Full Steam Ahead to PC: A Dokapon Kingdom Connect (Steam) Review

By Manuel

Players: 1-4 (Local & Online)
Platforms: PC (via Steam)

Dokapon Kingdom Connect is a hybrid party board game with heavy RPG inspiration and elements. It originally released on the Nintendo Wii in 2008 and this remake saw a previous release on the Nintendo Switch earlier this year. (Our review for that version can be found HERE!) It's now available on PC via Steam and we're going to see if the jump from non-Nintendo systems suits the game well. Then again this is Dokapon Kingdom we're talking about so it would be pretty hard to mess things up right? Right? Well, let's dive in and find out!

Dokapon Kingdom Connect drops you into the world of the same name, which is ruled by a King... with no name. The Kingdom is enjoying a boom period and money is flowing straight into the King's pockets. Then the Fire Nation attacked... I mean, the monsters arrived. Towns are being taken over and the Kingdom is in dire need of saving, and more importantly the King isn't getting all the taxes from his people! Money is key in Dokapon Kingdom so the King summons heroes from across the land to make sure that gold continues its way to his coffers. Along with the promise of riches is an offer to assume his throne and take his daughter's hand in marriage. The winner of this grand prize will be determined by how much money they're able to accumulate by their journey's end of course. Things aren't as simple as they seem though, and the evil in the land can just as easily find a home within the hearts of our heroes. Will you let the promise of money and power corrupt your heroic ideals?

Dokapon Kingdom is played by 2-4 players. They can be any combination of computer-controlled or IRL players. You're able to customize your hero at the start of the game, but it's best not to grow too attached to any particular aspect of them as they're sure to come out the adventure very different. Turn order is determined randomly and you're tossed into the RPG-sized overworld that makes up the game's board. You spin a spinner and move between one to six spaces. Each space has something happen on it, or is a set event or location like a shop or a town. Gameplay then moves onto the next player once you complete whatever action your space has. Oh, and you can also use items during your turn, but before you spin, that you get from item tiles or from the item shop. There's a lot more to gameplay, and we'll cover most of it soon, but there's probably a bit more than I could begin to outline without playing it yourself. Rest assured that you'll be doing a lot no matter what you spin, and there's nothing like "Free Parking" where your turn will go unused.

​Besides what I already outlined, gameplay in Dokapon Kingdom works sort of like Monopoly. That is if Monopoly required you to defeat monsters whenever you wanted to take control of properties. Your overall goal is to get more money than any other player, so you'll always want that in the back of your mind. Money can be obtained from certain event tiles, accumulated by defeating monsters, stolen from other players, and so on. But the most assured way to get a giant bump in your assets is to liberate towns that are occupied by monsters. Each town you liberate has a set value that is determined by its level, and that value is added to your assets at the end of each week's earnings roundup. You can also stay in your town to heal for free, collect taxes, and upgrade it so its value and services offered increase. Other players can also stay in your liberated town to heal, but are charged for the privilege. Now where the Monopoly comparison sort of fails is the fact that there isn't really any true negative consequence if a player lands on an opposing player's town. They can just choose to not do anything, similar to going to a shop and not actually buying or selling anything. Now liberating towns sounds easy, but each is protected by a monster whose power is equal to the town's rating. In short you can get in a lot of trouble if you're not careful picking your battles, so try not to rush in too quickly if you see a town open for the taking.

Combat is a core mechanic to just about any RPG, and that's no different here. Combat works in a rock, paper, scissors way (actually rock, paper, scissors dominates a LOT of this game's mechanics) where certain attacks are more effective against certain defenses. These aren't locked in stone though as powerful characters can still one-shot weaker ones no matter how they attempt to counter, and random misses can quickly drag a battle into several additional turns. Each tile on the board has an action or an event associated with it, with most of the board's tiles being blank. If you land on a blank space you can get a random event from an NPC, a trap, or most likely a random monster encounter. You can run from a battle for a penalty, but that penalty is usually less than what you'd have received if you tried to fight and lost. Random battles are par the course in RPGs though, so let's talk about something more exciting. If you finish your turn on the same space as another player, and that space is a non-event tile, you can battle them. These battles are obviously far more risky and offer some unique rewards. Besides the winner getting bragging rights for a few turns (and the loser sitting out at least two so they can heal), you can also steal their gear, give them humiliating names and hairstyles, and generally make it so that they're no longer the same hero they started the game as. This is as friendship-ending as it sounds, but it definitely is the most exciting aspect of gameplay and can quickly turn the tide in favor of the winner. It's also a little tricky to time correctly so you might not see it too much depending on your play style.

