If Space Marine 2’s wanton devil-mulching left you hungry for more fantastical depictions of medieval zealotry, maybe take a look at Band Of Crusaders, an open-world party-based RPG in which you are the Grandmaster of a knightly order, trying to keep a bunch of wily Archdemons out of Europe. It seems to play a bit like XCOM, with an oppressive world map that is slowly encroached upon as you travel around recruiting soldiers, interacting with settlements, and picking real-time fights with hellfiends “inspired by biblical descriptions and European folklore”. Naturally, parallels with real-life xenophobia and sectarian hatred abound. Here’s the trailer.
And here are some more details from the Steam page. Your Band Of Crusaders can hire up to 20 knights, and you can train, equip and rearm them at an expanding campsite of upgradeable buildings. “Each crusader brings novelty to your camp with their own backgrounds, strengths and weaknesses as well as the ability to synergize with their Brothers,” the developers explain. There are no fixed character classes, but each crusader has a skill tree made up of active, passive and “semi-active” abilities, and there’s an emphasis on “versatile” multi-role builds.
The overworld sort of looks like they modded Darkest Dungeon into Where The Water Tastes Like Wine. It worsens steadily as the demons invade and various human factions fight back, a darkening of the mood that (assuming you last long enough) culminates in a scrap with one of the Archdemons. Conditions such as time of day and season affect how you play. As for your opponents, “each of the enemy families has its strengths and weaknesses, encouraging the player to strategize and adjust their combat tactics”.
I’m in two minds about the real-time combat, which sees you giving orders in slow motion. They’re calling it “deep” but going by trailers, it’s a bit of a scrum. Still, there’s the threat of character permadeath to keep you on your toes.
Read more about Band Of Crusaders on Steam. It doesn’t have an exact release date yet. Developers Virtual Alchemy are a new indie studio from Warsaw, Poland, whose ranks include former CD Projekt and War Hospital staff (nobody senior, going by their LinkedIn page).