Ask a teenage gamer what shareware is, and he or she might just shrug at you. But back in the early 90s, shareware was where you'd find so much of the innovation in PC gaming. Classics like DOOM and Duke Nukem 3D were shareware games originally, and the developers behind them would generously give up a full quarter or even a third of the full game to entice players to buy the "registered" copy. And it worked for a while before the major game publishers started funneling millions into every game's development, forcing ridiculous release schedules and worrying more about making their investors happy than in creating a quality product.
But shareware is back! Thanks to the ease of publishing your own games on the internet without having to deal with a big-name publisher or distributing to thousands of stores, many amateur and semi-professional game developers are making new games. Many of these products are small, derivative time-wasters, like the Tetris-clone puzzle games out there, while other developers are actually coming up with new ideas that major game developers haven't even touched on. One example of the latter is Mount & Blade, a game that combines tactical action with RPG elements and medieval combat to make up for a truly unique experience.
The biggest draw for Mount & Blade is that many types of weapons and fighting styles all work together in one battlefield. You can command a few dozen troops - some have bows or crossbows, some have shields, some have swords, and some have lances. Then there are horses, which are a major part of how combat in this game works. You can use any weapon while on a horse and even trample foes while charging into an enemy host.
But let's start over. This is an RPG and you'll start out at level one with a few choices for your character. You'll get to spend some points on your classic attributes like Strength, Charisma, Agility, and Intelligence, and these in turn will not only improve your character but will also dictate the limits you can place on specific skills. And there is a pretty nice set of skills to choose from, many of which are combat oriented, but there are also plenty that affect your ability to lead and keep up a party of combatants on the field. Skills like Riding and Weapon Mastery will keep you alive, while Leadership and Surgery will keep your buddies alive. Trade and Prisoner Management will keep your jingling bag full of coins as well.
Mount & Blade is currently an "unfinished" game - it still lacks a main story, and while you can pick up quests to get sent on, there's little actual plot to follow. There are a few unique things you can do, like pick up a couple of persistent "hero" characters which will follow, fight and level up and won't ever die (just like your own character), but overall you will need to find the combat and battles fun to really be able to enjoy this game. And while you'll never die, losing a battle means that any common troops will be killed, and you have a chance at losing items or money during your defeat.
The game seems pretty simplistic, but trust me on this - there's plenty here, even for hardened veterans of full-price RPG titles out there. As you level up and build your skills and weapon capabilities, you'll find that Mount & Blade offers a dynamic style of combat that's unlike any other. Not only will you need to make some important tactical decisions to win (for example, fighting at the top of a hill so that enemy mounted troops can't charge you, since the horses slow down when going uphill), but you'll need to have a character that's built well to use whatever weapon's in your hand. Finally, all action occurs in real time so you'll need good reflexes - and precise aim as well if you're using a bow, crossbow, or throwing weapon.
Here's an example of a situation that can commonly occur in mid-battle: you'll be on your horse, plunking away with your bow when you realize that some enemy mounted troops have snuck around behind you. They charge up with their swords, brutally crippling your horse as you topple to the ground. You'll fight your way back to your feet and fire off a shot that one of the mounted riders blocks with his shield (and the arrow will stay stuck in the shield!), doing a grand total of zero damage. A horse tramples you, hurting you somewhat but not too badly. Again you get on your feet, and then you realize that one of the horsemen has no shield - a couple seconds later, with an arrow sticking out of his neck, he drops off of his horse and you take this opportunity as a chance to get away. You jump on the dead guy's horse to barely escape two more mounted units, and as you ride off, you turn to your side in the saddle and start scoring more killing blows with your bow.
All of this action happens only when a battle opens up on the world map. This world map works a little bit like the top-down maps you'll see in many classic RPGs, but even here all of the movement is still tracked in somewhat-real time. Enemy raiding parties might chase you or you might be hunting down a specific party as per a merchant's quest you've been given. You can pause whenever you want, and other friendly and enemy parties are represented on the map. Your own movement speed is dictated by a number of factors, including the number of your troops that are mounted, your riding skill, or whether you have any extra horses in your party to carry all that gear you looted from the last battle. When you collide with an enemy party, you have the choice to try and flee, stand back and let your troops fight the enemy without any intervention from you, or to charge in with your followers to do a little fighting yourself.
