Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 Producer Says RPGs Need More Than Chosen-One Power Fantasies

Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 was built around a notably different idea of what an RPG hero can be. Rather than placing a supernatural saviour at the center of an apocalyptic battle between obvious good and evil, Warhorse Studios has continued to pursue a more grounded medieval perspective: a world where status, skill, relationships, and ordinary human failings matter as much as any grand destiny.

That direction is not simply a stylistic preference. Martin Klíma, Warhorse Studios co-founder and executive producer on both Kingdom Come: Deliverance games, has explained that he is weary of the repeated formulas that define many role-playing adventures. In a recent interview, Klíma said he remains bored by stories that make the player a chosen individual assigned to save the universe. He does not view power fantasies as inherently bad, but he believes their regular use has made them predictable.

It is a useful explanation for the identity of the Kingdom Come series. The games have always stood somewhat apart from fantasy RPG conventions, leaning into historical atmosphere and a protagonist who is not immediately equipped to conquer every threat in his path. The studio's approach suggests that escapism does not require dragons, ancient prophecies, or cosmic stakes. A carefully realized historical setting can be just as transporting, particularly when it asks players to earn their place within it.

A response to a familiar RPG blueprint

The chosen-one narrative remains one of gaming's most durable structures. A player begins as someone underestimated, inexperienced, or unaware of their significance. Before long, an immense responsibility is revealed: protect the kingdom, stop a dark force, recover a sacred artifact, or save reality itself. Along the way comes a party of memorable allies, escalating combat abilities, and a villain whose intentions are rarely difficult to understand.

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Those ingredients can support excellent games. Klíma was careful not to dismiss the power fantasy in principle, and there is a reason the structure has survived for so long. It offers clear motivation, satisfying growth, and a straightforward emotional arc. Becoming stronger is one of the central pleasures of RPGs, and many players still want to move from vulnerability to mastery over the course of a long adventure.

His concern is repetition. When the same heroic journey appears again and again, even strong individual entries can start to feel as though they are following a route players already know. The problem, from that perspective, is not that a game offers empowerment. It is that empowerment can become too standardized when every new quest eventually turns its central character into the singular answer to the world's biggest problem.

Klíma's comments also point to an important distinction between genre labels and player expectations. RPGs are a broad category, encompassing everything from sprawling fantasy epics and Japanese role-playing games to historical simulations, tactical adventures, and systems-driven sandboxes. Yet the public image of the genre can often narrow around a handful of recurring story beats: destiny, ancient evil, moral binaries, and steadily increasing spectacle.

Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 belongs to a different branch of that family tree. Its historical realism shapes the kind of fantasy it offers. Instead of escaping to a magical world, players are invited to inhabit a version of the past with its own social rules, dangers, limitations, and texture. That framework leaves room for a more personal kind of role-playing, where a character's journey can feel rooted in survival and circumstance rather than preordained greatness.

Progress Quest and the value of satire

Klíma traced part of his thinking to Progress Quest, the self-playing satire that distilled familiar MMORPG routines into an intentionally hands-off experience. By reducing the cycle of fighting, leveling, collecting, and advancing to automated systems, the game made the genre's loops visible in a particularly blunt way.

For Klíma, that experience became a realization that other players might also be exhausted by an established formula. Satire often works best when it exposes a recognizable truth, and Progress Quest highlighted how easily progression can become detached from meaningful player involvement. Numbers rise, enemies fall, equipment improves, and a character's status grows--but if those rewards are delivered without surprise, challenge, or context, the routine risks becoming empty.

That does not mean every game needs to reject progression. In fact, progression is deeply embedded in the appeal of RPGs. The more interesting question is what progress represents. Is it merely bigger damage values and increasingly ornate gear? Is it access to new areas? Is it social mobility, practical competence, knowledge of a place, or a changed relationship with the people around the protagonist?

A grounded historical RPG has an opportunity to make those forms of advancement feel different. Learning to navigate a society, understanding how to prepare for danger, and gaining credibility through action can be as compelling as discovering an ultimate weapon. The player still develops, but the development can feel connected to the world rather than imposed on it by a universal heroic template.

