Sellswords: Ashen Company

The game was good for the first couple hours, i thought we we're going to receive more updates but we got nothing. The guy took my money and dipped

EDIT: From the recent announcement and my conversation with the developer over on twitter, I'd say he wasn't trying to cash-in ASAP and leave as much as he bit off more than he could chew with an ambitious project such as Sellswords and tried to fund it by creating a second game.

I don't think that completely justifies charging people for a game without a clear plan laid out to finish development but he did promise to give everyone that bought this game every future game released under Mutiny Software for free (starting with his second game SwarmZ) but as noble as that promise is, I don't know the developer personally and he could just start making games under a new studio name to get around his promise.

Overall, if there was a rating in-between Good or Bad on steam, I'd definitely give it a rating in the middle instead of negative (even though I still think no one should buy it as of right now since it doesn't have a lot of content past 15 minutes worth of gameplay and the development of the game is dead without any idea if or when it will be revived again) but if what the developer has communicated so far is true then even though I still find his actions wrong at least he wasn't being greedy or malicious.

I'll leave the original review up below though just as a reminder to developers to communicate better with their customers, otherwise you might get some "undeserved" hate.

ORIGINAL REVIEW: Great concept, but the game is literally in a pre-alpha state with only 15 minutes worth of content. Basically all you can do is spawn friendly and enemy troops and go into a battle till one side loses.

The developer making this game is apparently now working on another game (it's a one-man developer) and has been very quiet about this one or how he somehow has the time to work on two projects, so I'd say he's just cashing in on interesting concepts by making a barebones pre-alpha build and putting it up for sale as early access.

Avoid till it's updated to a much better state, developer doesn't seem trustworthy.

Amazing potential, huge innovation. On the official discord, I read that the developer is planning to do a Sandbox Mount and Blade campaign. This is the future! Delicious project ! This is the competition we were all waiting for and it's a valorous one-man-team doing it. Keep up the good word Maximilien! Keep the fight and make that dream game!

I very hesitantly recomend this game. In early access I expect a game to either be updated regularly or I at least want information as to the state of development periodically. Radio silence for 6 months is very worrying. I will come back to change my review once something changes. Either for better or worse

The game is good but its kinda bare bones at the minute but the devolper does say there will be a campaign and more factions features etc and its surprisingly fun it may not look the best but combats really fun and the scale is large for a game of this genre so i am recommending this but if youre tight on money id wait until its more fleshed out.
Ps. The devoloper is a very small team it may even be one person its very indie so give them some slack if it takes awile for an update:]

No updates from the Dev in multiple months so nobody has an idea if he is even still working on the game... It's really not hard to printscreen and write a small message on steam or on Discord is it... There is no real excuse. If the dev is still working on the game then I shall gladly remove this review

its ok i guess? cant rec this because it doesnt even have campaign yet. its a total war / mount and blade crossover if i were to explain it in the simplest terms.


ill buy it again when campaign comes around, but until then dont buy this game. its just sandbox right now

I love this game and hope they keep up the good work. The combat does have a few issues but nothing that would make me return it.

So the idea behind this game is what iv been waiting for, for a long time. unfortunatly the moment i decided i was going to refund was watching One single enemy soldier be ignored, and really they just cant comprehend the small radius so they will walk towards him slowly, dieing one by one. i mean dont get me wrong, it was cool running alongside my army, but there are better games with this idea, even old ones for example rise and fall. I know the game is not done, but with what iv seen, i cant imagine it will get 10x better. Il deff buy it later on even if it costs more! it seems they should have worked on it more before giving us a taste, because once i noticed how hard it was for my men to fight one person, the other faults came easily. anyways, good luck with the game! i pray you make it an awsome thing that makes me look foolish for not staying by its side through the early access. please prove me wrong, i have been wanting this style of game like TW series but 3rd person. omg imagine switching from 3rd or 1st. Please. make my dreams come true!

The idea is interesting, and one I would absolutely get behind. However the execution is pretty bad. Combat is incredibly simple, sluggish, and clunky. Not being able to move during attacks, the attacks being controlled with the same buttons used for footwork, the actual impacts feeling underwhelming at best...