And this is when the battle starts - the battlefields are generally pretty large in size and with a full day/night cycle, you'll find that fighting in the dark is a unique challenge. Some areas are full of hills and trees, making mounted battles an interesting game of cat and mouse, while others are much more open. The best part is that you can set the game to where there's zero "fogging" - you can see the whole battlefield in any direction, including all of those troops coming at you. This can lead to some hugely satisfying long-range shots from a ranged weapon, and this is most certainly a useful tactic if you've got the aim. But if it's morning-time in the game, there will be fog that screws up your view distance, which can make trying to use long-range weapons really difficult. For that reason, many people who use bows will avoid fights until it gets into the afternoon in game time.
The biggest downside to Mount & Blade, aside from the lack of a way to "beat" it, is that it just can't stand up graphically to many other RPGs out there today. Sure, the game can throw around dozens of troops fighting at once, but even if there's only one on the screen at a time, they still look ugly. The environments feel somewhat natural, but the hills don't "roll" smoothly and most of the vegetation is very basic stuff. At first you'll swear you're trapped in 1999, as the graphics start out that bad, but once you get into the larger battles you'll realize that the game actually starts to look good in its own way when a ton of people start fighting all around you.
Archery is one of my favorite things in this game, but note - arrows are real projectiles and you'll have to lead your targets precisely to hit them at a distance (although there's no wind to take into account), so it's not just a simple point and shoot affair. Unlike with melee weapons, ranged weapons can also hit friendly troops, so when the two ragtag armies crash into each other and get all mixed together, you can stand back and pick off the enemy but you'll need to do it very carefully to avoid killing your own followers.
But what is probably the most satisfying element in Mount & Blade is jousting with a lance. Sure, you can poke at people with your lance by tapping your fire button, but the best way to use it is to get your horse moving fast - your character will then "couch" the lance under his or her arm. You don't even have to press a button to attack, as whatever's in the way when the lance hits them will likely be totally obliterated. Of course, this isn't as easy as it seems, as your enemy will try and dodge the incoming lance (which, when couched, can only be directed by turning your charging horse in either direction) while trying to swing and kill your horse out from under you. Still, taking someone out with a couched lance is a real thrill in this game, and it's still balanced out gameplay-wise by the fact that you won't be able to couch your lance unless the horse is going full speed on a relatively flat plain.
Sometimes, you can't avoid a battle, and sometimes, a battle is almost impossible to win, because the game will not stop you from travelling across the full map if you want - make sure you stay in the starter area at the beginning of the game, and only start moving out from there once you've got a few levels under your belt. The difficulty can be tuned nicely with the game's multiple difficulty options, but when you do lose a fight, you'll find that the game's not quite over. Your character will play dead and lose a bit of cash (and maybe some items out of your inventory), and the troops you've been travelling with can often get wiped out or taken away as prisoner. This can leave you in a tough spot, as you might not have enough money to hire more troops, and even if you do, they'll be rookies with little skill in fighting the tougher troops. It's possible to pull it out, but you'll have your work cut out for you.
When it comes to managing your host of troops, Mount & Blade has a unique system which forces you to feed your troops; combine that with a few wins, and they'll have higher morale and will do better in battle. Your Leadership skill controls just how many total troops you can travel with, and if you continue to win battles with the same guys over and over, they'll level up themselves and become tougher. That's why Surgery is an important skill, as when one of your guys dies in an otherwise victorious fight, you'll have a chance to bring him back to life. You'll want to have this ability if you want to maintain a nice little chunk of elite mounted troops.
Mount & Blade is still technically in beta testing, but you can go download a demo and play up through level six (and try the fun arena missions where you get a random selection of weapon and/or mount) to find out for yourself whether this game's for you. If you like it, the purchase price is $14 as of this writing, or $17 if you pay via PayPal; the full price later on, when the game's finished, will be $25. If you do decide to give it a try, I want to note that this game has a pretty tough learning curve - check the official forums for the game to read the FAQ and ask any beginner questions you might have. But stick with it for a short while, and I think that RPG fans out there will find this admittedly unfinished game to be well worth the money.
