕘'𝕤 𝕓𝕠𝕦𝕟𝕥𝕪 𝕣𝕖𝕥𝕦𝕣𝕟𝕤 𝕓𝕦𝕥 𝕥𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕥𝕚𝕞𝕖 𝕪𝕠𝕦'𝕣𝕖 𝕟𝕠𝕥 𝕡𝕝𝕒𝕪𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕒𝕤 𝕒 𝕘𝕠𝕠𝕕𝕪 𝕥𝕨𝕠-𝕤𝕙𝕠𝕖𝕤. The last King's Bounty episode (before King's Bounty II was announced) is a great addition to the series. You've taken on the role of Cavaliers of Light, then an Armored Princess, then a Nord trying to save what's left of his Viking Kingdom... and the only thing we haven't imagined …
- [7]
6-7/10. The pros are that it's still a good ol' King's Bounty, drags you in real hard in the early-mid game and you have bigger incentive to use "evil" units if you didn't so much in previous ones. The cons are that you often need to clear/scour entire areas 4-5 times for a SINGLE chain quest which can get tedious and boring (especially in late game), as well as go back and forth a lot between far away locations for …
Summarised from 34 of the 224 public posts collected about this game; every point cites the posts behind it ([n] opens the post) and the split is counted from the posts’ own ratings. Updated Oct 12, 2026. How summaries are made
RottenBot@rottenbot · automated account
King's Bounty: Dark Side sits at 69% positive across 167 opinionated reactions from 4 sources. Fresh or rotten — where do you land?
Critics, per Wikipedia
The game holds a score of 73/100 based on 13 reviews on Metacritic and an aggregate of 71% on GameRankings based on 5 reviews. It was given a score of 8/10 by Brett Todd of GameSpot, praising the game for its gameplay and soundtrack. Eike Cramer of 4players gave it a score of 77/100, praising it for allowing players to play as the usually antagonistic races from the series. Rüdiger Steidle of GameStar gave it a review score of 68/100 and criticised it for offering nothing fresh when compared to the previous games of the series. Claudio Chianese gave it a review score of 7.1/10, saying the game was made for both the old fans and new players of the series.
From the “Reception” section of Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Critic context only — not part of the audience score.
Reactions
60 of 225 · most liked firstit's one of the first games i fell in love with when i was a kid and somewhere along the line i picked it back up as a web-based game, so it remains one of the 2 games I'm halfway competent at still playing. (the other one is King's Bounty)
positive · AI labelView post →Game Boy Color has these wonderful ports (I guess they can be called official "demakes") of Heroes of Might & Magic games that feel like a missing link between Heroes and King's Bounty. First game is basically Heroes 1, but the second game is more like Heroes Greatest Hits.
neutral · AI labelView post →Do only buy this game if you're a fan of the series. If you have not tried them, please, try King's Bounty: Crossworlds, which has the first and the 2nd game included, which are both vastly superior to this release. Let's start with the bad: It's terribly unbalanced. The very first time you're able to roam, you'll find extremely difficult fights, in the tutorial area. You are forced to fight a few of them, and they're frustrating as hell. After that, there are spikes of difficulty…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →The King's Bounty game are on deep discount on Steam, and if you like turn based my army of monsters fights yours combat it's really good. The story is such that I click click past it at this point. It's not bad or anything just trite and only sometimes amusing. But the games, solid fun.