An audience that has changed

Klíma also argued that many games have traditionally been designed with teenagers in mind, particularly in their use of direct power fantasies. His point was not that younger players should not enjoy those stories. For someone in their mid-teens, the experience of becoming exceptionally capable in a vast fictional world can be especially appealing. It can provide confidence, release, and an uncomplicated sense of agency.

But the gaming audience is not limited to that age group. Players who have spent decades with the medium may have different appetites, or they may simply want more variety alongside familiar forms of fantasy. They may still enjoy a world-saving adventure, but not want every major release to frame them as an inevitable saviour. They may respond more strongly to stories about work, loyalty, reputation, class, consequence, and the compromises required to get by.

This is not an argument that mature audiences only want grim or realistic games. Adults can enjoy colorful, exaggerated, playful, and fantastical experiences just as much as anyone else. The issue is breadth. As games reach more people across more age groups, studios have room to serve players looking for a different emotional register than the standard rise from nobody to godlike champion.

Warhorse's stance reflects that opportunity. Historical settings can provide constraints that fantasy worlds often avoid, and constraints can make role-playing more interesting. They demand that a game think about believable clothing, weapons, customs, travel, authority, and social expectations. They can also make success feel less automatic. If the world does not exist solely to celebrate the player character, then the player must engage with it on its own terms.

Not a rejection of other acclaimed RPGs

Klíma anticipated that his criticism of repetitive design could be interpreted as an attack on recent high-profile RPG successes, including Clair Obscur: Expedition 33. He stressed that this was not his intention. That distinction matters, because a game can embrace big emotions, striking fantasy imagery, and major stakes while still being inventive in its own execution.

The success of Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 demonstrates that players are not automatically tired of dramatic fantasy or ambitious narratives. A familiar premise does not doom a game to feeling stale; craft, imagination, mechanics, tone, characters, and presentation all matter. Players regularly embrace stories with recognizable foundations when those stories offer a fresh perspective or are executed with confidence.

Klíma instead pointed toward franchises such as Assassin's Creed, Watch Dogs, and Far Cry when discussing the fatigue that can come from playing a similarly structured experience repeatedly. These series are not all RPGs in a strict sense, but they have helped define a broad open-world design language: maps crowded with activities, repeating objectives, escalating upgrades, and recognizable loops built to sustain large adventures.

Again, the criticism is not that these systems can never work. Their endurance shows that plenty of players find them enjoyable. The concern is what happens when repetition becomes the defining characteristic. By a tenth similar experience, the surprise of discovery can be replaced by a checklist mentality. Players may know the rhythm of unlocks and activities before they even begin.

Why Kingdom Come's alternative matters

The value of Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 is not that it proves one RPG model is superior to every other. The genre is healthier when it contains both giant fantasy spectacles and more grounded alternatives. Some players want to wield impossible magic and determine the fate of worlds. Others want a messier, smaller-scale adventure in which competence takes time and the setting does not bend around their importance.

Warhorse Studios is clearly pursuing the latter audience. Its historical approach provides an alternative form of escapism, one centered on immersion rather than omnipotence. The appeal lies in entering a world that feels materially different from modern life, while still dealing with human concerns that are immediately understandable: ambition, friendship, conflict, embarrassment, survival, and the struggle to make a name for oneself.

That variety is especially valuable at a time when RPGs continue to expand in scope and audience. There is no need for developers to abandon power fantasies, chosen heroes, or huge confrontations between light and darkness. Those ideas remain effective tools, and they will continue to produce beloved games. But Klíma's argument is a reminder that they are tools rather than obligations.

Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 represents a case for asking different questions of an RPG protagonist. What if the player is not the universe's appointed defender? What if personal growth is hard-won rather than guaranteed? What if the most absorbing adventure comes not from becoming all-powerful, but from feeling like one person trying to find their way through a convincing, demanding world?

For Warhorse Studios, those questions are not a rejection of the RPG genre. They are a way of keeping it from becoming too comfortable with its most familiar answers.