The RTS aspect also seems fairly broken. I frequently order units to move around or attack certain units and they flat out don't respond to my order.

I'm so hungry for more content in this kind of genre, but quite frankly this game really isn't in a state where you should be allowed to buy it.

On the brightside, the performance is actually good and the models look fairly detailed for the scale so that's cool!

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Rework combat. Allow us to move during swings, add alternative control schemes, improve AI coordination, improve dodges, etc.

Make the RTS aspect more similar to total war and actually work more than 40% of the time and this is the beginning of a fun game.

It could be good one day, but this really isn't worth the price at all or worth paying unless you love this genre and really want to support the dev.

This game is awesome. I recommend it! I am excited for the future updates!

Some things that could be improved in the future -

- Nerf the archers power lol
- Maybe improve the animations for incoming arrow fire. It looks awesome up until when there are few targets left and you see 100 million arrows all converging to land in the exact same spot ha ha. that landing part looks a little wacky. However, for the most part, arrow fire is fine.

- In the future, sword attacks could be less predictable as at the moment its usually obvious as to when you should strike back.

- Maybe have the soldiers standing closer together as they are quite spread apart. I think Pixelated Apollo mentioned this too.

- I think an amazing thing would be to be able to control random soldiers just like you can with the general but make them weaker I suppose.

I might have missed a thing or two - but either way - I REALLY LIKE THIS GAME AND I DON'T EVEN CARE IF IT'S IN THE EARLY STAGES. AWESOME WORK!!!!!!!!!!!

Showing a lot lot lot of potential..... current state of game is very limited but I bought the game for what it can be, not for what it currently is. To me that is what Early Access is all about. Fingers crossed for an open world campaign ala Mount & Blade where I can roam the map and level up my units a while before going further in the story-line.

Genuinely an awesome concept and the foundation of something very special. For the early stages it is in and for a solo developer I am most impressed. Very excited to see future updates and I am more than happy to support the developer and the growth of his project.

Yes i would recommend,
but let me give you a warning,
This game is like SUPER SUPER early, so please dont expect a full game if buying.
So far this game only has a quick battle type mode and plays very similar RTS as the total war series.
The FPS aspect of it is pretty cool and fun, and switching between RTS and FPS type gameplay is almost seamless.
again, this game is SUPER early, so if your buying it, its like playing a rough demo.

Once this game becomes a bit more released/developed it will definitely be a game that any M&B or TW owner would want in their library.

fun and exiting! you would think a game made of 1 man would be pretty shit, but it's amazingly immersive and fun. thumbs up!

This is fantastic, hopefully the dev will not abondon and steadily improve this.

Huge potential! A mix of Mount & Blade and Total War is what we want. But their is some jouney and first of all a multiplayer is necessary.

Tonnes of potential!

Maybe this will be feature complete before Bannerlord comes out!

I can't say for sure it is a good game, but it is a GOOD idea. Really good idea.
I tried to learn how to make games in order to make THIS SPECIFIC GAME.
I've been thinking about it, dreaming about it.
I wanted an union of Mount and Blade with Total War series. as realistic as possible.
This one is trying this.
It is an astounding idea, the graphics are good, and it works well even though the battles are huge, but I know the game has a lot to improve yet.
I feel the attacks are irresponsive. Slow to happen, I would very much like to see it fixed, but as we know, it is in early stages.
I also feel you could control another soldier after you fall in battle instead of only controlling it as Total War style.
Also, I believe the battles are lengthy, I don't know yet if this is due to anything but the early stage of the game, or anything else.

I hope this game is also willing to approach the union between RTS and RPG, but I don't know yet it this is the case.

Nonetheless, even though if it doesn't unite with RPG (which would be my dream) I would still play it, for I have countless hours of Total War in my life.

I have only to thank you creators of this amazing piece.
The idea has been my dream for years.

If I was Total War and I would be very worried....this game has huge potential. Imagine having this battle system while being able to build your character in the campaign mode ?

The couple battle I played here were very epic with me running with my guys while arrows were flying everywhere and people were dying all around me and them BAM we hit the enemy shield wall ...

Anyway, pretty good game so far and I am very exited to see what dev updates will bring in the future !