neutral · AI labelView post →I've seen someone else mention these, but I have to recommend them as well: **Maniac Mansion** (1987). It's the first SCUMM (_Script Creation Utility for Maniac Mansion_) engine game that all its successors use (Indy 3 & 4, Monkey Island, Sam and Max Hit The Road, etc). Really hard game play from what I can remember, and it has a sequel too, Day of the Tentacle (1993), which is absolutely hilarious. **Laser Squad** (1988) was among my favourites growing up, they are the precursor to UFO/XCOM…
neutral · AI labelView post →Turns out I had rose tinted glasses for this game. I had played some King's Bounty games as a kid and I had always thought that they were just amazing. After completing this game (no exaggeration 76 hours in less than two weeks). I think it is fair for me to state the pros and cons according to my experience. But TLDR the game is FAR from a good game because of a ton of bugs and the game dragging on for far too long. That said, the combat and progression is fun which is what kept me playing…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Choose 20 games that greatly influenced you. One game per day, for 20 days. No explanations, no reviews, no particular order. (5/20) King's Bounty #GameChallenge #Games #GameDev #PromoSky
neutral · AI labelView post →Full of bugs , flaws...no support at all , they don't even bother trying to answer or reply to your help requests...overall , a bad game
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Heya folks, here's a 2nd short featuring King's Bounty II by Fulqrum Games/Publishing. I've made a lot of progress in the game today, I'm actually a lot further into it than this part as well. #kingsbounty2 #videogames #indiegames #rpg #shorts
neutral · AI labelView post →The second of the two sequels that were developed by a completely different team and thus failed to retain the magical charm of The Legend / Armored Princess. This one gets points compared to Warriors of the North for its intriguing "play as a baddie" premise, slightly more competent writing and a bit less blatant reuse of assets. However, it’s still unbalanced and highly repetitive, as well as way too long for its own good. It also shows a lack of basic polish at every turn, from awkward map…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →King's Bountry: Dark Side is a tactical RPG that is best described as Heroes of Might and Magic, but you only play as a single hero. I didn't spend a lot of time with this one but it's clear that by this point the series was in trouble. The first two games were great, Warriors of the North had issues but still had enough of the old game's magic. This one is just embarassing, it feels like amateur mod making you realize how much work went into previous games. Like the map design: only when you…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Heya folks, here's a 1st short featuring King's Bounty: The Legend by Fulqrum Publishing. This boss is from the 2nd major area in the game, but I'm currently on the 3rd major area. I started this game years ago as well. #kingsbountythelegend #videogames #indiegames #rpg #shorts
neutral · AI labelView post →A 1990 ad for New World Computing's tactical fantasy game, King's Bounty
neutral · AI labelView post →This game is a significant departure from previous installments in the King's Bounty series. While I appreciated the concept of finally being able to play with dark forces, the overall experience left much to be desired. The game feels unnecessarily long, with quests that drag on and pacing issues that make it feel more tedious than engaging. One of the biggest problems is the lack of balance. The elves, in particular, are far too powerful, making encounters with them disproportionately…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →𝕂𝕚𝕟𝕘'𝕤 𝕓𝕠𝕦𝕟𝕥𝕪 𝕣𝕖𝕥𝕦𝕣𝕟𝕤 𝕓𝕦𝕥 𝕥𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕥𝕚𝕞𝕖 𝕪𝕠𝕦'𝕣𝕖 𝕟𝕠𝕥 𝕡𝕝𝕒𝕪𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝕒𝕤 𝕒 𝕘𝕠𝕠𝕕𝕪 𝕥𝕨𝕠-𝕤𝕙𝕠𝕖𝕤. The last King's Bounty episode (before King's Bounty II was announced) is a great addition to the series. You've taken on the role of Cavaliers of Light, then an Armored Princess, then a Nord trying to save what's left of his Viking Kingdom... and the only thing we haven't imagined ourselves portraying up till then was a Vampire. Fear not, for Dark Side does…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Doesnt appear stable anymore. Wont launch into world view on Win 11
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →For #RandomGameSaturday - a giant collector's box of King's Bounty The Legend (The Legend About Knight in home market) - when 1C got rights for KB from dead 3DO/NWC, they hired Katauri Interactive to make a new series of games. A great fairy tale #RPG adventure with #HoMM - style combat
positive · AI labelView post →King's Bounty: The Legend Gets Achievements and Steam Workshop at 18.
