You are the Bard, a selfish rogue weary of pointless sub-quests and rat-infested cellars. Now includes original classic games The Bard’s Tale 1, 2 & 3!
Modeled estimate, not a reported figure. How we estimate →
Each in the currency that store quoted — not converted: the gap between two rows is the publisher's pricing, not an exchange rate.
14 of 15 markets; the rest we haven't asked for this title, not markets where it is unavailable.
Availability
We put this game to every storefront we collect. A market that answered not sold has told us something about the game; a market we never asked has not, and the two are never drawn the same.
About
Genres
Sums Steam only; GOG publishes no volume signal, so the true total is higher by an unknown amount.
| Store | Price | Audience | Score | Chart | Est. revenue |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
SteamYou are here | $19.99 | 1Kreviews | 77% | — | $527.6K |
| $3.99−80% | 532ratings | 76% | #145 | not modelled |
Matched by title — a reused name can pair the wrong games. * is a critic aggregate. Prices and positions are each store's United States storefront; Epic charts worldwide. Audience and Score too, except Steam's, which is worldwide.
Engagement
Reviews
Themes across 54 recent reviews and how positive each mention is. A keyword signal, not full sentiment analysis.
Reviews
It is a console-style action RPG, and the controls were clearly designed with a gamepad in mind. Playing with a keyboard and mouse is extremely uncomfortable. For example, when using a bow I regularly opened a menu by accident instead of firing. So if you have a gamepad, use it from the start. Another piece of console heritage is that you can only save at specific locations. First and foremost, this is a parody of classic RPGs. Usually the main character is a warrior, mage, or rogue. Here, he is a bard, although in practice he combines elements of all three classes. The protagonist is not much of a hero either. He is a shameless opportunist who does everything for his own benefit. The opening scene already tells you everything you need to know: he scares an innkeeper with a rat, then "catches" it himself and collects a reward for getting rid of it. That is more or less how he earns his fame. Sometimes his actions have more serious consequences and cause a small-scale apocalypse for everyone around him. You can talk to some NPCs, but dialogue choices usually come down to two options: be polite or be rude. You never know in advance which one will benefit you more. Sometimes one response gives you a reward while the other makes you miss it. Sometimes both choices lead to different rewards. Either way, you cannot predict the outcome, so most of the time you just pick whichever response fits your mood. The RPG system is simple, and there is no need to plan complicated builds. You gain stat points with each level and occasionally choose new skills. The skills that matter most are the ones that unlock new weapon types. You start with a sword and armor, but later you can unlock flails, shields, daggers, two-handed weapons, and bows. New equipment simply replaces the old version if its stats are better. Armor works the same way. Loot is automatically converted into money, which is a surprisingly amusing idea. The items themselves are often jokes, so it is worth reading what the Bard has just "sold". You can find things like a goblin bank promissory note and other useless junk. Money can be spent on drinks at the tavern, which temporarily buff or debuff the character, healing at temples, and equipment from shops. The graphics and art direction have very little to offer. The visuals are dull, dirty-looking, and generally forgettable. The locations serve their purpose, but there is not much reason to stop and admire them. The progression is mostly linear. Some areas can be skipped or visited in a different order, certain "artifacts" can be missed because of a wrong decision, and there are three endings. Even so, it still feels like a sequence of levels where you travel from point A to point B, kill a boss, and sometimes walk all the way back afterward. The main gameplay mechanic is summoning creatures. These can be animals such as rats, magical beings, elementals, undead, knights, mercenaries, and other companions. The number of active summons is limited by available slots and your mana pool. Both depend on the musical instrument you are using: lutes, harps, flutes, an axe-shaped electric guitar, a singing sword, and other options. In practice, the Bard is his own small army. Summoned creatures can also be given simple commands such as "forward" and "back". The companions are often amusing because of their dialogue. My favorite is the old man who collects loot, disables traps with his own body, and finds secret doors. He does all of this while making comments along the lines of "that junk wasn't worth bending over for", "I hope this hurts you as much as it hurts me", and "they don't make doors like this anymore". The main reason to play, however, is the humor. It is often dark, sometimes satirical, and fairly mean-spirited. I enjoy that kind of thing. Cutscenes regularly include songs, so at times the game almost turns into a musical. The lyrics are also funny and fit the general absurdity very well. Another good idea is the narrator, who constantly makes sarcastic comments. The Bard regularly argues with him, breaking the fourth wall in the process. Taken as a whole, this is a solid but unremarkable game. The gameplay started to feel boring fairly quickly, but the humor made up for a lot of it. I kept playing mostly to see the next joke, song, or disaster the Bard would cause for everyone around him. It deserves a positive review, even though I was never particularly impressed by it.
