The obvious risk with sprinkling gunpowder into Mount & Blade's finely-seasoned combat broth was that all the old melee tools and missile-slingers would be rendered redundant in an instant.
After a few days of play, I'm still not totally convinced it was a wise move, but I do have to admit that musket mayhem does have a certain smoke-wreathed charm. Clever Kievites SiCh Studio, realising that guns are amazingly rare in electronic entertainment, have rectified this.Īt first glance, the idea of adding boomsticks to an open-world RPG built around intricate swordplay, artful archery and fancy horsemanship might seem odd, not to say dangerous. What you couldn't do was pull a firearm from your belt and blow his brains out. In the marvellous but Marmite-y Mount & Blade and its semi-sequel Warband, you could end a man's life by cracking his skull with a warhammer, slashing his vitals to shreds with a sword, pin-cushioning his abdomen with arrows, or thrusting a lance through his family jewels.
