The Dark Eye Blackguards - turn-based tactical RPG set in The Dark Eye world

[Infinitron]

http://steamcommunity.com/app/249650/discussions/0/540744935810711426/

Clarification regarding Patch 1.4

Hello good people of steam. There have been lots of discussions regarding ongoing support for Blackguards, especially another patch.
Right there i will say: We will have a Patch 1.4.
This patch has been delayed for a very long time because of internal processes being delayed by external processes (if that makes sense). The Patch will fix important bugs like the broken healers and add new localizations. A full Patch note will be posted here upon release which is to be expected by no later than the end of this month.
After that we will focus all our ressources on Blackguards 2 so 1.4 will likely be the last BG1 Patch.

As for discussions regarding our new partnership with Bastei-Lübbe: We are not beeing drastically "restructured" by external investors. Most of our workflows are not affected by this. The lack of communication in the past months was mostly because of other stuff going on, other projects needing attention and so on. We will see to keep the comms more up again when the next new stuff comes around.

best regards
Spartan

 

[Infinitron]

http://steamcommunity.com/games/blackguards/announcements/detail/1787116131758266680

Localization Update – 3 new language packages now available
25 JUNE - STEF.DAEDALIC

Hi guys,

we’re happy that today we are finally releasing our big localization update for our Blackguards. The update contains the reworked Russian localization as well as the brand new Japanese and Korean language packages.

Have fun playing and don’t get lost in Aventuria!

PS: The patch will available in about 2 or 3 hours from now, so please don’t worry if it’s not starting immediately.

Best,
Your Daedalic-Team

 

[Abu Antar]

So that's why the game was updating. Good that they finally fixed the healers, better late than never.

"As for discussions regarding our new partnership with Bastei-Lübbe: We are not beeing drastically "restructured" by external investors. Most of our workflows are not affected by this. The lack of communication in the past months was mostly because of other stuff going on, other projects needing attention and so on. We will see to keep the comms more up again when the next new stuff comes around."

I hadn't heard about this. I know they come off as positive with those comments, but one should never completely trust that there are no problems.

 

[Niektory]

Bros, do you know why sometimes my characters leave the battle instantly after getting downed, without the 3 turns period to heal them back? Is it some mechanic I'm not aware of or a bug?

 

[Name]

Bros, do you know why sometimes my characters leave the battle instantly after getting downed, without the 3 turns period to heal them back? Is it some mechanic I'm not aware of or a bug?

Bug I say.

 

[Jools]

Haters gonna hate, but...

I must admit I am not really enjoying this game. The story, albeit very well-written, is a bit too "weak" to compel me playing on, the whole game itself feels more like an excuse to make the player run through an endless line of combat scenarios. Combat (varied and balanced and all) also seems to be getting a bit trite, which is not happening, for example, with DOS or Shadowrun: again, my main gripe is that there isn't "much" other than combat, in this game. Even towns/cities are static locations with zero explorability, and this (along with the not-too-compelling story) really makes it difficult for me to find any degree of immershun, or to be eager to "explore" more in order to appreciate new visuals or side-stories.

I have no problem admitting the game is very well "made", the visuals are very pretty, the audio is nice, the combat system works wonders. It's just lacking some oomph, so to speak: probably it's one of those "great game, but not the game for me" cases. AKA "You're really nice and all, but you are not my type. Secks is denied".

 

[Name]

Haters gonna hate, but...

I must admit I am not really enjoying this game. The story, albeit very well-written, is a bit too "weak" to compel me playing on, the whole game itself feels more like an excuse to make the player run through an endless line of combat scenarios. Combat (varied and balanced and all) also seems to be getting a bit trite, which is not happening, for example, with DOS or Shadowrun: again, my main gripe is that there isn't "much" other than combat, in this game. Even towns/cities are static locations with zero explorability, and this (along with the not-too-compelling story) really makes it difficult for me to find any degree of immershun, or to be eager to "explore" more in order to appreciate new visuals or side-stories.

I have no problem admitting the game is very well "made", the visuals are very pretty, the audio is nice, the combat system works wonders. It's just lacking some oomph, so to speak: probably it's one of those "great game, but not the game for me" cases. AKA "You're really nice and all, but you are not my type. Secks is denied".

No, it's a case of "great game, but way too much hype around this part of Internet". If nobody tells you about this game and you stumbles upon this German gem after finishing DOS or Shadowrun Returns the third or forth time you will come here and tell everyone how awesome this game is.
Actually comes to think of it the two things this game may win over others are:
1.Difficulty
2.Ruleset Adaptation

 

[Telengard]

Haters gonna hate, but...

