As the town of Chronville faces an imminent invasion from the Skeleton Lord, you, as the Forest Knight, are tasked to build a team of the finest heroes in order to stop the Skeleton army’s advance and defeat the Bony Tyrant.  Are you up for the mission in this fantasy world?

Background

Developed by a team of creators under Chrono Games led by Behfar Iranmanesh, he created Forest Knight as he always enjoyed playing video games on long rides with his phone. The project is also backed by Enjin-coin thus Enjin-backed items are available in their marketplace. The game was released in the first quarter of 2022 in both the Ethereum and Polygon Blockchain. They plan to continue with updates following its roadmap that seeks to implement a land system and cross-platform play as you can only play it on Android and PC if you use an emulator currently.

Graphics and Gameplay

Forest Knight uses a cartoony art style with chibified characters in a bright environment and popping colors that remind me of the character designs for Brutal Age. The gameplay feels similar to Final Fantasy Tactics, Fire Emblem, and other chess-like turn-based strategy games. There are currently two modes to play: A PvE mode where you fight a computer-controlled opponent and explore the world of Chronville to progress the story through different stages and unlock heroes of different classes with varying stats and abilities. Then there’s a PVP mode where you set up your best team of three heroes and three pets to go toe-to-toe with other players in a 1v1 match.

The gameplay isn’t entirely original for a game of this nature, but it can keep players who are interested in this genre where they think of strategies in real-time as the battle unfolds using their different units' advantages while minimizing their weaknesses which can hook you in as a player for a short time. It’s a good alternative if you are waiting for the next breakthrough in turn-based gaming.

 There’s also a management-like simulator where you can upgrade a village with resources like gold and crystals that you win as rewards while you complete battles. As you progress, you need to improve your character’s equipment and weapons which can also be NFTs that you can buy and sell in either the game’s or Enjin’s marketplace. Speaking of battles, partaking in one uses Food, an energy system of some sort. Maybe this can help slow down the earning capability of players and over-minting the KNIGHT token which we will talk about next.

Tokenomics

Forest Knight rewards players who complete stages of the game with cryptocurrency in the form of the KNIGHT token. KNIGHT can be used to purchase equipment, weapons, land, pets, and infrastructure. This can also serve as the key for some events as some of the missions in the game will only be available to KNIGHT token holders and feature higher tier items or NFTs as an incentive for holding onto the coin. They will also be available for staking in quarter 3 of 2022 and will be used to merge NFT items and make them even stronger and as of writing, it is still not currently out on their website so if you are planning on staking, you may have to wait more.

Final Thoughts

As a strategy game enthusiast myself, I find it at least worth trying out the game. It helps that the game is free-to-play and open to players who don’t want to spend yet. It’s a different story though if you want to play the game competitively and earn a spot at the top of the leaderboards to receive the bigger rewards. I think NFT holders will hold a significant advantage in PVP as the NFTs will tend to be stronger than the defaults you can obtain from quests. With this, I recommend that the developers have some system implemented to help level the playing field, but I doubt it will push through as this will then reduce the impact and value of purchasing the NFTs they feature.

I also recommend that they create a separate app for PC as setting up an emulator adds extra steps just to play the game on a bigger screen. Overall, I think the game is alright, but it doesn’t hold that wow factor, at least for me. If you are looking for a game to burn your boredom while you’re on long drives and make a couple of coins for a drink, then I think you’ll find the gameplay of Forest Knight enjoyable enough to fill that desire.