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Tale as old as time.

Bard's Tale IV: Barrow's Deep, is coming soon, DRM-free to GOG.com.
More than 100 years later, evil is back, as it tends to do. Pick one of four available classes (yes, you don't have to be a bard) and before you know it you'll be crawling through cavernous dungeons or the legendary city of Skara Brae, solving puzzles, bopping beasties in a turn-based fashion and having a grand ol' time. Along with your party and your shiny gear, of course.
Post edited May 04, 2018 by maladr0Id
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LynetteC: I've just done a quick comparison at xe.com. The CDN price of KC: D converts to £41.4337 GBP, so not much different to the price I see here. The GBP price of BT4 in CDN is... wait for it... $122.996!

I think people should be voting with theit wallets to stop this kind of gouging at launch.

Much as I loved the original game and really want this one, there's NO WAY I'm paying that much!
Agreed, and don't get me wrong: I'm well aware how expensive this one is even compared to KC:D. My point in general being the prices for new releases of many games seem to be getting higher and higher. Indeed, we need to vote with the wallet.
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dtgreene: The 2004 game isn't a different version of one of the others; it's an entirely different game that isn't even in the same genre.
But if the 2004 version isn't a reboot should they not be treating it as that being the fourth game?
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Lodium: One problem with low spec hardware even on turn based games coud be the number of units, stuff going on, size of maps, number of AI players. one of the Civilization games used to freeze or crash for me on a low spec hardware especially on huge maps with lots of AI players and units.
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dtgreene: By the "number of units", do you mean something like that Berserker room in the first game (though, due to the way the game works, you don't see all of them, so it doesn't use up extra resources; it just takes time to get through all the battle messages).

(Incidentally, the high system requirements will likely mean I won't be able to play a game I've already paid for.)
Not the very first game, i think it was the third or fourth one. It only crashed on low spec hardware on wery huge maps. Maximum size of world and alot of units. Im not sure if it crahed due to size of map or other stuff though. I didnt have the same problem on smaller maps though i didnt test it more. No problems on better hardware.

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dtgreene: By the "number of units", do you mean something like that Berserker room in the first game (though, due to the way the game works, you don't see all of them, so it doesn't use up extra resources; it just takes time to get through all the battle messages).

(Incidentally, the high system requirements will likely mean I won't be able to play a game I've already paid for.)
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trusteft: Exactly, the number of units is irrelevant in this type of game.
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tomimt: One of their aims in doing BT4 was graphical fidelity. Fargo stated that as BT 1-3 strived to be graphically better than the competition, BT4 would do the same, hence the requirements for better hardware.

I've watched a couple of beta vids of it, and in them the players have said that the game runs fine on lower HW than recommended though, so like always, the minimum requirments aren't necessarily gospel.
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trusteft: Nothing I have seen so far screams "this game needs a GTX 970!" As I mentioned before, this feels like either lazy work or lazy work. (programming/marketing)

And in the case the game does manage to run on lower specced systems. Is anyone with anything less going to gamble if it does or not? How many people in their right mind will buy a game knowing their systems is below the min req?

Mark my words, this is a sign of very poor work and I have now no doubt the game will be riddled (heh) with issues.
Then, why did it crash for me ? Note, i didnt have the same problem on smaller maps when i played one of the civ games.
I cant speak for this game, because i havent played it. But the civ games are also turn based. Im Not saying turn based games need high specced hardware, just to make myself clear, but at least in my experince i wasnt able to run that civ game optimal on my lower specced pc.
Post edited May 07, 2018 by Lodium
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pferreira1983: But if the 2004 version isn't a reboot should they not be treating it as that being the fourth game?
Should TES 3: Morrowind been named TES 5, given that Battlespire and Redguard came before it? Battlespire and Redguard were more like Daggerfall than The Bard's Tale (2004) is like the original Bard's Tale games. Also, there's the actual 4th game, The Bard's Tale Construction Set (not available on gog), which is definitely more like the original games than the 2004 game. My answer is: no, they are side games, and have too little in common with the originals. Of course they still had the option of forcing them to be official members of the series, anyway, despite differences. This is how we got Fallout 3, for example (note that it wasn't Fallout 5, with Tactics and the awful console game as 3 & 4, respectively). To a lesser extent, Wasteland 2 was also very different from Wasteland 1, and this new game will be very different than a game designed to run on ancient 8-bit hardware, but someone who has the rights to the name decided they were close enough to call them a series. I can guarantee there will be lots of complaints about how the new game is not like the old, regardless.
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aluinie: Saw this on kickstarter and paid some cash hopefully can get a gog key and not a steam key for it.
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Tarhiel: Surely we will have chance to choose, I would be more afraid we would get the basic version instead of Deluxe Edition, even if you supproted them for Deluxe Edition.