I must admit I am not really enjoying this game. The story, albeit very well-written, is a bit too "weak" to compel me playing on, the whole game itself feels more like an excuse to make the player run through an endless line of combat scenarios. Combat (varied and balanced and all) also seems to be getting a bit trite, which is not happening, for example, with DOS or Shadowrun: again, my main gripe is that there isn't "much" other than combat, in this game. Even towns/cities are static locations with zero explorability, and this (along with the not-too-compelling story) really makes it difficult for me to find any degree of immershun, or to be eager to "explore" more in order to appreciate new visuals or side-stories.

I have no problem admitting the game is very well "made", the visuals are very pretty, the audio is nice, the combat system works wonders. It's just lacking some oomph, so to speak: probably it's one of those "great game, but not the game for me" cases. AKA "You're really nice and all, but you are not my type. Secks is denied".

To dig into what you're saying a little more. Exploration is an important aspect of the classic RPG. The choice the devs made to remove travel AND to have static backdrops for settlements is a rough one for maintaining player interest. With those choices set, one must then work overtime to make each locale feel unique and interesting. But then the devs also made the choice to set the backdrop for the settlements at street level rather than a distance shot, which heavily restricts the creative possibilities - seen one marketplace, seen them all. With a distance shot, one can do a lot more with the art to get a sense of place. And then do street level for important locales.

But add to that, most NPCs in the game are fairly generic, no character but the party is involved in the story for any length of time, and no matter which country you're in, most people speak in the same accent. Add that to the samey settlement backgrounds, and there's very little here for those who desire a sense of exploration and adventure.

On the story, it is indeed overall a random jumble of important events that just kind of occur one after the other simply because they do, rather than having a commanding narrative that drives the action. Which adds up to most of the story becoming filler as an excuse for battles, as you said. Filler stories can work well, but they tend to work best when the story is told in a minimalist fashion, a la most level-based strategy games - a few paragraphs to illustrate why you're pressing on and what the goal of the next battle is. There's rather too much story here for it to function well as filler. And as a grand epic, the story lacks focus, a commanding narrative, and a driving goal to power the characters onwards. Which, for those looking for a powerful or interesting narrative, will leave them feeling wanting.

And the combat is great. Until, that is, one learns one of the power abilities and haste, which together in one second increases the characters' power output by 6x, and then you start trashing all over everything.

All in all, the game's a very shiny indie. But like most indies, there's a lot of stuff missing. It's all a question of whether those missing bits are important to your enjoyment of an RPG.

 

[Infinitron]

I see gay people

 

[Baxander]

I saw this game during the Steam summer sale and came very close to buying it. I had my eye on it for a while, being a somewhat/kinda fan of Drakensang and the Dark Eye universe.

I still can't decide if I want it or not, but the more I read about it, the more I think i would possibly enjoy it.

 

[Grunker]

i can now add josh to the list of people who complains dogs are not cats

Roguey, i am disappoint

edit: wait, fuck I was too fast on the trigger:

probably it's one of those "great game, but not the game for me" cases.

roguey, i recall my disappointment

 

[Roguey]

i can now add josh to the list of people who complains dogs are not cats

Roguey, i am disappoint

edit: wait, fuck I was too fast on the trigger:

probably it's one of those "great game, but not the game for me" cases.

roguey, i recall my disappointment

......................?

 

[deuxhero]

Nice to see the Japanese translation. Good cRPGs so rarely get translated to it (which is weird given they have such a boner for Ultima), only the mass market crap.

Sadly no silly comments on the moon boards about it. I'm honestly not even sure they know of this addition. Maybe next time its on the front page.

edit: A few reviews, mostly positive but things with usernames attached tend to lack the more "colorful" things.
http://store.steampowered.com/app/249650/BlackGuards?l=japanese

edit 2: When looking for screenshots I saw some with really messed up portraits. At first I thought they redrew some graphics for the translation (which has happened in the past, but I was pretty sure they stopped doing it around the time we stopped removing crosses) but I noticed the log was in English and these shots were on the English steam page

(promotion pictures on bottom)

I assume they changed these during early access and never bothered to update the promo shots?

 

[Minttunator]

I'm a baka gaijin so I put it through Google Translate and the result is hilarious in its own right:

It's not a good game. It is possible to see the beautiful hand-drawn picture even when what is pulling the horse. Each time, the annoying load is long every time you move in and out on the town. Program would also be the recycling of old equivalent of existing simple. I to repeat many times the greatest boring simple combat. The Stop it loose. Where I that there is a charm to this combat system? Rather than performing in the head the play Gross thinking alone Serifumawashi of the characters have a pompous, you should ceases to mass-produce game never of what is new. Boring this shit and who seems to have a battle of more than 180 games slow turn-based, would want to do? It is pain free.

 

[Orma]

Game was fun and relaxing until chapter 3.

 

[Western]

Really? I haven't finished the game yet but most people seem to think chapter 3 is the best part, since the game is more off rails/open.

