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    Mount & Blade games are Turkish-made "Medieval Simulators", focusing on realistic small scale battles where every person acts independently.

    Mikemcn's 101 Flavors of Mount and Blade (Buy it!)

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    mikemcn

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    Edited By mikemcn

    So Mount and Blade, my favorite series of all time, is on sale in a Steam Midweek madness. For $5 USD you can have any one of a variety of awesome games.

    If you have any interest in realistic melee combat, RPG leveling, horse archery, large sandbox worlds, army building, faux mongolians, telling poems to fair men/maidens, or kingdom management, you should buy it.

    The problem of course is that there are so many of these great games. So to help you make a decision you won't regret, i've compiled a list below of the Pros/cons of each game. I will also include the optimal ice-cream pairing for each.

    • No Caption Provided

      Mount & Blade

    • Flavor: Vanilla

    • Why I love it:

      • Where it all started, while M&B didn't impress visually (even in 2008), it's free-form sandbox gameplay and physics based melee combat made it stand out. The feel of the combat is unmatched in any RPG before or since, you're not slapping your weapons around like in Skyrim or playing out a canned animation like in Chivalry. The sword's swing is simulated, you can knick an enemy with the point but cause less damage or hit them with the full-force of your weapon in the head, causing an instant kill. Just moving your weapon in the way of an enemies attack will stop it.

    • What sets it apart from the rest of the series:

      • Singleplayer-only, and super ugly, but the fundamental mechanics are all there. It's visual simplicity make's it a solid laptop game though, or an intro to the series for anyone with an older PC. Also, it Doesn't know the word balance. As the horseman faction you can basically wipe the floor with the entire game world, something I nearly did before the next game in the series came-out.
    No Caption Provided

    • Mount & Blade: Warband (Probably go for this one.)

    • Flavor: Organic French Vanilla

    • Why I love it:

      • Improves on Mount and Blade in every way, more items, another faction, a bigger world, multiplayer and improved graphics that would have been really nice a year before the game actually came out rather than a decade before. The kingdom-building mechanics have been expanded and many a quality-of-life improvement has been made. This is the one to get if you want to start out the series.
    • What sets it apart from the rest of the series:

      • The multiplayer was always amazing, once you got a feel for the sword dueling, you can go toe to toe with people in epic clashes set-apart from the overall battle.
    No Caption Provided

    • Mount & Blade: With Fire and Sword

    • Flavor: Chocolate

    • Why I love it:

      • It's just really unexpected and different, based on a series of historical fiction novels written by a famous polish author from the 1800's, set in real-world Poland in the late 1600's. Whereas the previous games place themselves in the fictional land of Caladria, this game is just set in Poland, with Swedes, Russians, Turks and more represented. Polish Hussars charge against Turkish Janissary, and you find yourself turning to the pistol rather than the sword. It offers some substantial improvements over Warband, but also takes steps back. Really just an odd duck, but anyone with interest in the period should take a look.
    • What sets it apart from the rest of the series:

      • The only full-single-player game in the series with muskets. They're are horribly accurate but if you get hit by a rifle it usually means your death. This makes the combat swing sometimes from frustrating to supremely satisfying, which makes it harder to recommend, but it's worth a look if you've fallen in love with the other games. It is my second least played M&B game, but I do appreciate it for it's quirks.
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    • Mount & Blade: Napoleonic Wars (Multiplayer only and requires Warband.)

    • Flavor: Neopolitan

    • Why I love it:

      • The match begins, you and your Russian comrades race to the first line of defense, a small village on the end of a bridge. It's quiet now, the French are just starting the approach, and out of sight or at least certainly out of musket range. The Russian line infantry takes up positions in windows, behind trees and rocks, while engineers construct barricades and riflemen find positions to snipe from. An artillery officer and a horse-drawn cannon unlimber along the line of defense, cannon trained towards the crest of a hill. The French appear over that hill in their gaily-colored uniforms, in stark contrast to the Russian Green. The first Russian shots are fired as the enemy comes into reasonable distance, the cannon booms, a few French fall but the line of barricades and broken buildings is soon enveloped in thick smoke. You scramble to reload for after the smoke clears, but cutting through the haze, a French Hussar bares down on you, you barely get out of the way in time and draw your bayonet. Turning, you see his horse caught on a barricade, you quickly cut down his mount, but miss it's rider, fortunately your fellow-soldiers cut him to pieces, more enemy hussars rush through the position, rather than reload you grab a fallen comrades gun, still ready to fire and turn it on the nearest horsemen, firing and killing him in one blow as his horse charges past you, oblivious to it's freedom. You start to reload once more but soon realize the effort is futile, the enemy infantry is on you, and it's time for the bayonet.
    • What sets it apart from the rest of the series:

