After over 900 hours of playing, I can't recommend this game.

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LOL dude, if the game gave you 900h, it did its job. The purpose of a game its to make you have fun, if you played that much its means you really enjoyed the game. If not you rly have a problem of empty life
I have lots of hours because I play each time a patch comes out, to see if the game is fun yet.

The problem is that it still isn't fun, just a timesink that takes lots of hours to play but doesn't provide much enjoyment in the time you're playing it. A good game provides a variety of fair, interesting challenges to the player that test their decision-making abilities or skill.

It's not a fun RPG because the story and quests are very basic, the game lacks immersion, and a lot of build options are very underpowered, so there's little meaningful decision making.

It's not a fun strategy game because the AI still makes frequent major errors, there are annoying cheats they get like never dying off or never having to pay for mercenaries, and many systems that should add variety or depth are incomplete or missing.

It's not a fun tactics game because due to bugs and weak armour, there are only two viable tactics that are very simple to beat the AI with, and even big battles are just a moshpit that ends in a few minutes.

It's not a fun action game because armour basically does nothing, opponents are dumb, fights are too quick (see above) and weapon balance is messed up.

Bannerlord is almost all just moving around on the map, doing fetchquests, looking at menus and grinding repetitive battles with no tactical depth. It's largely missing varied, fair, challenging gameplay.
And of course, the game is far for be finished and im not happy of how the company manages the community and the info.
Then who is your post helping?
 
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Pretty much this. The game has or had HUGE potential. As someone who really enjoys the dynastic/RPG aspect of the game instead of trying to speedrun a Calradia conquest, I can tell you that I've been disappointed with the progress. As it stands there is so much jankyness and immersion breaking material in the game.

Something that would improve my experience personally would just be fleshing out and adding certain features to the entire clan and kingdom management part of the game. Also INCREASE the freaking cool down period between wars. I can not do any RPing or management of my estates when I'm at war every single moment of the game, and I can't just let the NPC's handle wars because they stand ZERO chance against enemy AI. I don't know why they tantalize us with these really neat Crusader King-like features if they're going to keep it really janky and unfinished.

Another problem is that the way relationship gain/loss works is ridiculous and serves pretty much zero purpose. For example, you increase/decrease relationship with entire clans rather than individuals which doesn't make sense to me. What if I killed the father of a certain NPC (in battle or via execution), but then that NPC joins a friendly clan? Their relationship towards be resets to friendly. Also, what if I have just taken an enemy kingdom's entire holdings, and 100 relationship enemy lords STILL refuse to join me? Does that make any sense? Loss/Gain of relationship should also be harder (or easier in the former's case) to obtain, and have actual consequences or benefits.

Population should also be handled differently. Fix the code behind how likely or who NPCs choose to marry. 70 year old ladies shouldn't be marrying young male lords. Increase the fertility of NPC couples, also introduce a mechanic that adds infant/child mortality. Also more clans could be introduced if villages weren't tied to castles, or just add clans that don't have any estates. As players we also have no choice to choose what NPC clan members we want our own clan members to marry, NPC clans only offer the oldest unmarried clan member as an option which a lot of the time is an elderly widower.

Also fix the model generation of children. This has been a consistent problem since the game came out, all of your kids are still freaking clones and it bothers me to no end. Add more names as well because there are so many repeating names, is it that hard to think of, let's say, 500 more names? .

I think after they fix these things they can go and think about expanding the game. Maybe add naval combat and add villages to all of those empty islands.
 
Bannerlord is almost all just moving around on the map, doing fetchquests, looking at menus and grinding repetitive battles with no tactical depth. It's largely missing varied, fair, challenging gameplay.
This is so on point it could be the short summary of a game magazine review if they invest more than 10 hours into the game with a 6/10 rating.
 
This is so on point it could be the short summary of a game magazine review if they invest more than 10 hours into the game with a 6/10 rating.
Tbf the og M&B was the only real game that Taleworlds actually made before Bannerlord. Warband was just an iteration that added a bit of content but nothing earth shaking. VC was developed by another company. With F&S was co-developed with another company and Napoleonic Wars was multiplayer dlc. It's actually understandable that they can't make an interesting rpg that has in-depth mechanics because they lack the experience. They also lack in experienced devs and add to the fact that management has made it clear they don't want a lot of depth to the game so it appeals to as big an audience as possible. It's actually a wonder that they've managed to made a mediocre game. :party:
 
When I played warband for 1549 hours, I played with minimal modding -- in fact, I'd say at least 1000 hours of those was unmodded. But couple hundred hours of modded gameplay is still nothing to cuss at, certainly. Warband levelling up has always been immediate -- rudimentary perhaps, but easily understood and the benefits are obvious. Every point you invest is guaranteed since your characters are immortal. Sure the late game has always been poor and needed much more improvement -- but never in my life had I thought to myself: gee! I sure think the early game needs a complete overhaul!