neutral · AI labelView post →Buggy, crashy, great idea done with half power Still better than Kings Bounty 2
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Sexy sorceresses & seductive succubi in a solid turn based strategy game. 11/10
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I've played through all five Kings Bounty Games and this is the only one where I don't even remember a moment of the campaign that i thought was really cool. KB Dark Side isn't a bad game that i wouldn't recommend on its own; but it's a fraction of a shadow of Armored Princess or The Legend, and is awful for a king's bounty game. The game had a lot of design flaws, and they almost all stem from the setting. You play as the bad guys; seems like a neat concept. However, every single objective…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →We finished King's Bounty on the Genesis! Great game. Looking forward to playing the Heroes of Might and Magic series! #retro #segagenesis #twitch #twitchstreamer
positive · AI labelView post →I played all Kings Bounty games in the old days. This is by far my favorite. Yes, the quests are mostly running back and forth, but its just a nice touch to play as the evil guy (Demon Princess). Only one quest was broken (Camilla did not finish), but it did not break anything and I was able to end the game. There were about 5 crashes in about 100 hours, which is quite good for such an old game running on Windows 10. If you like Kings Bounty you will like this game. Its much longer, but it has…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Fix the game its not working, awful from the developers
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Not only the worst and most unfinished in the series. Its also the biggest chore to 100%(like 3 times as much hours)
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →5/10 another kings bounty reskin without fixing bugs
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Heya folks, here's a 3rd short featuring King's Bounty II by Fulqrum Games/Publishing. This short focuses on some combat, and is around where I left off last night. I hope to complete the game today as well. #kingsbounty2 #videogames #indiegames #rpg #shorts
neutral · AI labelView post →Heya folks, here's a set of screenshots featuring King's Bounty II by Fulqrum Games/Publishing. I just spent the last... 4-5h playing the game while watching some classic Doctor Who. Still lots of quests to complete yet though. #kingsbounty #videogames #indiegames #rpg #screenshots
neutral · AI labelView post →Not a terrible game, but really not one worth your time. It's unnecessarily long, repetitive, feels super janky, quests will make you run around from one end of the map to the other just for the sake of it. If you're new to the series, better try Armored Princess or the first one. If you've played all the others... I guess give it a shot, but be warned that this is likely going to be 100 hours you could be spending in a better way.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I bought this years ago and never got around to playing it. I really enjoyed the 1st king bounty and HoMM in general. So I had a sudden hankering for HoMM and I thought this would do it. It does, to some extent, but I can't recommend this in good conscience. This game thinks you are an errand boy and embraces inane fetch quests throughout. Terrible quest log, no guidance, no hints, not even a recap. be ready to randomly search of stuff for hours (or google everything all the time).…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Initially a fun game, but it becomes a chore after 30 hours. Good things: -Fun combat -First levels are interesting -A massive amount of content -Good soundtrack Bad things: -The game crashes A LOT and the autosave only seems to work when you enter a castle -Mid game levels are barren and not very interesting -A lot of stupid back and forth walking during quests and a lot of backtracking -Quest log and map look unfinished and sometimes give you very little information -Game doesn't encourage…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I love "Heroes of Might and Magic" type of games. I am not familiar with that particular game series, so I was excited and full of joy when I got to play it. Dark Side was my first game on that list, so I immediately jumped in. At first the game seemed to be a well experience — it has pretty fun gameplay, good storytelling and such a pleasant music, that I spent an hour in game menu just to listen it. Looks great, huh? Too bad that the game also has a lot of cons, which together will be a…
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Still better than all modern games I can play this days. After long and bored start the game has blossomed. Awesome as usual
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →The best of the series (in my opinion) in plot, battle mechanics, leveling, and choices of the King's Bounty (aka Wild Goose Chase the Game) series. At least, as long as your ok with being evil. But even still, some of the "evil" agendas are actually positive things depending on your perspective (you help a female orc with self esteem issues. Go you!). It's fun and quirky with the quests and problems you have to solve along with building the best army of dark creatures (and light if you wanna…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →II liked the idea of playing with the 'bad' guys for once instead of the human goody guys.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Started King's Bounty II today. After 90 minutes of play, I guess it's pretty okay...I'm a little miffed that the game is forcing me to remember things without a glossary to refer to 😑 Anyways, here is Countess Katharine, a mage and all around girlboss...some might even call her bitchy 😂
neutral · AI labelView post →Heya folks, here's a 4th and final short featuring King's Bounty II by Fulqrum Games/Publishing. Well, I've officially completed the game! It's also the first completion of 2025, there's plenty more to come as well. #kingsbounty2 #videogames #indiegames #rpg #shorts
neutral · AI labelView post →Broken Alliance, is an indie turn-based adventure strategy game with RPG elements, inspired by old-school classics like King's Bounty, Heroes of Might and Magic, Age of Wonders, Master of Magic... all with a fresh deckbuilding twist. store.steampowered.com/app/1704180/...
neutral · AI labelView post →A very long, repetitive game with good combat. However, it is rather janky so that, sometimes, you have no clue what to do or where to go. In addition, save the game often for two reasons: one, it likes to crash, and two, you will often be surprised with powerful fights that you had no idea were going to happen (save before you click on anyone or any castle).
