CEO Statement regarding the release

[five bucks]

8 years? It started before 27 Sept 2012 - that's over a decade

And 2 years of early access, as I said

 

[Ser Jon]

I agree absoultely that Taleworlds will never deal with issues that many people bring up. I just hate when people think that modders can or should save a game. That's ass backwards thinking modding should be there to enhance the game not to make it enjoyable.

If modders can and want to fix Bannerlord, that's awesome, but I'd feel really bad not only as a customer to be getting a broken/incomplete game, but as a person for thinking it should fall on people who aren't even being paid to do the work. Unfortunately, a lot of other people have come to depend on modders fixing things, so they need to lean more toward pushing the issues to them rather than to those who are actually responsible.

 

[xdj1nn]

If modders can and want to fix Bannerlord, that's awesome, but I'd feel really bad not only as a customer to be getting a broken/incomplete game, but as a person for thinking it should fall on people who aren't even being paid to do the work. Unfortunately, a lot of other people have come to depend on modders fixing things, so they need to lean more toward pushing the issues to them rather than to those who are actually responsible.

That has been Bethesda's strategy since development of Skyrim begun, and it has been working well for them, they've even tried to pull-off a paid mods (and they partially did). It's a disgusting practice, but none the less not without precedence.

 

[RozBritanicus]

Will there be another beta before release or is this it ?

 

[black_bulldog]

Will there be another beta before release or is this it ?

This is it, afaik there really aren't beta/ea releases for consoles (in most cases) so this is full release on the 25th.

 

[black_bulldog]

If modders can and want to fix Bannerlord, that's awesome, but I'd feel really bad not only as a customer to be getting a broken/incomplete game, but as a person for thinking it should fall on people who aren't even being paid to do the work. Unfortunately, a lot of other people have come to depend on modders fixing things, so they need to lean more toward pushing the issues to them rather than to those who are actually responsible.

Taleworlds came to rely on modders to fix issues with it's previous titles. It's a bad habit to get into but as @xdj1nn said it's not unprecedented. But I pray to god it doesn't become the industry standard.

 

[Ser Jon]

Taleworlds came to rely on modders to fix issues with it's previous titles. It's a bad habit to get into but as @xdj1nn said it's not unprecedented. But I pray to god it doesn't become the industry standard.

Warband modders really twisted up TW thinking, I guess.

And I don't see it becoming standard, at least not for a long time. Not a lot of games are developed even with mods in mind, so they'll either ship broken and be forgotten, or ship not so broken and be forgotten.

That has been Bethesda's strategy since development of Skyrim begun, and it has been working well for them, they've even tried to pull-off a paid mods (and they partially did). It's a disgusting practice, but none the less not without precedence.

Oh, I forgot about their attempt to get paid off mods. That was so embarrassing. Don't they now have an in-game shop, where you can buy mini-mod expansions? I vaguely remember that... well, hopefully it's not something TW will follow with Bannerlord a year or two into release.

 

[Philozoraptor]

Same with warband, modding was hard, but modders will find a way

There is one big difference between BL and WB modding. In WB you could have done complex mod by being self made because they had custom script language that made modding easier. In BL you need to know C# in order to do complex mods, AKA pool of potential modders is significantly reduced. Current official modding tools are primarely for making new textures and maps.

 

[Danny5]

There is one big difference between BL and WB modding. In WB you could have done complex mod by being self made because they had custom script language that made modding easier. In BL you need to know C# in order to do complex mods, AKA pool of potential modders is significantly reduced. Current official modding tools are primarely for making new textures and maps.

Oh wow I didn't know that, so bannerlord is much harder

 

[NPC99]

Oh wow I didn't know that, so bannerlord is much harder

Bannerlord is far more professional than Warband, which was quite rudimentary. Accordingly the entry/learning barriers for modders are far higher. Not just on coding, but across the board on asset creation and scening etc. However, I doubt that the pool of modders is smaller as C# is a popular language (a number of modders use it at work for business applications etc.) and Bannerlord has reached a wider audience. Most of the initial flush of mods were purely/substancially code based. Full conversion mods will take much longer as asset creation is a time sink. Even creating new cultures in xml is a slog.
If you want an example, watch Enpremi's handsrig tutorial https://forums.taleworlds.com/index...tool-and-tutorial-3ds-max-and-blender.444631/ By comparison gloves in Warband were simple meshes with three vertex frames, merely allowing open and closed fists. Even I could mod Warband gloves (with the help of mtarini's OpenBRF).

 

[Danny5]

Bannerlord is far more professional than Warband, which was quite rudimentary. Accordingly the entry/learning barriers for modders are far higher. Not just on coding, but across the board on asset creation and scening etc. However, I doubt that the pool of modders is smaller as C# is a popular language (a number of modders use it at work for business applications etc.) and Bannerlord has reached a wider audience. Most of the initial flush of mods were purely/substancially code based. Full conversion mods will take much longer as asset creation is a time sink. Even creating new cultures in xml is a slog.
If you want an example, watch Enpremi's handsrig tutorial https://forums.taleworlds.com/index...tool-and-tutorial-3ds-max-and-blender.444631/ By comparison gloves in Warband were simple meshes with three vertex frames, merely allowing open and closed fists. Even I could mod Warband gloves (with the help of mtarini's OpenBRF).

