Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord Old Discussion Thread

[xdj1nn]

well, idk, they can announce in game events as much as they feel like, I'm still skeptical about this game coming out this year...
1st glimpse was back in 2012, it's been 4 years, that's not a short time period tbh...

I am still hopeful about the result of all the wait, but I find their marketing strategies to be at the very least questionable, announcing a game 4 years before it has even a chance of releasing isn't something very smart to do, but, here we are, the fools who became fans of M&B, waiting until we are nothing but bearded corpses...

 

[Meevar the Mighty]

The announcement coincided with the new Paradox Entertainment IP, War of the Roses. Paradox was deliberately trying to cash in on the M&B franchise, so TW had to make it clear that they were still around and they weren't involved with WotR. At the time, a lot of people thought that WotR was the next M&B because they had a lot in common, including a shared publisher.

The latest interview with Armagan Yavuz said that they are hoping to get some version out this year, but they can't promise.

 

[xdj1nn]

The announcement coincided with the new Paradox Entertainment IP, War of the Roses. Paradox was deliberately trying to cash in on the M&B franchise, so TW had to make it clear that they were still around and they weren't involved with WotR. At the time, a lot of people thought that WotR was the next M&B because they had a lot in common, including a shared publisher.

The latest interview with Armagan Yavuz said that they are hoping to get some version out this year, but they can't promise.

Yeah, I saw it (Armagan Yavuz interview), but from a costumer pov I still feel like they were going to release something 3 years ago, not in 2017. When the first ETA for 2016 was announced I did not believe it, and apparently I was right. The lack of dev-blog posts made me wonder why are they taking so long...
From the 1st trailer up until now the amount of time under development is kind of bizarre. I have Game Development knowledge, and I can say that there wasn't THAT much to be done, usually the slowest part is the art (which had progressed alot years ago). Unless you mess up all of the code, but that rarely happens...

My guess is that they've started to invent features along the way and ended up with their hands full... Much like amateur creative processes where no one knows wtf they are going to do and start having late ideas and forcefully implementing them without any planning, that's the only logical explanation as to why they've never announced the features, and the massive amount of time under development... Unfortunately for us that means it's likely that Bannerlord has been neglected at times, kind of like when you have some project going and you simply leave it there untouched for a while due to lack of ideas... I would say they need some sort of Producer to organize things, and someone better at marketing... In my honest opinion I would never have chosen to announce M&B2 before having at least 3/4ths of it done and ready. The worst part is that I know that their marketing moves already injured their sales alot, and that's a hard blow on the franchise, over time that can have bad consequences such as less money for more development from their part =(

 

[upsettingshorts]

I'm guessing there have been false starts along the way. Work that had to be redone. They've also (re?)built their own engine and tools, which takes time as well.

 

[Meevar the Mighty]

Since they have only one game and a full team employed to make it, I doubt there have been days when the project has been sitting on the shelf.

If the team has learned to remove limitations from their engine and work toward something that they can easily change in big ways, serious mods will also be much easier to make, so the long development time just seems like a complete win-win to me. The fact that TW does things differently to what you might consider the industry standard has worked out pretty well so far.

 

[Narlan]

Yeah, I saw it (Armagan Yavuz interview), but from a costumer pov I still feel like they were going to release something 3 years ago, not in 2017.

I agree, me too when the game was announced I felt like it was going to be released the year after. I remember many of my friends in the team talking about it like it was going to be out in a year. When a year passed, I felt like it was late... when two year passed, I felt like it was canceled . It's only one more year after that I realized that I was wrong and that the developement has not even started when they annonced.

My guess is that they've started to invent features along the way and ended up with their hands full...

That is exacly what I felt too ! In fact, by listening to the replies of Captain lust in the weekender to the questions, at some point, when he is confronted to the multiplayer, his answer looks like they have not yet even thought about the multiplayer. But that can be explained if they followed the same pattern than for M&B1, the multiplayer came only later.

Unfortunately for us that means it's likely that Bannerlord has been neglected at times

Yes, but I don't think it will be a bad game. The demo looks cheap and staged at some points (the crime gameplay is cheap, the dialogues are cheap, the face animation is not implemented, the battle AI is yet cheap, some models are cheap...)... but look, the other feature are NOTHING like cheap. The face animation is good, the face customisation is above most game of all time. The battle itself is pure gold, the scenes are near perfection, the finding path really works (wich even grown games often fails to feature), the weapon customisation is decent, the world map is imaculate. Whatever they have planned for that game, it's all going to be good when it's done.

In my honest opinion I would never have chosen to announce M&B2 before having at least 3/4ths of it done and ready.

Again, I agree. Like today would seem to be the right time to announce it.

 

[SenorZorros]

--anti-pyramid snip--

--anti-pyramid snip--

I'm imagine that to be the case if you were charging a stationary man who was holding his spear out in front of him, but if you were stationary and he was charging you, wouldn't you also kinda sidestep out of the path of the spear as you deflect it? I mean, if a guy charges you with a spear, the spear's point is still coming at you even as you're deflecting it. So, wouldn't your move consist of both the deflecting sweep to one side with your sword, and stepping to the other side, out of the way of the spear, with your body? Then the spear would go past you to the side, and might, I imagine, open up a nice opportunity for a counterattack, as your opponent's weapon would be out of the way and he might be unbalanced after his momentum carried him to far and he didn't hit anything.

the problem with your comparison is that a spear and a sword are very different weapons. a spear is a battlefield weapon. to cumbersome to carry around but very effective both in single combat as well as when used in a formation. a sword on the other hand is a sidearm meant for a closer ranges and generally either as a backup or in a civil setting. you can't really use a on-handed sword without anything against a spear because it was not designed for that.