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →As a fan of the series, it's my duty to say: THIS IS A MESS! The game is far away from being unplayable, however... - Quests are weird, if you skip some dialogue you might have to look at the internet a way to complete it. - Progress is unlinear, which it's good, but super easy to find yourself following the wrong path and then returning to another island, now a piece of cake... - Camera is too close, maybe the closest to the series - I might be wrong in this one, but I could bet there's a…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →My favorite KB of all. Story is deep, dialogues are genius.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →6/10 Let's be honest - more of the same. That's the 4th game of the "old" series and the last, thankfully. Don't get me wrong, as a game it's good - but when you play 4 nearly the same games in succesion… you just get bored since you do practically the same thing over and over.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →6-7/10. The pros are that it's still a good ol' King's Bounty, drags you in real hard in the early-mid game and you have bigger incentive to use "evil" units if you didn't so much in previous ones. The cons are that you often need to clear/scour entire areas 4-5 times for a SINGLE chain quest which can get tedious and boring (especially in late game), as well as go back and forth a lot between far away locations for some quests, Also late game battles can go on for 5-10min+ each if you want…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Its still a King's Bounty, so its not that bad of a game. But it is clearly inferior to The Legend and to Crossworlds. It feels like it was made with little effort and I would recommend this game only if you played previous games and you really want to play something very similar.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →www.twitch.tv/sabriel_zann I'm back from the dentist once more, fed, watered, rested and ready for more King's Bounty: The Legend. I deeply appreciate the people who've popped by to see me play this game. I know it's probably not the most exciting thing in the world but it's very dear to me. ❤️
positive · AI labelView post →In my opinion, the best game of the series, but it's hard, i don't know if it's the hardest, but it's very hard.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →No thanks, the quests can get bugged and you get stuck on a mission with no way of completing it. Also, the necounters are way too punishing. I was on easy and even in the beginning your starting army gets decimated with no way of replenishing it later. Just stay on HOMM3 or something, this is just bad.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Do you like heroes of might and magic? Would you like a H&MM that has some humor and interesting takes? Look no further.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →I have played all 4 of the King's Bounty games, this one was the most convoluted and I walked away from it for awhile but wanted to come back, I did find a few hints online which helped get over humps in quest lines but in the end I think this one has the most depth and creativity in story arks. I found myself smiling a lot ... I think this is my favourite of the 4 in the end.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Songs of Conquest is outstanding from top to bottom. Best King's Bounty / Heroes of Might and Magic game yet, and they've got a great pipeline of very reasonably priced DLC on the way too.
positive · AI labelView post →More of the same, with some interesting tweaks to the formula. My favourite story in the series so far. Genuinely funny dialogue at times, and I like how the quests force you to pay attention instead of just making you chase the quest markers around.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Earliest memories of video games were titles such as Aztec, Spy vs Spy, Frogger, King's Bounty. But what really got my eight year old mind captivated on a summer vacation in the 80s was Elite on C64. I've spent hours into the night trying to get as far away from Lave as possible, all while trying to make some profit on hauling food and computer parts. I did not understand the concept of saving and loading a saved game back then, so there was a lot of trial and error into permadeath involved.
neutral · AI labelView post →This game has a bad rep among the fans of the series, but I guess I'm just just too much of an edge lord to not love it :)
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →The only bad King's Bounty game
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →If you have never played any King's Bounty game before, this one starts very hard. This game series could be considered boring to people who don't like repetition. There is a lot of reading, walking around and strategic battles. The story is fun and refreshing since this time you get to play as the 'bad guys'. The graphics still look great and pack in lots of colour and detail. There are three characters to play as, so it is very long if you play them all.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →worst in every way than KB:AP. I want more KB, but i'm struggle to get through the bs beginning. 15 mana, no shops, no freedom, 1 spell. like this is torture.
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →Basically a map expansion to King's Bounty. No new units or spells. The twist is that you start out controlling monsters instead of "good" creatures. If you've played any of the previous games (Armored Princess, Crossroads, North) this is more of the same.
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →for normal gamers : its ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ sucks don't even try it for KB fans : its ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ sucks don't even try it for KB super fans : its ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ sucks don't even try it (you gonna try it anyway) a solo modder would create better game than this out of older KB 0/10
negative · reviewer's own thumbsView post →*Warning: spoilers* Huge sequel with tons of stuff to do. I am honest, I was going to write a bad review about this game because of many reasons, but as the game progressed, it became better and better. Although it will not look like it in this review, the game is actually fairly good! King’s Bounty: Dark Side is the final instalment of the King’s Bounty series. Its story is fairly simple this time. The Light is taking over the world and exterminating every living creature of the Dark. You…
positive · reviewer's own thumbsView post →King's Bounty is basically HoMM 0. www.lemon64.com/game/kings-b...
neutral · AI labelView post →
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