I've played many board games where it's clear after a few turns that some players are just getting too many bad hands dealt them, and there's no way that they'll realistically be able to recover and secure a win. This leads to games where everyone might as well give up halfway through since the outcome is pretty much obvious. Dokapon Kingdom doesn't really allow for that kind of scenario to play out though. Any game can easily be turned on its head by a single player seeking revenge for one too many bad turns. If you find yourself getting picked on by other players, or are just always losing in general, you might see yourself slip towards the dark side and become a "Darkling". These Darklings have stats far beyond anything that you can get through leveling, so you'll be destroying other players left and right. You'll also be able to steal back towns for the monsters by un-liberating them from the players who rescued them and adding them to your assets. Oh, and you'll also be rolling a ton of wheels that will see you flying across the game board. You're pretty much guaranteed to come back from your losing streak and see yourself settle comfortably into a top position. Well, until someone else turns on you and does the same thing that is. There are definitely ways to win without becoming a darkling, and having a player become one doesn't always mean that the game is now in their favor, but it's probably the earliest thing in-game that will make players realize that you can't sit back and get too comfortable if the game seems to be going in your favor. Don't worry though, the ensuing fights with your soon to be former friends will ensure you'll never have to experience that again!

Let's talk about reaching the end of a game as they can be quite long at times. First off, the story mode is divided into chapters that see you defeat a big bad in each section of the Kingdom before moving onto the next. This takes quite a long time to get through if you're playing with a complete set of four players. It's pretty much mandatory you complete the story mode early on though as it unlocks a lot of things you can use in the casual mode. The casual mode is where you play a single game that has the entire map open to you and allows you to set whatever goals and limitations you want. This means you can start off at a certain level, limit how long the game runs, and more. The story mode has endings to each chapter as determined once the relevant bosses are defeated, and the casual games end after whatever preset requirement is met. No matter how you reach the end though, the ending is always determined by the same thing: money. Simply put, the player with the most money when the final tally is counted is the winner, no matter if it was by a last minute burst of luck or not. I like to think of those last minute shakeups as the board game equivalent of getting blue shelled. Because everyone knows when the game will end, casual games are probably the most hectic as there are a lot of strategies on how to get rich quick, and how to relive other players of their gold. You'll quickly find your own strategies if you're playing offensively or defensively, and this level of depth is something you don't often see in games like this.

Before we leave the gameplay discussion, let me talk once again about one of my biggest gripes with the game: it's not truly random. When I was doing my first playthrough on the Switch I found myself being absolutely TROUNCED by the sole computer opponent I had set myself up against, so I resorted to save scumming. For those that don't know this is the practice of saving and reloading if something doesn't go your way in-game. It wasn't my proudest moment, but this was my first time with the game in over a decade after all. Well, it was while doing this that I learned that all the player's turns are pre-determined as soon as it becomes their turn. They'll always roll a pre-determined number on the spinner, each space will always have the same events or encounters, and even the battles will have the same results. Now there are some ways to "change" this, as in choosing the "correct" options in battle, or simply choosing from the best options given, but I found it really annoying once I realized that every move is pretty much pre-set up. I don't know how deep this runs since I only did the basic testing, but I definitely can say with that this is also present in the Steam release. I did all my playing on the Steam release against human players so far though, so I was able to determine that this sort of pre-determination is present among all players. An oddly specific thing to gripe about I'll agree, but doesn't it feel odd to know that your spins on the wheel never actually matter? The game already determined you're going to move X amount of spaces and nothing you can do can change that. Well, you COULD reload a save before your turn to get a different outcome, but then you're just loading in a different pre-determined thing that will then have its own set of pre-picked outcomes. Anyway, it was my biggest annoyance and I had to share it with you all again.

Now, there is something I want to address that I was not aware of at the time of Dokapon Kingdom Connect's Switch release, and that's the issue of censorship. I wasn't aware of the censorship present in the game when I first reviewed it, but noticed talk of it in the Steam discussions boards ahead of this release. Basically a lot of graphics were altered from the original Wii version, and the ability to actively rename players you beat in battle was removed entirely. I actually remembered the latter aspect of the game during my Switch playthrough, but assumed that I must've been remembering the Wii version wrong. I can't fathom why they'd remove that option if I'm being perfectly honest, though the current solution of giving players a new name from a random list isn't a horrible replacement. I do wish I could give their defeat more of a personal touch, but it's something I can definitely forget and get over. The graphical changes are something that don't bother me at all though. It's the usual changes one would expect, female characters are now more covered up than they were before. I understand some players being upset that it's not exactly like the original, but it's not as if the changes are particularly distracting or anything. Giving the female warriors pants over the bikini bottoms she had before isn't going to ruin my experience that's for sure. Also, it's worth mentioning that the changes were not done on the localization level, these were done for all versions of the game pretty close to release. I don't think we'll ever get a full answer as to why the changes were made, but I think the real distraction they cause is from the (rightful?) complaints from the fandom as they dominate discussions on the Steam community tab. If you're interested in more on this, here's a more detailed explanation of what was changed by way of Censored Gaming on YouTube.

