Pathfinder: Kingmaker (2018)
Pathfinder: Kingmaker is a 2018 role-playing (rpg) video game made by Owlcat Games and Deep Silver.
A charter sends your party into the Stolen Lands, a lawless frontier of bandit kings and fey mischief, with a simple mandate: carve out a realm and hold it. Owlcat's first RPG wears its influences openly, an isometric, party-based throwback to Baldur's Gate and Fallout, faithful to the tabletop Pathfinder ruleset down to its dense character math. Beyond dungeon-crawling, you govern the kingdom you claim, appointing advisors, ruling on disputes and racing timed threats that can undo everything. It is demanding and systems-heavy, generous to players who enjoy building a character sheet as much as a story.
Quick answers
What is Pathfinder: Kingmaker about?
A charter sends your party into the Stolen Lands, a lawless frontier of bandit kings and fey mischief, with a simple mandate: carve out a realm and hold it. Owlcat's first RPG wears its influences openly, an isometric, party-based throwback to Baldur's Gate and Fallout, faithful to the tabletop Pathfinder ruleset down to its dense character math. Beyond dungeon-crawling, you govern the kingdom you claim, appointing advisors, ruling on disputes and racing timed threats that can undo everything. It is demanding and systems-heavy, generous to players who enjoy building a character sheet as much as a story.
When was Pathfinder: Kingmaker released?
Pathfinder: Kingmaker was released on 25 September 2018.
Who made Pathfinder: Kingmaker?
Pathfinder: Kingmaker was made by Owlcat Games and Deep Silver.
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Explore Pathfinder: Kingmaker guides
Pathfinder: Kingmaker in our writing
- Companion guide: The CRPG: The Complete Guide to Computer Role-Playing Games
- Companion guide: The CRPG Renaissance: How Kickstarter Brought the Genre Back from the Dead
- Companion guide: Owlcat Games: From Pathfinder to Rogue Trader, the CRPG Comeback
A few thoughts on Pathfinder: Kingmaker
Baldur's Gate 3 is the modern peak of the party-based D&D-style RPG this game reveres. For more of Owlcat Games's own dense tactics and bigger stakes, Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous is the direct sequel. And Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves captures the tabletop spirit underneath it all, an adventuring party improvising its way through trouble.
Fantasy stories about the burden of ruling as much as adventuring
Kingmaker eventually makes you both adventurer and ruler, juggling advisors and disputes on top of dungeon crawling. Game of Thrones and House of the Dragon spend as much time on the burdens of rule as on war, Oathbringer keeps its heroes tangled in the politics of uniting fractured kingdoms, and Redwall's young defenders find themselves responsible for an entire community's safety.
Lawless frontiers with bandit kings, fey and no one else to keep order
Kingmaker's Stolen Lands are a frontier ruled by bandit kings and fey mischief until you carve out your own claim. Honor Among Thieves sends its party through the same kind of lawless, half-civilized territory, The Witcher 3 fills its countryside with warlords and monsters nobody polices, and Red Dead Redemption 2 and San Andreas both hand outlaws the run of land the law hasn't caught up to yet.
Prog rock and metal for grinding through dungeons rules-first
Kingmaker rewards players who love poring over character sheets as much as exploring the map, and this music has that same dense, deliberate weight. King Crimson's In the Court of the Crimson King brings theatrical, layered composition to match the ruleset's complexity, Judas Priest's Painkiller and Fates Warning's The Spectre Within add driving intensity for combat, and Blind Guardian's IX Equilibrium leans straight into fantasy lore and legend.
Manga about defending a fragile foothold against forces beyond the walls
Kingmaker's fledgling barony survives only as long as you can hold its borders against bandits, fey and timed threats. Attack on Titan turns exactly that fragile foothold into its whole premise, Fullmetal Alchemist keeps its state alchemists caught between political factions and outside threats, Rurouni Kenshin rebuilds a fractured country one settlement at a time, and Inuyasha spends its run defending scattered villages from what lives beyond them.