The Dark Eye Blackguards 2

[Scroo]

I just turned it on, so I dunno if they said something about it before.

Edited my post - the first two hours of the LP have already been archived if you want to watch them later.

Cool, will probably watch it tomorrow then, I don't have much time today anymore.

 

[Scroo]

Blackguards 2 won't offer C&C, the effort would be too much. They define C&C as the tactical options you have on the battlefield.

Also I'm obviously the only one in that chat who even played Blackguards

 

[Infinitron]

Holy crap, that session went on for 8 hours and the Daedalic guys stayed the whole time!

 

[Angthoron]

While that's cool, it's also pretty fucking unhealthy to have your crew doing an 8-hour shift on a Saturday. I hope that's not their regular practice.

 

[Darth Roxor]

I hope that's not their regular practice.

Only since they got acquired by a publisher!

 

[Infinitron]

Italian Blackguards 2 E3 preview: http://www.everyeye.it/pc/articoli/blackguards-2_anteprima_22916

Google Translate:

Spoiler

Blackguards 2 - Preview
Posted on 30/06/2014 by Andrea Schwendimann

It seems to witness a revival has been going on for a couple of years now. After the adventure point and click , the card-game , and the space-sim , surely they are the turn-based RPG that have awakened from decades of slumber. Blackguards was a surprise only a few months ago and, although not without flaws, the title Daedalic has the merit of having brought on our screens a good game system in a charming setting, complete with a plot that intrigues without boring (as opposed to the three Drakensang, we dare say). Without reaching innovations and artistic prodigies Banner Saga, it is undeniable that if you're interested in the genre immortalized by the old Final Fantasy Tactics a trip to the land of Dark Eye do not have to leave it to escape: and the well-deserved success was such that the German study , which is already developing a following. Of Blackguards 2 , at E3 in Los Angeles, we got to see just some concept art, but this developer showed us several new introductions that could lead this successor in the hearts of all of us.

​

Set some years after the end of the first chapter, Blackguards 2 resumes directly across the setting and the characters developed specifically by Daedalic universe of Dark Eye.Mature and sombre tones of the protagonists of the first game back in no uncertain terms and we will be once again called to command a party of characters who have the most simple profile of offenders and little good to spotless heroes. The Black Guard are only the shadow of those who have defeated the Nine Hordes, even if their reputation is extremely exaggerated by the stories of their deeds. Then return the actors that we all know, even if things are not going very well so far. The dwarf Naurim has become fat and lazy: numb from the glory is given to the party extremes and illegal businesses that have enriched even more, so now living annuity and did not want to lift a finger. The proud Takate is now bored by success and has given the sheer cruelty, looking for a distraction: he put on an illegal gambling den in the forests of his people, who now capture human to make them fight each other ... just as had happened to him time. His blood lust is insatiable but can not find peace, since there seems to be a worthy goal for the defeat of the Nine Hordes. Finally, the magician Zurbran was completely overwhelmed by his desire for women. The last lover was able to track him down, subdue him and sell him as a slave, simply deceiving him with her feminine charm and just for sheer revenge. Now Zurbran has completely lost confidence in himself and who knows where he is the charmer that just a few years ago has terrorized the globe with his power.

Throughout this comes Cassia , the heroine of Blackguards 2 : Shark distant heir to the Throne, is determined to exterminate opponents to dominate the surrounding territories. For this reason, attempts to track down the remaining Blackguard, corrupt in some way and win the South Aventuria you understand the fair maiden? All this thirst for conquest and power could not be central to the gameplay of Blackguards 2 . called We will in fact manage to personally battles crucial to the success of Cassia, choosing from time to time, such as regions that invade and raze the city on a map as a strategic tactic typical of Total War. Without disturbing the title too Creative Assembly, did not reach a similar complexity for sure, but not as we would like. Rather Daedalic adds to Blackguards 2 a component that goes beyond the simple turn-based combat. Manage territories and expand-especially-while at the same time to defend against enemy attacks, will not be easy as the company of heroes will still have to deal with the quests and missions typical of the way, to try to vanquish the enemy forces. As we can conquer new lands then unlock new quests, new artifacts, new equipment and new cities. All this will once again be non-linear, with crossroads and choices to be made that will lead players on roads are also very different, according to the programmers. Of course we recognize a lot of courage on the part of Daedalic, in introducing such a novelty in a formula that could easily just be refined and expanded. However, the trade-offs required will also come with a loud voice from the community. First, the introduction of Stamina as a resource in combat and-most importantly-increased clarity in the statistical structure of the game, which has remained largely unchanged, but that will be much more transparent, especially in the combat log, to allow a more precise control on party and the tactics to be adopted. There also comes a line of sight on the battlefield improved, as well as the introduction of the formations of attack (it was really frustrating to start every fight with the manual positioning of the units), and full cover from enemy attack supply from the soil. The game engine will be the same, so nothing new from this point of view, although we hope to be better optimized, given the heaviness ingolfante the first title.