But in General, inXile are good when dealing with KS, so I don´t expect any major hitches here.
They are one of the worst offender when it comes to crowdfunding ending bad. They take advantage of the system, keep crucial information hidden until it's too late, don't listen to feedback and generally do what they want and care nothing for their backers (which should involved in some of the decision if they chose to do some changes to what was promised).

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Tarhiel: But in General, inXile are good when dealing with KS, so I don´t expect any major hitches here.
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SeduceMePlz: Not really. Backers of T:ToN had to beg/demand to get the proper edition matching their pledge tiers. And the backer outfit pack was made available on Steam but not GOG - we had to wait and get it from the backer portal two weeks later.

I pledged for Bard's Tale before the Torment fiasco, but inXile will not get another pledge from me.

I *might* reconsider if they do it right this time - if we get Deluxe keys from the start and absolutely no bullshit. Obsidian can do it - inXile has no excuse.
Right. They screw up on all the line. They made changes and removed rewards and people find out around release when they already knew months before. They removed translations that were promised and backed.

They also made new crowdfunding campaign when they still had to deliver the previous game.
For that reason I asked a refund for Bard's Tale and Wasteland 3 as I didn't want to be involved with them anymore as they have proved they cannot be trusted. I suggest you to do the same if you feel it the same, at least that would be a signal for them.
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pferreira1983: But if the 2004 version isn't a reboot should they not be treating it as that being the fourth game?
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darktjm: Should TES 3: Morrowind been named TES 5, given that Battlespire and Redguard came before it? <snip>.
I find it interesting that no one who's debating what Bard's Tale games should be considered 'series' are bringing up The Mage's Tale at all.

The very first game wasn't 'The Bard's Tale', back in the '80s. It was 'Tales of the Unknown: The Bard's Tale'. They originally intended to do other 'Tales of the Unknown' games, but everyone latched onto the Bard's Tale name, so that's what they stuck with.

The Mage's Tale (VR only, 2017) is a first-person dungeon crawl, but you only control one character and it's real-time. Still, I've played it, and it feels a lot more similar to the old RPGs than the APRG Bard's Tale.

The Mage's Tale is officially a Tale of the Unknown, too.
As much as I've always wanted to play BT1-3 as a kid, looking even at the remaster today, I can't help but see pretty much just mazes with random battles and no ... Tale. That's not very enticing to me. If there is a story in there somewhere, I sure must have missed it, in the half hour of watching someone play this. So is this a Dungeon Crawler with not much of a plot to speak of, or is there going to be more than random battles all day, every day?
Post edited May 07, 2018 by Jammet
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Jammet: As much as I've always wanted to play BT1-3 as a kid, looking even at the remaster today, I can't help but see pretty much just mazes with random battles and no ... Tale. That's not very enticing to me. If there is a story in there somewhere, I sure must have missed it, in the half hour of watching someone play this. So is this a Dungeon Crawler with not much of a plot to speak of, or is there going to be more than random battles all day, every day?
What I've seen of the beta, there is definetly more story and the battles are less random, at least in the dungeons. As there is a wildernes map as well, that might have more random battles.
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dtgreene: By the "number of units", do you mean something like that Berserker room in the first game (though, due to the way the game works, you don't see all of them, so it doesn't use up extra resources; it just takes time to get through all the battle messages).

