Here’s a sentence that I get to write far too rarely: a developer appears to be taking Steam’s Early Access Program very seriously.
TaleWorlds has famously finally opened the gates to the long-awaited Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord after eight years of anticipation with what surprised many to be an Early Access title. After a long internal development, TaleWorlds has invited players to join the ranks as Bannerlord makes its way through Early Access into a fully-fledged release.
This alone upset many fans to find that the title, as Early Access games tend to, was not already completed and hosted its fair share of bugs. While many users have favorably reviewed the title, a few have taken to dragging the developers at TaleWorlds over the hot coals both in the Steam reviews and in their official forums, while displaying a tenuous-at-best knowledge of various epithets and violently-charged verbiage. Beyond the Half-Life 3 syndrome that is clearly affecting the title, however, TaleWorlds has arguably been radically successful in bringing Bannerlord to the Steam platform regardless of metric used.
The title absolutely has bugs, however, ranging from sudden crashes to desktop to the graphics failing to render. On that note, TaleWorlds hasn’t been spending too much time arguing with the naysayers online; they’ve been absolutely crushing it in regards to working on their title with consistent updates that have, thus far, been released on a daily basis.
It’s not entirely likely that this development standard can maintain through the Early Access life of Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord; developers frankly need some time to rest in order for their brains to work.
But thus far it has been an impressive feat to watch as they divert resources across a multitude of issues, ranging from the crashes that plague many, to multiplayer balances, to fixing the god-forsaken snowball mechanic that sees one nation trample every other one on the map within hours.
Five days thus far in Early Access, and they’re currently on patch 1.0.5.
It’s a smart way to battle the vocal critics of both the game and the studio, showing that they’re as dedicated as their fans in bringing a new and immersive experience to the numerous fans that have displayed patience for almost a decade. Admittedly, the title still has a good amount of progress that they need to make before the title is as polished as it should be, but it’s a solid beginning that few could argue could be done better.
