- Joined
- Dec 13, 2007
- Messages
- 1,215
Being an "indy" developer myself, I always appreciate/respect the work of indies the world over. And an indy husband & wife team from some random country have developed what I think is a bloody awesome game, "Mount & Blade" - I've spent way too many a spare hours on an evening playing this. I first tried it out back in 2005 when it was in early development (and you could buy it for a fiver back then, bargain 
), and have followed it's progress on and off (checking in every few months) since then. It just had it's final version released/published last week, and has actually made it to the shelves as a commercial game!
Selection of reviews/scores on MetaCritic here
You can get a demo from here;
http://files.filefront.com/mountandblad ... einfo.html
Or here;
http://www.worthdownloading.com/downloa ... 0&id=16467
Best classification I can give is a totally open-ended medieval action-RPG set in 'realistic' medieval times (no dragons or magic or elves etc.). The RPG elements are limited, but there are skills/stats and levels that increased for you/your companions as you get exp killing things/doing some simple quests (and a few not so simple you get later down the line from villages and lords)... and no real storyline (which is a downside in some ways, but leaves it totally open-ended in another way). Also at first you can feel a bit lost about what to do in the game when you first try it (the other main downside), but once you get in to it it's awesome. It's definitely the best combat system I've ever seen in a game - anything from sitting on a mount and jousting your enemies, to running around with a two handed axes swinging it side to side trying to get past enemy shields. You can end up leading an army of over 100 troops and sieging castles and towns to take over for yourself, or join one of five factions and join up with the armies of a faction (and later rebel and become a rebellion leader if you want).
You start out on a map with a horse and nobody in your side, best advice I can give at the beginning is find a "training camp" on the map and give combat a test, and then head to the nearest town (towns names appear in the largest font size on the map, as opposed to villages/castles which are smaller), go to the inn and see if there's anyone in there you can hire to join you (there's around 12 other 'heroes' in the game that you can recruit, that level up alongisde you and have their own stats/skills... the rest of your army will be filled up with regular soldiers you train up from recruits to archers to knights). Also visit castles every now and then and see if there's any lords to visit (the lords may be wandering the map with their army though - they do patrol and go to war just like you can) - lords will often give you quests to do that net you positive reputation for that lord and their faction.
It's all easily moddable (back in early beta days there were Lord of the Rings mods, the starts of a Star Wars mod, 100 years war mod etc. etc)... so expect to see lots of epic mods and total-conversions come out once the final release has been out for a month or two.
Graphics/general effects aren't amazing, but they aren't bad at all... and you have to take it for what it is - an indy developed game not a game with an epic budget or a huge programming/art team behind them. Though somebody has already released an improved texture pack on the game's mod forums.
Oh and for those wondering, I'm advertising this for two good reasons; 1: I really do think it's an ace game and think there's probably others here that will like it too once you get in to it, and 2: I think any indy team that makes an ace game deserves any free advertising they can get from fans, much like I've seen people promoting Bushtarion on other sites for me!
), and have followed it's progress on and off (checking in every few months) since then. It just had it's final version released/published last week, and has actually made it to the shelves as a commercial game!Selection of reviews/scores on MetaCritic here
You can get a demo from here;
http://files.filefront.com/mountandblad ... einfo.html
Or here;
http://www.worthdownloading.com/downloa ... 0&id=16467
Best classification I can give is a totally open-ended medieval action-RPG set in 'realistic' medieval times (no dragons or magic or elves etc.). The RPG elements are limited, but there are skills/stats and levels that increased for you/your companions as you get exp killing things/doing some simple quests (and a few not so simple you get later down the line from villages and lords)... and no real storyline (which is a downside in some ways, but leaves it totally open-ended in another way). Also at first you can feel a bit lost about what to do in the game when you first try it (the other main downside), but once you get in to it it's awesome. It's definitely the best combat system I've ever seen in a game - anything from sitting on a mount and jousting your enemies, to running around with a two handed axes swinging it side to side trying to get past enemy shields. You can end up leading an army of over 100 troops and sieging castles and towns to take over for yourself, or join one of five factions and join up with the armies of a faction (and later rebel and become a rebellion leader if you want).
You start out on a map with a horse and nobody in your side, best advice I can give at the beginning is find a "training camp" on the map and give combat a test, and then head to the nearest town (towns names appear in the largest font size on the map, as opposed to villages/castles which are smaller), go to the inn and see if there's anyone in there you can hire to join you (there's around 12 other 'heroes' in the game that you can recruit, that level up alongisde you and have their own stats/skills... the rest of your army will be filled up with regular soldiers you train up from recruits to archers to knights). Also visit castles every now and then and see if there's any lords to visit (the lords may be wandering the map with their army though - they do patrol and go to war just like you can) - lords will often give you quests to do that net you positive reputation for that lord and their faction.
It's all easily moddable (back in early beta days there were Lord of the Rings mods, the starts of a Star Wars mod, 100 years war mod etc. etc)... so expect to see lots of epic mods and total-conversions come out once the final release has been out for a month or two.
Graphics/general effects aren't amazing, but they aren't bad at all... and you have to take it for what it is - an indy developed game not a game with an epic budget or a huge programming/art team behind them. Though somebody has already released an improved texture pack on the game's mod forums.
Oh and for those wondering, I'm advertising this for two good reasons; 1: I really do think it's an ace game and think there's probably others here that will like it too once you get in to it, and 2: I think any indy team that makes an ace game deserves any free advertising they can get from fans, much like I've seen people promoting Bushtarion on other sites for me!
