‘I’m honestly scared to go to sleep’: Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2’s hardcore mode is finally here for anyone who wants a ‘tougher slice of medieval life’

Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2’s 1.2.4 patch introduces a couple of bug fixes, like rebalanced shop prices for herbs and a new bald hairstyle for Henry. But let’s be serious, no one’s getting out of bed for those features (well, maybe the new hairstyle), when the real kicker is the new hardcore mode that’s tacked onto the patch as well.

“Hardcore mode is here, and it’s not for the faint of heart,” the patch notes say. “You won’t see your location on the map. You won’t fast travel. You won’t get surrendering enemies, visual cues in combat, or even basic directions, unless you earn them.”

There are also a few permanent negative perks which you can select at the beginning of a playthrough. This will change how you engage with Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2, as there are no shortcuts to victory.

“Hardcore mode has arrived to Bohemia,” a blog post says. “The new game mode is set to shake the very foundations of Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 for anyone ready to test their mettle against an even tougher slice of medieval life.

“You’ll also have to remix your own adventure by selecting at least three permanent negative perks at the very beginning of your playthrough. You might choose the oafish Heavy-Footed perk, for example, which increases your movement noise while also wearing out your shoe leather faster. Alternatively, Sweaty increases your personal pungency as you explore the world, while Numbskull slows your experience gains.”

Karel Kolmann, senior game designer at Warhorse Studios, explains how the devs upped the ante for this hardcore mode compared to the same mode for the first game: “In the first game’s hardcore mode, we did things like disabling your map position and removing the compass but we’ve gone further this time. We’ve added the option to ask different NPCs about your location in the world, which is something more immersive. You can run into travellers on the road and ask for directions.”

The Bashful perk disables map assistance. It doesn’t sound too bad at first, but a couple of players have pointed out how annoying it can be when combined with the Somnambulant perk, which can trigger sleepwalking, meaning you can go to sleep and wake up in a random location.

“Appearing somewhere random is really annoying when you have something you want to do nearby when you wake up,” whousesgmail says. “It’s really fucking annoying when you don’t have any map guidance. Idk how helpful asking for directions is, but Bashful stops that, too.

“I’m honestly scared to go to sleep at this point because it procs so much. Not to mention, it doesn’t really add any difficulty, just inconvenience. It would be kinda funny if it were like 10%, but it happens so often I’m expecting and dreading it, which is dumb imo.”

There are other perks you can choose from that won’t see you waking up in a random field. One alternative is the Punchable Face perk, which just increases the hostility of travellers you come across. So you may get your lights punched out in the middle of a dirt road somewhere, but at least you’ll wake up in the same spot.