Blackguards 2 leaves aside the technical innovations and jumps straight to an extension and refinement of the complete mechanical that have made the success of the first episode. The guys Daedalic point a lot about this new IP, so as to have accelerated the development of a release date is very close in the early months of 2015.'s New strategic plan for the conquest of the territories and the arrival of stamina as a resource to be used in combat introductions seem very interesting that if come together in a renewed variety of missions (real strength of the first Blackguards) and a net expansion of the bestiary and equipment, could really elevate the franchise to heights not seen for quite some qualitative in ' scope of turn-based strategy. We are confident that Stoic is working hard to bring us the new Banner Saga sooner than we suspect, with inXile trying to drown out all through the immensity of Wasteland 2. And in this renewed interest in a genre believed to be dead for two decades, we can not have to wait anxiously for the clash to the palm of the best turn-based RPG has to start again. Blackguards 2 promises sparks and will be playable at the upcoming Gamescom in Cologne will keep you informed, lined up as always at the forefront.

 

[Infinitron]

RPGWatch collected questions for a community Q&A last weekend: http://www.rpgwatch.com/forums/showthread.php?t=24901

 

[Infinitron]

Game now has an official site, not that there's much there: http://blackguards2.daedalic.de/

 

[abnaxus]

So either Niam will be back, or she is used as placeholder in that video.

 

[Major_Blackhart]

Or it could be that chick that is going to be a major recruiter for the characters.

 

[Darth Roxor]

So guyses dis gaem is p cool

 

[Cyberarmy]

So guyses dis gaem is p cool

You lucky basterd!

 

[Darth Roxor]

 

[Infinitron]

Thanks twincast

 

[abnaxus]

 

[deuxhero]

Next time someone interviews them mention that a female PC in Blackguards 1 was very obviously a lesbian (or whatever it would be in a world that didn't have an island of "Lesbos") and ask if that will carry over to the sequel.

 

[Infinitron]

Next time someone interviews them mention that a female PC in Blackguards 1 was very obviously a lesbian (or whatever it would be in a world that didn't have an island of "Lesbos") and ask if that will carry over to the sequel.

Cassia isn't actually the PC from BG1. She's a new character. (I didn't quite grok that at first too, for some reason)

BTW, new Italian and German articles:
http://www.everyeye.it/pc/articoli/blackguards-2_anteprima_23441
http://de.gamesindustry.biz/article...ann-bei-uns-ist-game-design-kreative-diktatur

 

[deuxhero]

She is? That head they posted looked a lot like one of the female head options in BG1.

 

[abnaxus]

Yeah that's Niam's portrait. Probably used as a placeholder.

 

[Duellist_D]

So guyses dis gaem is p cool

Oh you...

Beta-Review when?

 

[Supermedo]

I hope the game have better writing, the story was so forgettable and for the love of god add animation speed option.

 

[Grunker]

Fuck the story. Just hand me P&P Encounters: The Video Game II and everything else is sprinkles and toppings.

 

[Infinitron]

Here is the Watch's Gamescom preview: http://www.rpgwatch.com/show/article?articleid=254&ref=0&id=708

The demo of Blackguards 2 was presented by Johannes Kiel, with Kai Fiebig adding additional information. To me Blackguards 2 looked like Blackguards 1 with changes, as could be expected. The results of the first Blackguards were apparently such to warrant a second Blackguards game and Kai mentioned it was a success in two ways. Firstly Daedalic went out of their comfort zone to make an RPG that was received well and secondly the sales were above expectation. This article reflects what was told to me and focusses on some of the changes in Blackguards 2 compared to it predecessor.

