King’s Bounty: Warriors of the North Developer Diary

Games Beat is offering another exclusive “pre-mortem” developer diary for King’s Bounty: Warriors of the North, which this time deals with the supernatural ‘Valkyries’ allies. Here’s a snip:

We had a long brainstorming about who could become a worthy ally to our Viking. The initial idea was to give our strong and powerful Olaf a selection of new, even more beautiful lady companions, a.k.a wives. But since similar characters were in King’s Bounty: The Legend and also because there were journalists and players who joked about Princess Emily’s armor-bearers whom they called ‘˜hubbies’, we decided to skip the family thing all together. But getting rid of fascinating females would have been wrong, so the decision was made to choose Valkyries the gorgeous goddess-like female fighters from Norse mythology.

The key thing about Valkyries in King’s Bounty: Warriors of the North is that unlike the aforementioned ‘˜hubbies’ and Pet Dragon they act both as companions while traveling and Spirits of Rage on the battlefield. So they are quite handy.

We chose five to be in the game. Every Valkyrie has her own unique abilities. Apart from the active participation in the battle our Valkyries play an important role in the development of the main character. Valkyries will give various and considerable bonuses to Olaf’s specific stats. Moreover, Olaf travels along with all five female-fighters, however he will need to choose one of them to become the main Valkyrie (not the favorite wife!), and her bonus will be 100 percent active unlike the other four with just 25 percent of their powers. Of course our female warriors will gain experience during the battle and it will only improve their combat abilities. If you want to increase their level, and hence raise the bonus they give to Olaf, you will have to do the following. I’m sure most of you have had lots of unneeded equipment items while playing the King’s Bounty games you wanted to get rid of. Olaf will now be able to sacrifice to a Valkyrie a specific item type allowing them to progress and gain levels faster. The higher their levels the more bonuses they give. Valkyries can reach the level cap only if you accomplish a special quest unique for each of your companions.