(Incidentally, the high system requirements will likely mean I won't be able to play a game I've already paid for.)
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Lodium: Not the very first game, i think it was the third or fourth one. It only crashed on low spec hardware on wery huge maps. Maximum size of world and alot of units. Im not sure if it crahed due to size of map or other stuff though. I didnt have the same problem on smaller maps though i didnt test it more. No problems on better hardware.

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trusteft: Exactly, the number of units is irrelevant in this type of game.

Nothing I have seen so far screams "this game needs a GTX 970!" As I mentioned before, this feels like either lazy work or lazy work. (programming/marketing)

And in the case the game does manage to run on lower specced systems. Is anyone with anything less going to gamble if it does or not? How many people in their right mind will buy a game knowing their systems is below the min req?

Mark my words, this is a sign of very poor work and I have now no doubt the game will be riddled (heh) with issues.
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Lodium: Then, why did it crash for me ? Note, i didnt have the same problem on smaller maps when i played one of the civ games.
I cant speak for this game, because i havent played it. But the civ games are also turn based. Im Not saying turn based games need high specced hardware, just to make myself clear, but at least in my experince i wasnt able to run that civ game optimal on my lower specced pc.
I don't know why it crashed on you. I never had a crash of a Civilization game since the very first. Perhaps you had a problematic PC, or perhaps Windows and their infinitely fantastic stable code was to blame. Any number of reasons could be. I know what it wasn't though. The graphics card. Because that's what we are talking about this game.
If your computer had a problem with the number and size of units/AI, that's a memory and/or CPU issue. NOT a graphics card issue.
Again, not an issue you are bound to have in this turn based rpg. Or do you think you are going to face 100s or 1000s of enemy units at one battle? Not that it would matter for the GPU that much to begin with, in a turn based game, but just trying to answer your strange question.
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SeduceMePlz: Not really. Backers of T:ToN had to beg/demand to get the proper edition matching their pledge tiers. And the backer outfit pack was made available on Steam but not GOG - we had to wait and get it from the backer portal two weeks later.

I pledged for Bard's Tale before the Torment fiasco, but inXile will not get another pledge from me.

I *might* reconsider if they do it right this time - if we get Deluxe keys from the start and absolutely no bullshit. Obsidian can do it - inXile has no excuse.
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Tarhiel: I remember that. In general, T:ToN was somewhat badly managed from their side - I think it has to do with all the compromises they had to do in order to get the game released, and subsequent backlash of supporters, since they didn´t communicated those changes up until short before release.

But it seems they learned their lessons - Bard´s Tale and Wasteland 3 all had less variable stretchgoals than T:ToN, which makes them easier to fulfill.

Having said that, I also expect Deluxe keys for Bard´s Tale ultimate digital edition backers.
"Didn't communicated those changes" is a funny way of saying "they lied for months about available features, they took money for features they never planned to implement".
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Tarhiel: I remember that. In general, T:ToN was somewhat badly managed from their side - I think it has to do with all the compromises they had to do in order to get the game released, and subsequent backlash of supporters, since they didn´t communicated those changes up until short before release.

But it seems they learned their lessons - Bard´s Tale and Wasteland 3 all had less variable stretchgoals than T:ToN, which makes them easier to fulfill.

Having said that, I also expect Deluxe keys for Bard´s Tale ultimate digital edition backers.
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reative00: "Didn't communicated those changes" is a funny way of saying "they lied for months about available features, they took money for features they never planned to implement".
InXile wants the money of the backers but don't want or feel obligated to uphold their part of the bargain. They don't even feel it's mandatory to communicate the changes they made to those rewards or campaign goal. And in the end a lot of backers were left with something they would never had pledge to begin with or with a worst deal than regular customers (collector's edition). They really don't need (or deserve) backers money, they could do they games with publishers money if they want (they partner with them anyway when the risk is lessened and that point let them dictate some changes that are inconvenient to the backers).
Post edited May 07, 2018 by MIK0
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LynetteC: I've just done a quick comparison at xe.com. The CDN price of KC: D converts to £41.4337 GBP, so not much different to the price I see here. The GBP price of BT4 in CDN is... wait for it... $122.996!