Agree on the modding part -- though it certainly appears it'd not be as moddable as warband, seeing how every addition is depending on the base module unlike in warband, each module is independent therefore, barring complete engine changes, each module can be ran regardless of versions numbers. No every mod needs to be updated per new game update, and with the game at the state it's in right now, how many more version updates must there be before it reaches a "stable" state? Let's not forget the modding scene of any game needs just as much fostering and this is sure to drive ambitious modders off.
 
warband went from zombie King Harlaus to a 2000's masterpiece

i'm ok with it getting me through lockdown and winter
it's over now. there's just too many flaws; making it boring
at least it stopped crashing as much
 
I get what OP is saying. I certainly have had some fun with the game and I still play it, but I can't say I actively enjoy most of what I'm doing while playing. Rather, it's always the idea of a fun playthrough that keeps me going. Try a new build or some idea for a roleplay, play through it for awhile, realize it feels the same as all my other playthroughs and start again. It just always feels like every single thing is missing a few components needed to be actually fun.
 
I get what OP is saying. I certainly have had some fun with the game and I still play it, but I can't say I actively enjoy most of what I'm doing while playing. Rather, it's always the idea of a fun playthrough that keeps me going. Try a new build or some idea for a roleplay, play through it for awhile, realize it feels the same as all my other playthroughs and start again. It just always feels like every single thing is missing a few components needed to be actually fun.
For nine hundred hours...?

Assuming 8 hours sleep a night - that's 56 straight days.

There's been 784 days since bannerlords release. That means 7% of his entire life since March 2020 has been spent on Bannerlord.

I'm sorry but if it's not something you enjoy that's borderline insanity. OP needs professional help - not a forum thread. God forbid they start smoking or drinking; they'll be dead within a week.
 
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naw, just lockdown & symptom-quarantine
i have 2k in another game, pretty easy to get 150 hours in every time you cough a bit, or been around someone that coughed, or went on a plane
 
For nine hundred hours...?

Assuming 8 hours sleep a night - that's 56 straight days.

There's been 784 days since bannerlords release. That means 7% of his entire life since March 2020 has been spent on Bannerlord.

I'm sorry but if it's not something you enjoy that's borderline insanity. OP needs professional help - not a forum thread. God forbid they start smoking or drinking; they'll be dead within a week.
Sure, I have 952. Like the poster above says, the game came out at the right time for it. Many were in lockdown, I personally had quit my job due to their covid response actions so I had a ton of time and not much else I felt like doing. I played a lot hoping to find more of what I loved about warband, then trying mods, then I played because there wasn't any other games that had interested me. If it were considered insanity to do something you don't love, I would never go to work or date women again. I don't hate the game, I want it to be better. In my head I think of all the things I would have liked it to be and when I have nothing else to do that's enough to get me to boot it up.
 
Try a new build or some idea for a roleplay, play through it for awhile, realize it feels the same as all my other playthroughs and start again. It just always feels like every single thing is missing a few components needed to be actually fun.
This is so true.

Picking a faction for a playthrough barely feels any different because their troop trees are so similar.

Picking a playstyle that isn't "bow/crossbow or slashing polearm on horseback" feels like an objective downgrade.

In addition to all the complaining I did further up about how the game lacks challenge, immersion, balanced variety, and gameplay loop variety.
 
Bannerlord is almost all just moving around on the map, doing fetchquests, looking at menus and grinding repetitive battles with no tactical depth. It's largely missing varied, fair, challenging gameplay.
In broader perspective, Warband on release was the same; however, it had what Bannerlord does not, a complete moddable engine. What will really doom the latter is the lack thereof since most people will abandon it before it goes fully moddable and stable (unless some hardcore modders sacrifice their private lives to do the devs' work which has already taken place).
 
At first when I started playing I was incredibly optimistic with the gradual progress the devs made and I was always looking forward to the patches and updates. But the fact is, these updates are very halfassed low efforts and I'm not sure if they feel guilty about stealing your money or if they're only pretending to care about the whole situation.

Bannerlord survives on life-support, their modding community. And I have no idea why they aren't influenced by the modders who make in-depth mods and massive overhauls, but this is why the game is gonna die out completely. They had a good promising start but were on a slippery slope from the getgo and it only went downhill.

I've got 400h into the game since I was content with the beginning updates, but truthfully it was the modding community that had me stay for 350 or so hours.

Can't recommend the game, and I won't until the devs come forth with some actually worthwhile updates that's not the billionth stats tweak or the occasional added armour/equipment.
 
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