E3 2003: Knights Of The Temple Hands-On

The Crusades have never looked this good.

Perhaps even more interesting than all the hugely anticipated games at E3 are the smaller games that you've never even heard of, but manage to blow you away nevertheless. TDK's Knights of the Temple is one of these. With an intriguing story, good old-fashioned hack-and-slash combat and absolutely gorgeous graphics, this is one of the nicest surprises of the show.

Knights of the Temple takes place during the crusades. As a young knight on his way to the holy land to go kill himself some heathens, the player will find themselves immersed not only in that historical conflict, but also in a demon infested nightmare dimension. I hate it when that happens.

The combat in Knights of the Temple is classic hack-and-slash goodness. Along with buttons for high and low attacks as well as blocking and jumping, the black button takes you into a first person view from which you can use your bow and arrow. The best thing about the combat in Knights is how realistic it feels. Your character moves just like how you'd imagine a guy with a twenty-pound sword and fifty pounds of chain mail strapped to his body would move.

All of the enemies actually value their own lives, and spend most of their time blocking. Pretty much the only time they'll open their defenses is if they think that you're open for an attack. This turns combat into sort of a bluffing contest, as you try to swing your sword wide enough to get them to think they have a chance of hitting you while keeping from actually getting hit.

The graphics in Knights of the Temple are, put simply, damned impressive. From the realism of the knights outfits to the animations motion captured from Medieval weapons experts to the fantastically creepy look of the nightmare world, there's not a single part of the visuals that disappoint. To make matters more cool, we've been told that the visuals aren't even finished yet, and additional effects like wooden shields being split by sword strikes may be included. Sweet.

While it's been more or less under the radar until now, Knights of the Temple looks like its got what it takes to be a surprise hit. With great graphics, interesting gameplay and a level of realism not often seen in medieval-themed games, there's just not anything not to like. We'll be keeping an eye on this one.

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