I think people should be voting with theit wallets to stop this kind of gouging at launch.

Much as I loved the original game and really want this one, there's NO WAY I'm paying that much!
Don't get too excited over a GOG bug. The game's estimated price will be around $40. If in doubt, you can still pledge $27 for a base copy:
https://app.crowdox.com/projects/inxile/the-bards-tale-iv
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Tarhiel: I remember that. In general, T:ToN was somewhat badly managed from their side - I think it has to do with all the compromises they had to do in order to get the game released, and subsequent backlash of supporters, since they didn´t communicated those changes up until short before release.

But it seems they learned their lessons - Bard´s Tale and Wasteland 3 all had less variable stretchgoals than T:ToN, which makes them easier to fulfill.

Having said that, I also expect Deluxe keys for Bard´s Tale ultimate digital edition backers.
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reative00: "Didn't communicated those changes" is a funny way of saying "they lied for months about available features, they took money for features they never planned to implement".
You must be very bitter about it, aren´t you?

Saying they didn´t meant to implement features they took money for is outright lie - they stated it several times they wanted to, they didn´t manage to do it because of the changes (read difficulties) during production, but what could be salvaged they implemented in patch 1.1 (Oom, Codex, etc.).

Again, I am not saying not communicating that is cool, but it´s not true they didn´t plan to do that.
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Clearsong: The very first game wasn't 'The Bard's Tale', back in the '80s. It was 'Tales of the Unknown: The Bard's Tale'. They originally intended to do other 'Tales of the Unknown' games, but everyone latched onto the Bard's Tale name, so that's what they stuck with.
I find it interesting that you quoted my comment on TES games, when Daggerfall was originally going to be Arena 2. "Everyone" doesn't decide what to call a game; the developers and publishers do that (possibly influenced by trademark law). The only things that get new names by the "public" that I'm aware of are political things, such as SDI being renamed Star Wars by the unimaginative press (and somehow making a lot of people actually think that was the official name).

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Clearsong: The Mage's Tale is officially a Tale of the Unknown, too.
If this upcoming game were a real-time and/or VR-only game, I would not even be slightly interested, regardless of its name. I am certainly not interested in The Mage's Tale for the same reason, regardless of its name or heritage.

edit:
As is, I am concerned about the lack of a Linux version on the gog store page, even though other sites claim there will be Mac & Linux versions at launch. Given that they have produced Linux versions for their other games, I trust there will be one, but I can't be sure, and it's not likely to work on Wine. Since the Facebook VR headset dropped Linux support, any VR taint on the series makes me wary of a Windows-only release.
Post edited May 07, 2018 by darktjm
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Lodium: Not the very first game, i think it was the third or fourth one. It only crashed on low spec hardware on wery huge maps. Maximum size of world and alot of units. Im not sure if it crahed due to size of map or other stuff though. I didnt have the same problem on smaller maps though i didnt test it more. No problems on better hardware.

Then, why did it crash for me ? Note, i didnt have the same problem on smaller maps when i played one of the civ games.
I cant speak for this game, because i havent played it. But the civ games are also turn based. Im Not saying turn based games need high specced hardware, just to make myself clear, but at least in my experince i wasnt able to run that civ game optimal on my lower specced pc.
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trusteft: I don't know why it crashed on you. I never had a crash of a Civilization game since the very first. Perhaps you had a problematic PC, or perhaps Windows and their infinitely fantastic stable code was to blame. Any number of reasons could be. I know what it wasn't though. The graphics card. Because that's what we are talking about this game.
If your computer had a problem with the number and size of units/AI, that's a memory and/or CPU issue. NOT a graphics card issue.
Again, not an issue you are bound to have in this turn based rpg. Or do you think you are going to face 100s or 1000s of enemy units at one battle? Not that it would matter for the GPU that much to begin with, in a turn based game, but just trying to answer your strange question.
I didnt speccificly said the GPU, i said a lower specced Hardware, this coud be countless configurations. Sadly i dont have that pc annymore so i cant post a screenshot or whatever so i guess we cant really pinpoint what the issue was.
Post edited May 08, 2018 by Lodium