Mount and Blade 2: Bannerlord isn’t scheduled for release until sometime in 2017, but TaleWorlds Entertainment is going hard at E3 with a demo that showcases the new siege warfare for the popular medieval combat simulator. I’m a recovering Mount and Blade addict, having once lost nearly an entire month to 100+ hour Warband binge, which sounds impressive until you start digging into the Stea comments and find out players frequently hit 1000s of hours of gameplay. Mount and Blade is special franchise, and the new siege warfare on display in Mount and Blade 2: Bannerlord makes it even special-er.
I say this with confidence because, of my 100+ hours with Warband a good portion was affluent on castle sieges. They were fun enough, but tedious. One entry point and no siege equipment except for one ladder or one tower meant wave after wave of archers then cavalry then infantry. Because the game is so big and so deep I never really questioned why the sieges weren't more complex; there's already plenty to do. But after seeing the new siege gameplay in action, I'm intrigued.
The first thing that struck me was the destructible environments. Castle walls and parapets crumble under siege fire, exposing pesky archers and pikemen on the ramparts. Castles themselves are attached to villages, unlike previous games where the two existed separately. Players can begin a siege on the world map to try to damage the castle or create a wall breach, or they can dive right in and control the action from the ground in true Mount and Blade fashion.
That ground action is where the real strengths of Mount and Blade 2: Bannerlord are found. TaleWorlds has upped the active soldier count to 500, a staggering amount of steel clad men on the screen. The AI has received an overhaul too, with troops responding in logical ways to events on the battlefield. Breach a wall and soldiers will leave their posts to fight you, or if an ally manning a siege weapon is killed another soldier will step in to take his place. Of course, players can control the siege equipment themselves, and have tactical control over squads on the ground too. You can choose to order your men around in ordered columns and dedicated waves, or you can just run into the free-for-all and start swinging your sword.
There will also be an active day/night cycle for battles, and weather effects that change conditions on the field. Siege equipment is simple to produce, too. There are no resources to manage, just gold. And gold isn’t just from taxes, Tale Worlds said an active barter system occurs in the game that lends itself to a robust economy that makes it easy for players to start raking in the cash.
Mount and Blade 2: Bannerlord is set for release sometime in 2017. And if the siege combat plays half as good as it looks that’ll give me plenty of time to clear my schedule for the next 100 hours of playtime I’ll devote to the franchise.
