There are absolutely no easy wins in Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2

After getting out of Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2’s mammoth tutorial, I was bestowed with a certain arrogance. Surely, after three hours of learning how to fight, flee, and play Farkle, I was equipped to tackle anything that this massive medieval world had to offer. Boy howdy, did I immediately have egg on my face. I spent my first five hours or so in the game properly getting my ass beat up and down Bohemia. It was an unforgiving, unforgettable experience. Victory can be satisfying, but when it comes too easily, it feels like empty emotional calories. Kingdom Come made me work for every victory, even ones as small as getting proper armor or affording a stay at the inn.

Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 picks up immediately after the events of the first game, with protagonist Henry in the sweet position of being an endgame RPG hero. He begins the game kitted out in proper gear, riding a horse, rolling around with a set of pals on an easy milk run gig. When he strips down with his nobleman buddy Hans Capon for a quick dip in the pond, their allies are caught unaware by an ambush. Hans and Henry barely escape with their lives, and to make matters worse, as soon as they get to safety they immediately quarrel with the locals and end up in the stocks.

By the time Henry is free to actually explore the open world, all that’s left at his disposal is a basic set of clothes, a sword, a few apples, and a set of dice. That should be enough, right? Surely, as an RPG hero, I’ll get poor Henry kitted out in epic gear and a trusty steed in no time. This isn’t my first rodeo in an open-world RPG; I know how these things are supposed to go.

Then the game pulled the rug out from under my feet by throwing poor Henry into the meat grinder. I decided to go check out the last known location of my trusty hound. As I approached the quest marker, I was set upon by wolves who murdered me after a hopeless skirmish. So, I tried again with an alternate route. This time, I stumbled upon a Cuman soldier in a full suit of armor who stood, drew his sword, and murdered me in a few swift strokes.

I got an early, low-stakes quest to steal a lute from a guy and deliver it to a couple of musicians. I was able to sneak into my target’s house, but upon trying to check a locked chest for the lute, my lock pick loudly broke and the town guard showed up. I had to pay my paltry savings to escape that situation.

Eventually, I stumbled upon a camp with a lone man playing dice and rambling in Latin. He claimed to recognize Henry, but was clearly having some kind of confusion or delusion. Despite this, he still handily won at a game of Farkle and took everything I had left in my pouch. I finally had enough, drew my sword, and killed the dude. Was this a cold-blooded murder? Yes. Do I have any moral defense? No. Did I finally get a win out of this? Absolutely, and I’d do it again, too.

This ended up defining my early strategy in Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2. If I find you in the middle of nowhere, and no one will witness my crime, you’re in trouble. I found a well-stocked vendor sitting under a bridge, offering an array of helpful supplies. As far as I’m concerned, that’s free real estate. After a few of these opportunistic crimes, I was finally able to navigate Bohemia with some confidence. The game is still unforgiving, but at least I’m able to engage with its quests. RIP to the solo NPCs I had to kill along the way, but I am simply built different.