The tale of Kingdoms of Amalur is a long and sad one, beginning with celebrity developers and ending in a salty morass of unpaid staff, a collapsed game studio, and charges of tax fraud. It took four years to sort that mess out: When it was all over, 38 Studios founder Curt Schilling agreed to a $2.5 million settlement, leaving Rhode Island taxpayers on the hook for another $28.2 million.
Compounding the sadness of the whole thing is that Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning is really quite good. THQ Nordic purchased the license to the game in 2018 but a remaster seemed unlikely, given the complications of intellectual property laws, but a couple years later we got one—and in less than two weeks from today, we're also getting a brand new expansion called Fatesworn.
Fatesworn was actually announced more than a year ago, but with no details beyond the title. Now we've got more: The expansion will take place in an all-new region in Amalur called Mithros, a place of snowy tundras, deep caverns, mountain villages, and the ancient lakeside city of Crownhold. In this icy realm, the fragile peace that followed the end of the Crystal War is under threat as Telogrus, the God of Chaos, has awoken and is rallying followers to his cause.
Fraser worried when the expansion was announced that it would overload an "already famously bloated" RPG, and while it remains to be seen how that works out, Fatesworn definitely sounds beefy. It will offer a new main quest of roughly six hours in length that follows the conclusion of the base game, with an increased level cap, 25 brand new Chaos dungeons, and new enemies, weapons, armor sets, crafting items, and more. Aside from the main questline, Fatesworn will also include "a ton of new side quests, task quests, and faction quests to fulfill."
It definitely sounds like a lot, but if you want more Amalur—or if Re-Reckoning, as the remaster is known, is still on your to-play list—then it sounds like a good pickup. Kingdoms of Amalur: Re-Reckoning – Fatesworn will go for $20/£18/€20, or you can snag it at a discount in the $55/£48/€55 Fate Edition bundle.
