Picture this: It’s the early 16th Century. The Earth has forgotten about its Tectonic plates, and there’s just one gigantic landmass (aka Pangaea). The whole planet is ruled by five kingdoms, which are always trying to one-up each other. And this giant planet-earth-thing is called Calradia. This is the setting you’ll find yourself in while playing Mount and Blade: Warband. Before the next big game in the series, Bannerlord, comes out, let’s take a look at one of the best medieval combat simulators out there.
First off, let’s get one thing out of the way: you won’t be playing this game for the graphics. Even for its time, the graphics were terrible, and they’ve aged like milk that was already spoilt in 2010. Unit textures and models look like they’re from the PS1 era. The game isn’t winning any awards on that front. BUT, as a compensation to all the fps buffs, the game is effectively stutter-free. It breezes through at 120 fps on a GTX 1060 with a Ryzen 5 1600 at 1080p maxed out settings, with no slowdowns whatsoever, even when there were hundreds of units on the field. Yes, yes, I’ll explain.
The core game is essentially an RPG style Total War-ish experience. You start off in a city in one of the kingdoms in the middle of an assassination attempt. Whether you win or lose this engagement, you are taken to the merchant’s house, and given a quest to hire 5 people and rescue his brother. After this, the entire world is open to you, to do as you wish. You can hire mercenaries, recruit volunteers, train them. Even hire companions on your travels that can both fight and provide passive campaign bonuses. My favourite part, though, was courting a lady, meeting her in the shadows, and then convincing her brother or father to let her marry me. This even leads to a small cinematic cutscene of the wedding.
The game’s combat mechanics are amazing, even by 2019 standards. Your attacks depend on your weapon and how fast you’re moving when you swing. Horse archery is realistic in that over 50% of your shots will be wildly off target. Hell, regular archery is not easy either. You can’t just draw the bow and wait half an hour. It causes hand fatigue, which will cause your shot to veer off target. Crossbows don’t work like semi-auto rifles either. Sure, they’re very accurate; but they have a long reload duration. You can’t just block from all directions; you need to predict the enemy’s hit and react in the same direction. Move the mouse in the direction you want to attack/block in to make that move. Misjudge it, and you’ll take damage. Charging fast on a horse with a lance is an effective way to get rid of pesky enemy skirmishers or infantry.
On the campaign map, you have the choice of attacking a city/castle and claiming it for yourself, letting you start your own kingdom. You can also choose to perform certain tasks for a King/Lord of your choosing, become a vassal to said king and wage war on their behalf. Unless you have a legitimate claim to rule, though, you will be hounded by everyone. You can also manage your castles and villages, earning taxes, managing buildings and garrisons. Party management is extensive, and you get to choose their equipment and formations in battle. You also have to carry food for the party, without which they will desert your party. You also have to flesh out your skills, traits and weapon handling stats. There are a TON of skills, such as Engineer (that helps you build siege equipment faster) or Tracking (that lets you see the tracks of other parties and determine their strength and heading). These are based on the four major stats of Strength, Charisma, Intelligence and Agility. How you spec into these will decide your playstyle
Unlike total war, campaign map movement is real-time, which pauses when you stop moving. You can choose to wait and advance time, however, and this speeds up the game so as to make it less tedious. When two parties/armies meet on the campaign, you can choose to engage in conversation, or attack them. If you meet brigands, they will demand payment to leave you be, and attack if you refuse. Attacking an enemy leads to the battle map, which will be the exact same terrain type as you can see on the campaign map. Each battle can have up to 200 units, and you control your troops per role (i.e. infantry, cavalry or archers). You can tell them to charge, hold or move front/back. You can also tell them when to fire on the enemy. This can make for a lot of tactical options in combat. You can also choose whether or not you want to fight with your troops.
Now whether you’re fighting, engaging in diplomacy or running a messenger service for a lord, the soundtrack that plays fits the theme. It’s calm, soothing and mellow. I can be at peace listening to the music while the AI lays siege to my castles and loots my villages.
You’re probably thinking “It’s a game from 2010. With Bannerlord coming up, why in Calradia’s name would I buy this game?”. Well, my reasons are two-fold. One, you’ll understand the game mechanics that much better, and get a feel for whether or not you’ll even LIKE Bannerlord. Secondly, MODS and DLC. Napoleonic Wars adds 100 player PVP combat, with muskets that take ages to reload, and actual musician classes that give a buff to accuracy. There’s also mods that totally change the game. Want to play as Robb Stark’s Bannerman? You can do it. Want to play in the Shire? Yep. Want to play in an Eastern setting with Elephants? Easy. Get yourself an ENB, however, to make the visuals a bit crisper. What are you waiting for, commoner? Pick up your sword, collect your warband and make a name for yourself. Charge!