Pathfinder: Kingmaker

The 3.5 that lived on

Pathfinder: Kingmaker is built on Paizo’s tabletop Pathfinder system — and Pathfinder is, in origin, Dungeons & Dragons 3.5. When Wizards of the Coast moved to 4th edition, Paizo took the 3.5 rules that remained available under the Open Game License and continued them as their own game; the CRPG inherits that ancestry wholesale.

Owlcat Games’ first title is an unapologetically old-school, real-time-with-pause party RPG in the lineage of Baldur’s Gate and Icewind Dale, adapting Paizo’s Kingmaker Adventure Path. On top of the dungeon-delving it layers a kingdom-management layer: you don’t just explore the Stolen Lands, you rule them, with provinces, advisors, and timed crises. It is set in Paizo’s own world of Golarion rather than a D&D campaign setting.

Because its rules descend straight from D&D 3.5 under the OGL — rather than from a WotC license — it sits among the unofficial entries, alongside the other d20/OGL games.