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Price dynamics, follower growth, revenue and sales trajectories with interactive tooltips
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14 on sale1 answered “not sold”0 we did not ask
The 1 “not sold” market is read from the Steam price pass of Sep 8: that day the store answered for this game elsewhere and gave no price there. The 14 priced markets are the same rows as the table above — each the latest price we hold, dated here when it is older than that pass. The 0 marked “not asked” were not put to this store at all — either it has no storefront there or we do not collect it yet, and neither is a statement about the game. A refusal is a refusal on one day; a store can list a title again tomorrow.
Stats
All-time low is the lowest price we've recorded for this game since we started tracking it.
Languages: English*, French, Italian, German*, Spanish - Spain, Polish, Russian*languages with full audio support
Hours played at review time, across 54 reviews with recorded playtime.
positive critical· bar length = how often the theme comes up
I've completed this game on PS4, so excuse my low hour count. This is pre-Deadpool Deadpool. It's good. Play it.
Уникальная игра, под маской обычного приключения скрывается концентрат цинизма, сарказма и чёрного юмора. Бард тот еще отморозок xd
Thank Paradise for the Gift! TL;DR: A weird comedic RPG game that I watched my cousin play back in the day, that suddenly peaked my curiosity. Summary: So back in 2007, I would met my uncle and cousins for a family visit during the holiday. Then I get to watch them play this game. Which I did not understand. I don't know what about this game so special. So, as a curious player I am, browsing through inXile Library, I happened to find this game. Yeah, so you play as the eponymous Bard, played by the English actor, Cary Elwes. Oh you don't know him? Well you may have known him from Rob Reiner The Princess Bride, Francis Coppola Bram's Stoker Dracula and among other comedic titles. As the Bard, your journey is to rescue a captive Princess (voiced by Jennifer Hale) so she can reward you with s3x. You story is narrated by the unreliable Tony Jay who often mocks your decisions and progress. Gameplay: The game used Snowblind Studios DARK ALLIANCE Engine, that was previously powered Interplay (no offense, but those f@#kers shoulda stayed bankrupt for raising prices on older games, like Monolith SHOGO) Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance (probably should check that game later). You walk to point A to B to engage in quest related stuff. You can either be civil or an a$$h0le, which leans more on the latter to earn the most stuff. You also gained XP from either finishing quest or killing enemies, which allowed you to level up and increase stats. To upgrade weapons, go see a merchant. You can also summon companions from animals like Electric Spider, Rats and human companion to aid your quest. They don't usually do much, but once you command them to either CHARGE or BACKUP, they will obeyed like a puppy dog. PROS: It's not a serious game and also an entertaining RPG, with a comedic premise and an unreliable protagonist and narrator. It certainly a good ARPG with simple-combat and mechanics and hooked you for the most times. CONS: Some. Despite being updated to the Remastered and Resnarkled version by inXile, the game has a lot of problems. Here's a list: - The game still uses the outdated DirectInput API, which if you use an Xbox Controller, you would experience Misplace input. Like for example on the menu: B is Accept and X is back, which MAKES NO SENSE! It also has a problems with Input delay when using Steam Input. So you need to go to [url=https://www.nexusmods.com/thebardstale/mods/4] Nexus [/url] and use this fix. Just simply extract it to where the game is installed and you are golden. - Follow up on the controller, there is no button prompt UI. So you'll be stuck with the Numeric button name, until someone created a mod that could replace it. Brian Fargo likely forgot that too. - The game suffers slow motion, because of a particle effects according to the forums. No known fix for it and Brian Fargo of inXile apparently forgot to fix it/notice it. Some said it worked when playing via Windowed mode, but others still experience the same issue. So yeah, it's a mix bag. The only thing that I hate, aside from the Technical Issue, is the lack of navigation for where you are going or where is the quest took place at and going back and forth to do some of this stuff, before doing the real ones. Tedious stuff, but yeah. Brian Fargo's signature I supposed. VERDICT: The game is actually good. You can either get it stand-alone, or buy the Wasteland 2 Director's Cut Digital Deluxe Edition, which grants you this game for free as a bonus. As for the technical stuff, there is not a lot of fix from the PCGamingWiki can tell you. You can either get used to it, or just stick with Emulators or newer console I supposed. 8/10
It comes basically down to the question: do you like driving old cars despite all the issues? If it's fun to you, in the context of old games with old designs and old flaws, this one is a gem. I really like the tone of it, the fact that it never takes itself seriously and voice acting is stellar. It is especially hilarious when the narrator and the protagonist start to argue on things. Silly on purpose, that's what it is in general and it's great. It is exactly as I remembered from 20 years of distance just looks a tiny bit better than back in the days and runs on modern machines. Well, if you are annoyed too much of a little clunky gameplay (well, combat is not the best A-RPG sytem you can imagine), it's not your game. But if you happen to like old cars then you know that all the flaws are forgivable for the experience that you can't get elsewhere.
