Infinite Knights review - "A casual RPG with not much going for it"

Some of the games that Apple features in its new games section are better than others. Some of them feel cobbled together, lacking the polish and precision that you might think such a position deserves.

Infinite Knights definitely fits into that category. There's nothing particularly wrong with it mechanically, but when it comes down to brass tacks it doesn't feel like it does enough to warrant the recognition its received.

Idle thumbs

The game is a casual RPG that sees you building up a team of adventurers to clear the demons from a tower they've taken over. The battles are time-based, with an ATB-style bar along the bottom of the screen, and they bimble along without much fanfare.

After the first few bouts you'll get the option to let the game play itself, and you'll almost certainly start using it. Not because Infinite Knights is convoluted or confusing, but because it gives you so little incentive not to.

You'll earn cash from your runs through the upwards dungeon, and can spend it on getting new knights to join your crew. You can use weaker knights as boosts for your stronger combatants, but you'll consume the lesser fighters in the transaction.

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Every idea that Infinite Knights has, while they're well implemented, is something that you've seen before - and often multiple times. They're all well implemented, and they don't feel like they've been thrown in willy-nilly, but there's nothing inspirational about them, and nothing that's going to start a convincing compulsion loop.

The style is solid but unremarkable, the menus are the same - everything about the game feels good enough, but that really isn't enough in a world as rammed with digital interactive entertainment as the one we live in.

Infinite Knights bimbles along, minding its own business, not doing anything offensive but not doing anything really worth talking about either. It's another casual RPG, wandering about in a world of casual RPGs while not really knowing why it's there.

Finite nights

This is one of those games that doesn't quite have an identity. It knows the direction it wants to head in, but the reasons behind that journey, and the enticements to drag you along with it, are seriously lacking.

It'd be unfair to say that Infinite Knights is a cash-in on the genre. It'd be more accurate to look at it as a small game trying to be something more than it is. But it doesn't take the time to work out what it actually wants to be before it loses its way.