How are women portrayed in King's Bounty: Armored Princess?

Question

So a game caught my eye recently when I was doing some online shopping. The game is called King's Bounty: Armored Princess.

The reason it caught my eye is unimportant, you jerk.

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What I really want to know about is how that cover reflects on the actual game itself. I'm not familiar with the King's Bounty series at all, and I've got some concerns based on this box art. For an 'Armored Princess', the woman depicted looks decidedly unarmored.

Normally, I wouldn't think too much of something like this, but here it just seems... off to me. Is the entire game rife with use of 'sex appeal'? Specifically, what sort of clothing, behaviors, camera angles, and dialog does the game use? If every cutscene is going to have multiple close-ups of this woman's breasts, or involve every male NPC trying to get into her pants, I'm not sure I want to play it.

Answer

Short Version

The raunchiest thing in the game is probably that image.

Long Version

Though it can of course be interpreted in many ways, I don't think women in this game are overly objectified, and they are certainly portrayed better than how they were portrayed in the earlier game of the series, which features a male figure on the box. Specific details follow.

Protagonist, NPCs, Dialog

You play as a powerful, independent, fearless female protagonist; and the occasional advance by an NPC (which is pretty rare anyway) can be harshly rebuked by you using either wits or threats of violence. You can also get male squires serving you. Most other women in the game are also portrayed as independent and spirited individuals, though most NPCs are male.

Some NPCs will remark about the beauty of the protagonist in dialogs, though, just not necessarily trying to get in her pants. Then again, most NPCs in this game aren't really human.

Portraits, 3D models, Camera Angles

There are three possible outfits for your character, depending on your class. Though none of them are particularly modest, the Mage's outfit is very revealing, and it is indeed what is portrayed on the box art, for obvious reasons. That image can also be seen in-game if you play as a mage, and the character's 3D model will also appear wearing that outfit. The other two classes do actually wear more conservative armor.

There are a few additional portraits and models in the game that depict scantly-clad female faerie creatures - particularly dryads, nymphs and succibi.

The game is almost entirely played from a bird's-eye perspective; the 3D models are not overly detailed and not really in your face, and there are almost no cut-scenes to speak of.

Still Unsure?

If you're still undecided, you can just try a demo of the game, it gives a pretty good representation of both gameplay and dialog options, and it doesn't spoil anything either.

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