Johannes and Kai mentioned that one of the biggest problems with the first Blackguards was that players did not know how the rule system worked. The Dark Eye P&P rule system can be pretty complex and not easy to understand. In Blackguards 2 many of these more complicated rules have been implemented such that they are better understandable by the player. The word simplified comes to mind with some of the changes that were mentioned by Kai, such as the 16 attributes that are in TDE and are now grouped together to seven and the more direct relation between incrementing an attribute and the effect that would have for that character in the game.
Although things have been made easier to understand, Kai emphasizes that the game has become less complicated, but at the same time has become more complex.



Blackguards 2 takes place in southern Aventuria and will be less linear than its predecessor. The player can now freely go through the map as he or she chooses. The story will also be different depending on the way you go through it, as it is will change based on the choices you make in the game. The ending of the game depends on what you have done during your travels through Aventuria, which will add to the replayability of the game, as long as you actually play the game in a different way every time. The much darker story of Blackguards 2 supports this with more difficult decisions to make your choices count.

In order to plan your route through Aventuria better the difficulty level of opponents are shown before entering a battle. As are the bonuses you can receive from the fight, so you can pick your battles if you like. At the start of a fight you select your units to deploy and where to deploy them on the grid. Besides the heroes to choose from, you can now be aided by mercenaries you hired as well. There are mercenaries available in all classes, so you can build your team as you see fit. Next to these mercenaries you can also free prisoners during a battle (if there are any) that are being held captive. Once freed, they will fight beside you to join your cause.



Several new creatures have been added to Blackguards 2, one of them being Demons. These demons can be controlled if you have found the right tunes, which you can use on a blood object, allowing you to charm the demon. Once charmed, the demon can be added to your team in combat. To allow for all these new units you can now have up to 20 units in total under your control.
Some other changes in the combat mechanics are that it is now possible to take cover behind objects and the addition of a line of sight tool, which allows to visualize what the line of sight of a character is and who can and can't be reached. In addition the somewhat weak mages from Blackguards 1 have been upgraded by changing their chance to hit and improving their spells.

What will also make an impact during combat is the addition of stamina as an attribute. Everything you do in Blackguards 2 during a fight will use stamina, such as moving, slashing, parrying, shooting, casting a spell, etc. In this way each action will reduce your available amount of stamina, which only replenishes slowly, and adds a need for better planning of your fight.

A new location you can visit at any time during your travels, is an encampment, which grows as you progress in the game. In the encampment you find amongst others, trainers, merchants and also prisoners whom you can torture to extract important information or whom you can make to join you.

Blackguards 2 features many other smaller and larger changes, which were not all shown, but result, in Kai's opinion, in a gameplay that is more tactical and very different from the first Blackguards.



Some things have not changed much though. You still can't influence anyone in a conversation by using any skills and for the major part the interaction with the NPCs in towns is similar to how it was in Blackguards 1, but there is one other new thing related to this that Kai did not want to inform me of yet, in order to not spoil things, but he did want to say that your decisions will influence the behavior of NPCs as well.

They have no idea yet if Blackguards 2 is bigger than the first. It also depends on what you consider to be 'bigger'. In amount of maps it is smaller, but as there is more to do, the playing time is expected to be longer.

There are no real plans at the moment to bring Blackguards 2 to other platforms, but they would like to do it. They don't see it as a problem to have it running on other platforms than Mac and PC and actually already have on some, but the controls are an issue. Because of all the things you can do in Blackguards 2 the controls are not that easy to implement on a platform with a different interface.

Blackguards 1 will not see any new DLC as they need all of their resources to work on the development of Blackguards 2. Once it has been released, it is likely that some DLC will be developed for Blackguards 2 though.
There are also no plans to bring any adventure titles to this world. They are aiming for something bigger for a future game. Something that incorporates more elements of an RPG, more skills, more talents and a bigger world. Whether or not this future game is Blackguards 3 was not shared, but Kai thinks it might be a big surprise once it is revealed.

If Kai himself could make any game he likes and would have a large enough budget he would make a game with the scope and complexity of Baldur's Gate 2 including an online playing mode. In his past he worked on Baldur's Gate 2 and he misses the really complex games like that in these days. There are not many of those, so if he had the freedom and the money he would like to create that type of game.

As far as the release date is concerned Kai was somewhat vague, but it is currently scheduled for the first part of 2015.

 

[abnaxus]

Is she leprose?

 

[Crooked Bee]

New video on factions:



Also, new press release: http://www.rpgcodex.net/forums/inde...-factions-video-and-gameplay-explained.95189/