      • If the above narrative from my memory of this online-only game doesn't explain it, then let me be more clear. Where as the previous games are good melee-combat simulators set in a faux historical world, this DLC is a one-of-a-kind historical illustration of musket and bayonet Warfare. There is a constant tension between taking the 1 shot you have before a long reload and simply turning to the bayonet or sabre. Musket combat is unpredictable but high stakes, with any moment spelling your death, but bayonet fighting is equally tense, with many an opportunity for a parry, feint or counter-attack but just as much opportunity to simply be stabbed in the back. It's amazing fun playing this game, and it may be my favorite online game ever. The community remains large and while the battles do not resemble true line-battles (Some community groups organize line events though), they do illustrate a time when war was less about murdering as many people on the other side as possible, and rather engaging in a precise game of chess. It's Arma for the 18th century with a side of coattails. It's a little bit of everything that makes videogames great.
    No Caption Provided

    • Mount & Blade: Viking Conquest, Reforged edition

    • Flavor: Rocky Road

    • Why I love it:

      • It came out a flaming mess, but the developers stuck with it and released a "Reforged edition"... it's works almost perfectly for me now, but it still somehow made Mount & Blade more janky than it already was. Squeezing a full sim-pirates esque boat mechanic in really pushed the engine to it's break point. But it's one of the only games out there that lets you command a Longship in raids against innocent monks Non-pagan dogs and generally just be a goddamn viking bandit. It has a full-story mode and is set in England, Ireland, Normandy, Denmark and Sweden.
    • What sets it apart from the rest of the series:

      • Boats are just a real cool way to get around. Of all the Mount and Blade games it has the most quality-of-life improvements and features. But it also proves that the Mount and Blade Engine as it stands now can only be pushed so far. Really worth checking out if you love the period or dream of being a pillager.
    No Caption Provided

    • Blood & Gold: Caribbean!

    • Flavor: Sugar-free mango sorbet

    • Why I love don't mind it:

      • Whereas before I mentioned Viking Conquests' Sid Meier's Pirates! similarities, this game takes it all the way. You play as a pirate in the Caribbean, you manage a ship and crew, you alternate between land and sea doing pirate things. You interact with or join France, the Dutch, England and Spain in their American conquests. The whole thing should be cool but mostly breaks under the strain of complexity, load times are abysmal even on an SSD unless you turn graphics down to 2008 M&B levels. Ship to ship battles are neat but mostly involve your dudes teleporting to the opposing ship or scrambling like monsterous spider men up the rigging to snipe. It is my least played-M&B game, and unlike the rest of the series, I wouldn't waste my breath defending it. However, it has potential if the devs can fix the load times and make the whole experience smoother. I'm not counting on that happening though.
      • Also the main menu has a really over-zealous sea shanty, so that's fun!
    • What sets it apart from the rest of the series:

      • It's not made by Taleworlds, but they did license their engine out for it. The setting is much more gun focused than the other games and the scenery is very different from other entries. Buy this one only if you're desperate for more Mount & Blade-like gaming or can remember the major plot-lines of any Pirates of the Caribbean movie past the second.

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    gobo212

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    Love me some Mount & Blade! The single player is super deep but can be rather confounding. The multi is a trip and it can be pretty awesome to invade a castle with 30 other people. Warband is the pick for sure (at least to start).

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    TheHT

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    #2  Edited By TheHT

    Fuck yeah Mount & Blade! #FuckSwadia

    If folks don't know how the game plays, you basically create a character (visual and stat sheet), then just ride around doing whatever the fuck you want. Hire some recruits, take on bandits, swear fealty to a kingdom, start your own. The game's got a top-down world map mode where you're moving your little party around the land, tracking enemies or war parties, travelling to towns and cities, managing your inventory (need food for troops) and such.

    Once you get into combat however it's all third-person (or first-person). You can attack in the four cardinal directions (or, well, actually just up, down, left, right; not really north, south... you know), but unless you have a shield you also have to block in those four directions. See a swing coming from the left, block left. See a swing coming from up high, sidestep and use a right slash because fuck that dude for leaving himself open. You can couch a lance to pretty much destroy anything in your path, get on with some horse archery, or just hang back and command your troops around the battlefield with some rudimentary commands and interface. You level up as you do shit (as do your units), and you take it from there. It's definitely not the most polished experience, but it's a goddamn blast once you get going.

    Get the old one if you wanna play that great Star Wars mod, but otherwise Warband is kinda the standard to buy. The biggest difference for me between the two is Warband's got ragdoll physics, an additional faction, and dope-ass multiplayer (in which archers are absolute scum). I suspect a lot of mods would be made for Warband specifically though. Not sure if they'd all work with the other spin-offs, and there are quite a few mods for both Warband and OG Mount & Blade. Never heard of Blood & Gold myself though. Sounds awesome!

    Also, Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord is on the way, which looks to be a fairly substantial improvement over Warband. Apparently likely to have an early access release sometime this year.

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    ArtisanBreads

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    #3  Edited By ArtisanBreads

    Mount and Blade II: Bannerlord is probably my most anticipated game. The series is great. Mounted combat is so fantastic and the freedom in it is great.

    If anyone has interest, grab Warband. There are also tons of cool mods for it that add lots of mechanics and also total setting conversions to everything from historical settings to a full Game of Thrones mod.

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    odinsmana

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    Great write up!