 

[Orma]

Well, privilege of being able to click on a few more villages is barely open world.

Also most of the quests basically are: click somewhere on the map, survive the combat encounter, trigger quest dialogue.

 

[Gord]

Who said anything about open world?
Chapter 3 is more open than chapter 2 and gives you various sidequests you can do mostly at will, but that's it.

The game is all about providing a background for various and mostly well-designed combat encounters.
It's basically only combat - almost every quest will at some point lead to combat.
That's what it sets out to do, and it succeeds with it, imho.
If you aren't interested in a combat-centric RPG, it's not the right game for you.
If you expect non-linear open-world, sandbox and story-faggotry, you should also get a different game.

 

[Orma]

Who said i hate the game? Or that I bought the game expecting story-faggotry?

I knew the game was basically only combat.

I just expressed my dislike for the chapter 3, as the game simply gets tedious with unnecessary side quests and creates an illusion of it being ''more open'' while only adding a few empty villages.

You don't have to be so defensive about it, and you surely didn't have to reply.

 

[Gord]

I don't know, but personally I enjoyed chapter 3.
Many of the empty villages will have something to do at some point in chapter 3, that is once you "unlock" the content by doing some sidequest.
After the ultra-confined chapter 2, chapter 3 was quite welcome to me.
But ymmv, I guess.

 

[abnaxus]

Anyone remember whether this game ever was top seller on Steam for any extended period of time?

 

[Infinitron]

Anyone remember whether this game ever was top seller on Steam for any extended period of time?

I don't think it was ever the top seller (or if it was, only for a few hours) but it was in the top ten for a while.

 

[Abu Antar]

It has been in the top 10 a few times, mostly during sales but I don't think it's ever held the top spot.

 

[twincast]

Nice to see the Japanese translation. Good cRPGs so rarely get translated to it (which is weird given they have such a boner for Ultima), only the mass market crap.

Sadly no silly comments on the moon boards about it. I'm honestly not even sure they know of this addition. Maybe next time its on the front page.

edit: A few reviews, mostly positive but things with usernames attached tend to lack the more "colorful" things.
http://store.steampowered.com/app/249650/BlackGuards?l=japanese

edit 2: When looking for screenshots I saw some with really messed up portraits. At first I thought they redrew some graphics for the translation (which has happened in the past, but I was pretty sure they stopped doing it around the time we stopped removing crosses) but I noticed the log was in English and these shots were on the English steam page

(promotion pictures on bottom)

I assume they changed these during early access and never bothered to update the promo shots?

Yep, that's exactly what they did. About halfway through EA IIRC.

I'm a baka gaijin so I put it through Google Translate and the result is hilarious in its own right:

It's not a good game. It is possible to see the beautiful hand-drawn picture even when what is pulling the horse. Each time, the annoying load is long every time you move in and out on the town. Program would also be the recycling of old equivalent of existing simple. I to repeat many times the greatest boring simple combat. The Stop it loose. Where I that there is a charm to this combat system? Rather than performing in the head the play Gross thinking alone Serifumawashi of the characters have a pompous, you should ceases to mass-produce game never of what is new. Boring this shit and who seems to have a battle of more than 180 games slow turn-based, would want to do? It is pain free.

Google Translate proves hilarious once again. Anyway, they most of all complain about the game being 180+ fights of "shitty, boring, easy, slow" turn-based combat, and flat-out tell people to stop making games "that have nothing new", but also mention sucky line delivery by affected characters as well as annoying travel from town to town.

 

[Darth Slaughter]

I'm a baka gaijin so I put it through Google Translate and the result is hilarious in its own right:

It's not a good game. It is possible to see the beautiful hand-drawn picture even when what is pulling the horse. Each time, the annoying load is long every time you move in and out on the town. Program would also be the recycling of old equivalent of existing simple. I to repeat many times the greatest boring simple combat. The Stop it loose. Where I that there is a charm to this combat system? Rather than performing in the head the play Gross thinking alone Serifumawashi of the characters have a pompous, you should ceases to mass-produce game never of what is new. Boring this shit and who seems to have a battle of more than 180 games slow turn-based, would want to do? It is pain free.

良いゲームじゃない。何が馬を引いてる時も手書きの美しい絵を見ることができる。いちいち、街に入ったり出たりするたびにロードが長くて鬱陶しい。プログラムも単純なもので既存の相当古いものの使い回しだろう。退屈この上ない単純な戦闘を何度も繰り返させる。いい加減やめろよ。どこにこのコンバットシステムに魅力があるというんだ？気取ったキャラクター達の台詞回しを一人で考えてキモイ劇を頭の中で上演するより、なんの目新しいことのないゲームを量産するのをやめるべきだ。誰がこのクソ退屈なそして遅いターンベースのゲームを180以上の戦闘があるらしいが、やりたいだろうか？ただの苦痛である