I also agree spears seem quite underpowered in warband and I would love to see them improved but there are many thrusting weapons that should be blockable like daggers or normal swords. even spears and pikes themselves should be blockable by some weapons like large two-handed swords (though those shouldn't be in bannerlord because they were later)

 

[DanAngleland]

When the first ETA for 2016 was announced I did not believe it, and apparently I was right. The lack of dev-blog posts made me wonder why are they taking so long...

Armagan said he didn't know when it would be released, but that his best guess was 2016. You make it sound as if there was more certainty expressed, and that you had the foresight to see it wouldn't happen. That's not the case. Besides, we don't know that it won't end up being released before the end of 2016. Finally, there is no reason to think the frequency of their blog posts is related to the amount of progress on the game, they clearly haven't worked like that before.

I'm imagine that to be the case if you were charging a stationary man who was holding his spear out in front of him, but if you were stationary and he was charging you, wouldn't you also kinda sidestep out of the path of the spear as you deflect it? I mean, if a guy charges you with a spear, the spear's point is still coming at you even as you're deflecting it. So, wouldn't your move consist of both the deflecting sweep to one side with your sword, and stepping to the other side, out of the way of the spear, with your body? Then the spear would go past you to the side, and might, I imagine, open up a nice opportunity for a counterattack, as your opponent's weapon would be out of the way and he might be unbalanced after his momentum carried him to far and he didn't hit anything.

Good idea. Perhaps a simple downward movement of the mouse and right click would do a sweeping parry with your sword, whilst moving the mouse down right/left would also do a quick sidestep in either direction. I think that would fit in well with M&B's dynamic character positioning.

 

[Louis The Last Breton]

This game started being developed at least as soon as warband release, so maybe they had a rough start.
I would like to think their next game is going to be announced 13 months before release

 

[~Lawrence~]

It really stinks because Warband is such an amazing game and all the fans have to wait years for release... We were fools for falling in live with warband... now we wait in eternal darkness for the new light of Bannerlord 

 

[kraggrim]

Still never heard an explanation for why early announcement is a bad thing for the company. People have brought up 'hype', but by itself that is unconvincing:

So I do think that Taleworlds announced the game way too early. If they did it just a couple of months before release they would have a much easier time getting hype going about the game. I don't think the game is doomed by any stretch, I just think that they will have a somewhat harder time getting everyone excited about the game again when the release comes around.

People keep saying things like this as if they're self-evident. So announcing a game's development closer to it's release date automatically generates 'hype' and more sales. Why is this? Are people actually so excited by a game's announcement compared to actual tangible info being released? They still have full control over how much info and publicity they push out in the run-up to release. They can still do the same publicity in the months leading up to release as they would have if they only announced it a few month before release.

Never worked in publishing/marketing myself, so maybe there's something I'm totally missing here . Just don't get why development-announcement is supposedly so much more of a hype-generator than release-anouncement/marketing.

And personally I can't see consumers' slight frustration at waiting ages between announcement and release actually resulting in lost sales. If there are a tiny handful of misguided people who for some reason hold a grudge about it then the community is better off without them, and I'd guess the financial impact will be absolutely minimal.


If you guys want them to change their ways for the future then it might be worth properly expressing why they should do so .

 

[Alene]

So what would've happened if TW would announce the game now? One thing would be a flood of suggestions for a game that's has been in development for a while. I think implementing new stuff at this point could be difficult.

Now they got suggestion early, and could pick ones they want to implement right from the start.

 

[Xephaeston]

I prefer to wait for a nice polished game rather than a very bugged one though. The work they have put into the mood looks really good. rip warband servers.

 

[Rungsted93]

Would love to see some mod at some time implement a noble hierchacy. Like:
Sir (Landed knight) > Lord > Baron > Viscount > Count > Duke > Prince (Principality not son of a king) > King > Emperor
Of course with some of the factions with different cultures the name of the titles would differ but the principle would be the same

Would add for some epic uprisings/Civil wars and overthrowings being a high ranked lord with your own vassals.

 

[Der Kopfsammler]

Im curious if the declarations of war are gonna have more "meat" to it, like actually seeing the villages suffering theft or kidnapping of villagers on wich we can interviene or other stuff, and not be something like "Kingdom #1 farted in the direction of Kingdom #2. Kingdom #2 declared war on Kingdom #1... because _reasons_..."

 

[Beny]

Your signature is misspelt.

 

[~Lawrence~]

Has it been discussed how many players will be able to play in one server?

 

[๖Kern]

Lust said, that they will try to make the MP playable for more people than is now...

Also. Not only the world map was reworked several times. More things were, I think, that this had some impact on the game development too.

 

[~Lawrence~]

I think it would be neat to expand on multiplayer to where it is not just killing other people but also roleplaying and joining factions with castles and wars etc.

 

[๖Kern]

I think it would be neat to expand on multiplayer to where it is not just killing other people but also roleplaying and joining factions with castles and wars etc.

There's a PW mod for this... Actually, PW devs already started development of PW mod for Bannerlord... or at least, they started to make models and things...

http://www.moddb.com/mods/medievalism (this one is developed by FW devs!)