Ahh that's interesting!

 

[rion4581]

Literally all I was hoping for was (1) Warband's feature base but with (2) better sieges, (3) better graphics, (4) better mod support, and (5) all features operational.

For a studio of 100 employees such a simple sequel should have taken 3 years tops.

Here we are 8 years of development and 2 years of early access later and not only have they still not completed (1) and (5), but the game is actually overall LESS functional than Warband and they're going to release this?

They also built thier own game engine from scratch. A big undertaking that consumed most Pre EA time

 

[five bucks]

They also built thier own game engine from scratch. A big undertaking that consumed most Pre EA time

Building a game engine does NOT take 10 years. Or even four.

 

[nibbler2345432]

C# isn't that much harder than whatever scripting language and is almost certainly going to be more powerful than whatever API the devs decided to make available in scripts, so... big win there.

 

[rion4581]

Building a game engine does NOT take 10 years. Or even four.

If you say so lol?

 

[xdj1nn]

Bannerlord is far more professional than Warband, which was quite rudimentary. Accordingly the entry/learning barriers for modders are far higher. Not just on coding, but across the board on asset creation and scening etc. However, I doubt that the pool of modders is smaller as C# is a popular language (a number of modders use it at work for business applications etc.) and Bannerlord has reached a wider audience. Most of the initial flush of mods were purely/substancially code based. Full conversion mods will take much longer as asset creation is a time sink. Even creating new cultures in xml is a slog.
If you want an example, watch Enpremi's handsrig tutorial https://forums.taleworlds.com/index...tool-and-tutorial-3ds-max-and-blender.444631/ By comparison gloves in Warband were simple meshes with three vertex frames, merely allowing open and closed fists. Even I could mod Warband gloves (with the help of mtarini's OpenBRF).

C# is easy to learn, reason why the entire Unity engine was built on it. The most complex older games were all made in C++. I still remember the workshops about Unity in University when it was in it's final stages of development, MS representants would come and give us some master-classes on it. The lesser engines would use other code languages other than C++ but C# was just being introduced as a viable alternative and it's golden to this date. Better libraries and much simpler than C++

The asset creation's just blasphemy. The only difference is level of detail and poly-count, but for any true 3d artist or even 2d artist, it's but a simple detail. The only thing that "gets in the way" is that it takes a bit longer to make, other than that the principles are the same.
The only true barrier is the coding and understanding how the game is compiled (which I guess TW released the tools?).

As for the whole "professional" just stop, Armageddon was pretty professional making M&B and Warband, there's no such a thing as "more professional" that's just laymen talk. The only difference is the structure and budget, yet it didn't make much of a difference because they've dropped the ball on a vast array of details due to lack of logistical management and clear direction.

 

[NPC99]

The asset creation's just blasphemy. The only difference is level of detail and poly-count, but for any true 3d artist or even 2d artist, it's but a simple detail.

Most modders are amateurs rather than professional 3d or 2d artists. If you watch the modding discord you'll see people struggling with importing assets, rigging, applying cloth physics etc. It can all be learnt, but takes patience.

 

[Duh_TaleWorlds]

C# is easy to learn

Mable / Monty Python (or whatever other name one likes to use for Warband's custom scripting language) was easier by virtue of allowing less. Though its limitations certainly inspired innovative solutions

Newcomers also benefited from being able to make minor changes without having to reimplement classes or use things like injection.

there's no such a thing as "more professional" that's just laymen talk.

Say that again, but slowly

 

[xdj1nn]

Mable / Monty Python (or whatever other name one likes to use for Warband's custom scripting language) was easier by virtue of allowing less. Though its limitations certainly inspired innovate solutions

Newcomers also benefited from being able to make minor changes without having to reimplement classes or use things like injection.


Say that again, but slowly

c'mon duh, you gonna say that Armagan wasn't professional while doing M&B and WB? The only thing is that it was full indie which makes things trickier/harder in some departments and easier on other departments... Now, he just called any Indie game made by small teams "amateur" and that's just unacceptable to me, really. Professionalism has nothing to do the scope of a project, nor it has to do with the scope of a company. It's comparable to calling Steve Jobs unprofessional before having a proper headquarters.Or any other startup / indie company. Professionalism has nothing to do with it, and arguably some of the handling of BL wasn't very professional, but that's not relevant to the point I'm making here.

As for the coding, yeah it was "simpler" but "simpler" doesn't always mean "simpler" when it comes to coding, if you know what I'm referring to

Most modders are amateurs rather than professional 3d or 2d artists. If you watch the modding discord you'll see people struggling with importing assets, rigging, applying cloth physics etc. It can all be learnt, but takes patience.

it certainly does! There are tricks and plugins that might help, but than again I'm too unfamiliar with freeware for art, I only know professional software so I can't help pointing to said plugins. I mean, I know the freewares but I have no knowledge on their usage, still use adobe and autodesk

 

[Duh_TaleWorlds]

you gonna say that Armagan wasn't professional while doing M&B and WB?

I don't think Armagan or generic professionalism were the point of @NPC99 Rather he seemed to discuss the way that the game was built and how it compares to the current product that had greater experience and resources at its disposal. In this, Bannerlord enforces/follows certain standards more strictly (no module_scripts with its 50k+ lines, for one ).