Mount & Blade: Warband

The graphics and animations were already outdated when it was released. BUT, the gameplay is fabulous, I still play it in 2021... :) My favourite MODs: Diplomacy and TLD (The Last Days of the third age of middle earth) I have 2 little problems with the original game (Native): 1) The women don't have a victory shout at the end of a battle. 2) The cattle driving mission is a nightmare. However, it is easy to fix: 1) Open the file skins.txt which is in the folder "\Mount and Blade - Warband\Modules\Native" ─ Replace line 59: 3 0 snd_woman_die 1 snd_woman_hit 4 snd_woman_yell ─ With: 4 0 snd_woman_die 1 snd_woman_hit 4 snd_woman_yell 6 snd_woman_yell 2) Open the file menus.txt ─ look for the line starting with: mno_cattle_drive_away 0 Drive_the_cattle_onward. 4 501 3 144115188075856273 7 1 1640 2 144115188075856273 11 ─ and change the value 11 to 10: mno_cattle_drive_away 0 Drive_the_cattle_onward. 4 501 3 144115188075856273 7 1 1640 2 144115188075856273 10 I love this game! ♥

This game has been called a lot of things, most commonly a Sandbox-Simulator. I think there is an easier way to explain what this game is to you: Mount&Blade is basically a 'medieval warlord'-variant of Sid Meier's Pirates. And just like that timeless classic, this one is a perfect time sink! Tons of hours of fun are to be had here, action and adventure await that are dynamically emerging and not scripted by some level designer. Like Pirates, it theoretically supports different playstyles like being a trader but the main focus in the game is being a warlord. Gather your band of mercenaries, join a faction if you desire, level up your character and maybe do the odd quest or two. Unlike Sid Meier's Pirates however, this game's is more focused on getting a single style of combat right instead of having various mini-game types. Make no mistake, combat-wise this is an action game with strong RPG and some RTS mechanics. It features a wonderfully simple but nuanced and skill-based melee combat system and does thankfully stay away from power attacks, special moves and magic-stuff. Another result of this focus on a single mechanic is the fact that said mechanic can now also be repurposed for multiplayer. When online or via LAN this game basically becomes a medivial battlefield simulator, wisely dropping the sandbox and RPG stuff that one would like to enjoy alone anyway. And last but not least, there are tons of good total conversions out there, like feudal Japan or Game of Thrones. This game was a true classic when it came out and I am still playing it until this day :-) And thanks to GoG, I can now buy this thing again and support both my favorite customer-friendly distribution plattform and the game's developers directly (as they are not publishing this game via Paradox Entertainment anymore). If you are either intrigued by what I have written or like games similar to Sid Meier's Pirates, you need to purchase this right away.

Thanks to its modding community, this games has nearly unlimited replayability. The best total-conversion mods IMHO so far: A Clash of Kings and Floris. Even as of now (November 2014) new great mods are being added – check NexusMods for “A New Dawn”. Despite some imperfections (mainly in the AI and graphical department), this game is pure addictive fun! Highly recommended for strategy aficionados!

Undoubtedly a classic. Playing Mount & Blade makes you wonder what AAA developers and publishers do with their massive budgets. It's a video game that captures your childhood fantasy of becoming a king and translates it into reality. Start from rags. Build up a small posse of close knit companions. Travel the world. Slowly make a name for yourself in tournaments, trading, and protecting the realm from outlaws. Garner favor with a King and become a vassal. Buy a perfectly breed horse and shiny new plate armour. Befriend all the Lords and overthrow the old king and become the new king. Unite all of Calradia. Or do none of that. You could terrorize the populace with raiding, pillaging, and plundering. Build a band of outlaws. Find a kingdom claimant and use them to become a deplorable Lord of the realm. There's so many ways to play Mount & Blade: Warband. Every playthrough is different because of the large, multifaceted nature of the world. It's harsh, unforgiving, and incredibly replayable. It's not perfect. The game looked bad even for it's time, though it's charming in its own way. What isn't charming is the frustrating aspects of the game like underdeveloped mechanics. The way tournaments function are confusing. Relationship options are lacking. Quests are redundant and almost never fun. The kind of little frustrations that a more experienced studio wouldn't make. Fortunately the game has fantastic, simple, painless mod support that rectify these issues breathe new life into this game. Warband is not for everyone, but give it a shot on sale. It's the only game that does what it does.

This is an old game, but I'm just now playing it so my rating is based on my experience as of 11/15/2021. So no nostalgia. The concept of the game is pretty fun. You create a "hero" with skills and attributes, recruit a "warband," then complete various quests and missions. Your hero and warband level up as you play. First I did the tutorial. Right off the bat, the fighting controls strange and clunky, and they never grew on me. My first character was a polearm fighter, and that style felt really clunky and disadvantaged. Sword and shield was better, but I still wouldn't call it "good." Ranged felt equally bad. Next, I did character creation. First I selected a background. Hunter, Warrior, Noble, etc. I had no idea what any of this stuff means without consulting a wiki, so I picked some choices that sounded warrior-like. Next are skills & attributes. There are tool tips that explain what these mean, but I had no idea which things I should focus on first. So again, I picked some things that sounded warrior-like. The town system has kind of a "Darklands" style menu system, AND a first person view, which is nice. I wish more games had a menu system to navigate instead of endless running. Overland travel was absurdly slow until I did a web search and found how to speed it up. The quests seem to be buggy. On one character, the bandit hideout did not spawn. On another, the sea raider landing did not spawn. On another, I cleared out the sea raider hideout, but it wouldn't let me cash in the quest. Despite having a PC that far exceeds the hardware recommendations, the was choppy in places. I don't have that problem with other games. I see what they were going for, and yes it's old, but I did not enjoy it.