For lovers of role-playing games and the medieval period, fantasy, or both, last week brought an incredibly exciting announcement: the news that Warhorse Studios, the developer behind the acclaimed open world. Kingdom Come: Deliverance and Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 role-playing games, it is working on a new title set in Middle Earth At the same time, he is also creating a new KCD game.
At the time, very little was said about any of the upcoming titles, although Embracer Group, the holding company that owns publisher KCD Deep Silver and Warhorse Studios, revealed that the new Kingdom Come game is scheduled for release in the “next fiscal year” in your latest earnings reportsuggesting a 2027 release date.
In a live stream of community tracking from WarhorseHowever, communications director Tobias Stolz-Zwilling shared some additional details about both projects. He began by confirming that both RPGs will be open-world before announcing that the third Kingdom Come title will be directed by KCD2 creative director Prokop Jirsa, with KCD2 design director Viktor Bocan in charge of Middle-earth gameplay.
He also reaffirmed the planned release window for the new Kingdom Come adventure: “If all goes well, it will arrive next fiscal year. Which means you won’t have to wait seven years for another Kingdom Come.”
Stolz-Zwilling also touched on the fact that Warhorse has grown enough that it can now comfortably work on two major projects at the same time, emphasizing that “we’re still a great team” despite being split on both games. “Of course, there are still things that we cooperate on,” he explained.
He went on to talk about the Lord of the Rings RPG in particular, then noted that “We have a completely amazing team ready to delve into what this universe has to offer. And this is, again, an absolute passion project.”
“I use that word a lot, but you know what I mean,” he added. “Don’t think it’s just, ‘Hey, you do it,’ and we have a job and now we’re doing it; it’s not like that. It’s not how we want to make games, we’re not swordsmen for hire. We’re making the games we want to make and the way we want to make them.”
Elaborating on this, Stolz-Zwilling explained that the developers have committed to “building the games in a very Warhorse-specific way,” that is, focusing heavily on the open-world reactivity and crunchy system-based mechanics that have made KCD’s games stand out as some of the best RPGs of the last decade.
“With KCD1 and KCD2, we have a unique way of creating role-playing games, of how we understand role-playing games. I said this in an interview with someone from Gamescom that we want to become the new kings of role-playing games. I still stand by it,” he continued. “I know it’s a little ‘haha’ and nosy, but I really stand by it. “I think we have our own formula that they love, and that’s one of the reasons why yesterday’s news made so many waves: because people trust that we know what we’re doing.”
Finally, Stolz-Zwilling discarded some descriptions that he was very Glad to hear, noting that the Middle-earth game will be “deeply immersive” with a “living world,” along with “interesting characters, memorable locations, and of course, a strong narrative focus.” Say no more, Warhorse, I’m in.
Are you excited to play the new Kingdom Come game next year and also the Warhorse Middle-earth RPG when it comes out? Let me know below.
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