Gdyby system sterowania nie był taki dziwny a możliwość zapisu dostępna w każdej chwili, to nic tej grze nie brakuje. Niestety te dwie rzeczy sprawiają, że odechciewa mi się w to grać. A szkoda, bo fajny humor.
I know we are 20 years on, but I have tried this on two different platforms (iOS and Steam Deck) and encountered catastrophic bugs in both cases. I can't even get past character creation on the deck. The game just goes into an eternal load screen. If this doesn't run on deck that's fine, but it should be labeled as such. Until it's fixed or updated info-wise it's a big thumbs down for me.
Слушай сюда. Ты ИЗБРАННЫЙ. Не отворачивайся, не делай вид, что это не про тебя. Про тебя. Ты ИЗБРАННЫЙ из ИЗБРАННЫХ, ты тот самый ИЗБРАННЫЙ, об ИЗБРАНИИ которого ИЗБРАННО шептались ИЗБРАННЫЕ старцы. Ты ИЗБРАН. Тебя ИЗБРАЛИ. ИЗБРАНИЕ твоё ИЗБРАННО, ИЗБРАННОСТЬ твоя ИЗБРАННА, и других ИЗБРАННИКОВ на эту ИЗБРАННУЮ должность нет, я проверял список ИЗБРАННЫХ лично. Древнее пророчество гласит, что в эпоху, когда видеоигры утонут в пафосе и серьёзных лицах, явится ИЗБРАННЫЙ. И этот ИЗБРАННЫЙ - ты, Звёзды сошлись над ИЗБРАННОЙ твоей головой. Планеты выстроились в ИЗБРАННУЮ линию. Все знаки указывают строго в одном направлении: на иконку Steam на твоём ИЗБРАННОМ рабочем столе. Ты должен сыграть в The Bard's Tale. Это твоё ИЗБРАННОЕ предназначение, это то, ради чего ты был ИЗБРАН ещё до рождения, ради чего твои родители когда-то встретились ИЗБРАННЫМ вечером, ради чего разраб вообще выпустил эту игру. Он знал, что когда-нибудь придёт ИЗБРАННЫЙ. Он ждал именно тебя, ИЗБРАННОГО. Бремя ИЗБРАННОСТИ тяжело, я понимаю. Многие ИЗБРАННЫЕ до тебя пытались отказаться от ИЗБРАНИЯ, спрятаться от ИЗБРАННОСТИ, переехать в НЕИЗБРАННЫЕ края, побриться налысо и уйти в монастырь для НЕИЗБРАННЫХ. Не помогает. Пророчество всё равно постучится в дверь кельи и вежливо напомнит ИЗБРАННОМУ, что он так и не прошёл The Bard's Tale. Так что давай уже, ИЗБРАННЫЙ. Открывай Steam. ИЗБРАННАЯ судьба ждёт.
Due to a control breaking bug this game is sadly unplayable at the time of writing on most linux systems including the steam deck
Hidden gem right here. Loved the dry humor from Tony Jay (narrator) and Cary Elwes (the Bard) and the music you have to save for your playlist.
Selling now
See how fast this game is selling right now — estimated copies and revenue per day from recent review growth.
Players by region
Where this game's players are, estimated from review languages.
Players also reviewed
The games this title's players most often review too — audience affinity.
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