    I have really enjoyed some Mount and Blade in my time (still my second most played game on steam I think). I used to play them as they came out, but have seriously fallen off the past couple of games. The series is just such a rough diamond. The combat is great and always has been, but every single other thing has great potential, but are just really barebones and often kind of shoddy. If Bannerlords can really improve on Quests, NPC interactions, UI etc. then that game can be really amazing.

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    ArtisanBreads

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    Just saw this on the Taleworlds site and thought it was interesting:

    In addition to this, we have announed that Warband will be releasing on Xbox One and PS4, this September 16th. This marks our first soiree into the world of consoles and we're excited for Mount & Blade to be reaching a whole host of new players!

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    Sin4profit

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    onarum

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    Yeah, Mount & Blade is something special, I have em all except for the original, since Warband made it superfluous.

    For people that find the vanilla single player experience a tad aimless I'd highly recommend a mod called Light and darkness, it's made by chinese devs and has completely broken English(which honestly makes it hilarious at times), plus a very cliched main story, BUT the mechanics are on point, and they do a fantastic job on guiding the player throughout the entire main plot arch.

    One thing it has that I wish vanilla + every single other mod also had is the ability to put your army in a sort of "rush" mode, it moves like 2 times as fast in the overworld map at the cost of morale (which makes sense really), holy shit it's so good to catch up to lil parties.

    Anyway, it's freaking good.

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    mikemcn

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    Just saw this on the Taleworlds site and thought it was interesting:

    In addition to this, we have announed that Warband will be releasing on Xbox One and PS4, this September 16th. This marks our first soiree into the world of consoles and we're excited for Mount & Blade to be reaching a whole host of new players!

    That is random and awesome! Maybe they're doing a test-console game before eventually putting out bannerlord? I can't imagine the series on a controller, but i'm sure it will be cool!

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    hans_maulwurf

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    I love Warband. It was love at third sight, but it's all the stronger for it.

    I love the ridiculous scope of what it simulates, from politics and wars down to rotting food. And it's probably the only game that works for me when it comes to emergent narrative. I also like that it's the opposite of pretty much every other rpg story setup: not only are you not the Messiah this world has been waiting for to save it, but shit happens constantly around you and you have to slowly work your way up to even beginn to influence these events in any significant way.

    The unique combat and huge battles are great foundations for all that to work of course, but what really sets it apart for me is that it feels like you could write down your experiences while playing and probably make a solid historical novel out of that. Man, what a great game!

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    ArtisanBreads

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    #10  Edited By ArtisanBreads

    @mikemcn said:

    That is random and awesome! Maybe they're doing a test-console game before eventually putting out bannerlord? I can't imagine the series on a controller, but i'm sure it will be cool!

    I'm really interested to check the controls as well. I hope it works. Always wanted to play on a controller anyways if they figure it out. I play third person and pretty much always like a game of that type with a controller. If Bannerlord has analog movement I will love that. Precision aiming with mounted archery (my favorite way to play) may suffer but I'll adjust.

    By the way, I saw the initial trailer for Bannerlord out of Gamescom but I thought I would share this video of a more interview style set up of it that was done, as it shows stuff like the UI, which looks way more like a proper strategy game and less hacked together how the old games did. And the set up for the battle, which really looks straight out of a Total War game with drag and drop arrangement of crisp formations. As a siege defender, he at one point launches an offensive against the camping siege party before the siege proper to extend the siege time and destroy some of their siege weapons which is a really cool. I am really excited for what they are showing here.

    Loading Video...

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    paulunga

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    #11  Edited By paulunga

    Dude, calling Sienkiewicz "some Polish author" is like calling Shakespeare "some English poet".

    Edit: Not to take anything away from Mickiewicz, Lem or many other greats.

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    TheKramer89

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    @theht said:

    Fuck yeah Mount & Blade! #FuckSwadia

    I should report you to the mods for such bigotry and mindless racism.

    Also, #FuckKhergit

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    mikemcn

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    #13  Edited By mikemcn

    @paulunga said:

    Dude, calling Sienkiewicz "some Polish author" is like calling Shakespeare "some English poet".

    Edit: Not to take anything away from Mickiewicz, Lem or many other greats.

    My bad my bad! I've got nothing against poland I swear, I just couldn't remember the name.

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    Lanechanger

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    As a totally unbiased party here...

    No Caption Provided

    ...everyone should play them some Mount & Blade: Warband. I'm actually kind of surprised warframe and dota 2 are still up there in my top 3 playtime but I guess they've been around for years and years. That also speaks to the strength of M&B:WB since I nnnnnnever play multiplayer and that's just time that I've spent over the course of I think 3 campaigns. And all of them were Warband vanilla! The only mods I have are just quality of life improving mods! Urg, it just feels so damn satisfying to siege a castle and you're basically some sort of super hero that wipes out dozens if not over a hundred of the enemy troops by yourself. And then the memory leak kicks in and you're sieging at like 9 fps and there are just bodies and weapons lying around EVERYWHERE and smoke is coming out of your CPU but I'll be damned if I'm going to let those filthy Rhodoks keep their castle one minute longer after all their sharpshooters have done to my men!

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