Studio Double Fine, with Tim Schafer at the helm, has been releasing titles for years that are more creative than most of the competition. Think, for example, of the surreal Psychonauts or the action heavy metal of the Brütal Legend spectacle. It is therefore not surprising that their latest experiment in the series is a multiplayer game in which the players are clay vessels. Well, while the premise of a PvP title in which you team-fight with clay pots would be dismissed with a loud laugh by other developers, in Kiln the idea has been worked out so that you will make your own pots on the potter’s wheel.
| Initial price | Reviewed version | Reviewer copy |
| 20€ | PC | Provided by publisher |
It is a unique combination of aesthetics and gameplay: just by choosing the shape of the pot, you will significantly influence its behavior in the arena. Except that, as you would expect, larger vessels will be stronger and more durable in battle (but therefore slower) than small ones, for example vases will differ significantly from pots in their unique abilities, just as pots will differ from jars, jugs, bowls, jars and so on. In principle, it is possible to customize almost every element of the container, and you have a number of tools at your disposal that you can use to create exactly the container you envision.
Among the crafted vessels you will need to choose three vessels that will be at your disposal during the match, so you can (or don’t have to) change them when an opponent knocks you out. By the way, the game itself in the arena is sympathetically conceived as a kind of tactical brawler with two teams of four players in which the goal is to extinguish the opponent’s flame three times – before the opponent does it to you. In order to succeed in this, you will have to collect water scattered across the maps and at the same time “slap” with opponents, that is, run away from them.
As expected, different types of vessels have different advantages and disadvantages, so some are better adapted to hand-to-hand combat, others are defensively oriented, others play the card of partisan raids, etc.
It is difficult to find more serious complaints about the basic one gameplay Kilna: the premise is good, as are the basic mechanics, while the controls are relatively responsive and intuitive. Each of the five available arenas is unique and requires you to adequately adjust your play style. For example, one of them has catapults that you can use to launch to the other end of the map, another uses moving ships, the third is in the middle of lava, etc.
All of this is initially a lot of fun, but the situation changes after a few hours of the game because Kiln is facing serious problems when his basic gameplay needs to be upgraded, either by deepening existing mechanics or adding new content. Similar to the failed Highguard, Kiln is simultaneously trying to be competitive and casual title, and it’s not as great as either.
In its current form, Kiln simply doesn’t offer enough to satisfy either of those two camps of players. Gameplay it lacks real tactical depth for a more serious game, while the number of maps, skills and classes is too small for chaotic banter after a busy day. At the same time, the title does not even support local multiplayer, which is a rather strange decision considering the concept itself. So if (or when) the servers die, it’s over with the game itself.
It’s hard for me to be completely objective with a title like Kiln. On the one hand, I would be happy if it achieves more significant success: in today’s market, it is difficult to find unique and creative games like this one. At the same time, I cannot ignore the serious shortcomings regarding the lack of depth, that is, the amount of content. This is the type of game that doesn’t seem to have been developed beyond the initial idea.
As things stand, my desire to succeed will probably come to nothing though, as the number of active players on Steam has been steadily declining since the game’s release. And here we are talking about a drop to a single digit number. Although the situation can be reversed with a better patch at some point, it’s all just speculation. Therefore, Kiln is currently only worth playing if you already have a Game Pass subscription, as part of which you can download it for free.