All that aside I want to discuss an important differences between the Steam release and the Switch one. If you guessed that I'm going to discuss online play now, well you're right and I'll let you go first next time we play DKC! Since this release is on Steam you can play online without the need of a separate subscription like Nintendo's online service. What's interesting to note is that even though it's a "free" experience, I found it far more stable than the Switch. Maybe it's because of the lack of wired internet support for the original Switch model, but I found that there was pretty much no lag or any notable issues on Steam when playing, something I can't say the same for elsewhere. I actually delayed this review so I could test out a game with some friends online, as the online mode was something I didn't touch upon in my earlier Switch review. Now I think this game is best played with a bunch of friends crowded around a TV if you can. Not for the old-school-ness of it all either, but I feel that things like stealing from players, forcing a name change, or any other of those fun griefing options are best experienced when playing in a way that puts you within punching distance of the other players. With that said I understand that this isn't always so possible, so I'm pleased to report that the online aspect of this Steam release is probably the single best reason to pick it up. I mean it's not like the game has "Connect" in the title or anything right? You can't simply play this offline.

I'm going to cover music and graphics at the same time here since I raved a lot about them in my first review, and don't have a lot to add to those discussions. First off, the sound works fine here and the same pros and cons still stand. That means that the music will always suit the scene, and the in-game dialogue and voiced sections are always good too. I still wish there were more voiced sections, especially in Story Mode cutscenes, but I understand why this probably couldn't be done. I'm also still unsure if this is the same dub as the original Wii release, but it sure sounds close enough that I never questioned it. Graphics on the other hand don't feel too updated from either the Wii or the Switch, and I have far more mixed feelings on that. I wasn't expecting this to suddenly be in 4K HD when it arrived on Steam, but I was surprised how low-res some things looked when played on my bigger monitors. Namely the opening cutscenes looking a bit pixelated, and things like the title screen looking a little blown out and fuzzy. It's nothing that I can say takes away from the experience, most of my nitpicks don't even involve actual gameplay anyway, but it's worth mentioning that you're probably never going to shake the feeling that you're playing a fifteen year old game due to the overall presentation and visuals.

I thought I wasn't going to have a lot to say about controls, but there are some quirks to talk about that I noticed and wanted to mention. If you play with an XBox controller, or anything that doesn't use the "backwards" Nintendo-style BA-YX layout, you'll notice that the buttons themselves are reversed. This means that you're still using "A" to do most everything, and "B" to cancel things, but they're now in different places than if you've played in on the Switch. I guess this only matters if you're used to that control scheme, and there's even an in-game option to switch the buttons, but it was something that kept me making mistakes in my first hours with the Steam version. If you've not touched that version, or if you're more of an XBox player anyway, you'll probably not even notice anything amiss. That aside, I seriously suggest you play the game with a controller if you have one. This is a console game at heart, and trying to control it with a mouse and keyboard is a nightmare I thankfully only had to deal with once when I accidentally unplugged my controller before it started up. Don't make my mistake. Hell, maybe true using a Switch Pro Controller to bypass my issues entirely.

There's a lot of replayability here on account of it being a board game, but it loses some of the fun of it being a party game due to it being on PC. Unless you have a fairly non-standard PC setup, it's not very likely that you'll be able to host a full couch co-op game, and that's where a lot of the fun with this game lies in my opinion. That isn't to say that there isn't a lot to experience even if you're playing solo, but this version definitely comes with its own share of pros and cons. I'm not sure how much mileage I'll get out of this beyond playing with friends who purchased this due to not having a Switch, or if I ever want to play an online game that isn't marred with Nintendo's typical online issues. I don't want to make it sound like this is a "lesser" version of the game in any way, just that there is probably an internal discussion to be had if you're currently debating if you want to either pick it up on the Switch or on Steam.

I really can't recommend Dokapon Kingdom Connect enough, especially if you are unable to play it in its previous Switch release. It's the same game here, but arguably more accessible and with the potential for cool things like mods and community support. (Not really my place to say, but maybe fans will get on that censorship thing for their own sakes.) I still personally would recommend the Switch version over this one, simply due an easier setup for local multiplayer, but you can't go wrong either way. Gather some friends together, boot it up, and watch as your friendships slowly crumble! Don't forget that everything is fair in love, war, and the accumulation of gold in Dokapon Kingdom!

For More Information on Dokapon Kingdom Connect:
https://ideafintl.com/dokapon-connect/

---

Story: B
Gameplay: A-
Graphics: B
Music/Sound: A-
Value: A

Overall: B+

Pros:
+ A really fun game that features a lot of variables and replayability.
+ The Steam version offers a more stable online experience than that on the Switch.
+ The full-game worth Story Mode can be played in full multiplayer.
+ Game options, random events, unlockables, and more ensure that no two games are ever the same.
+ Excellent music and gameplay really make this feel more RPG than board game at times.
+ There aren't many console-like party board games like this on Steam, and this is a great one.

+/- Get ready to lose friendships in ways unseen of this side of Monopoly.

Cons:
- Doesn't feel as charming as it did on the Switch, and the game's age is starting to show.
- Random dice rolls and turn outcomes still aren't actually fully random.
- Though online gameplay runs a lot smoother, local multiplayer isn't nearly as easy to pull off as it was on the Switch.
- The censorship issues are hard to ignore once you know about them.

A copy of this game was provided to us free-of-charge by the publisher for the purpose of this review. This did not affect our review in any way.

---

#DokaponKingdomConnect