Hi everyone, work on the Director’s Cut is going very well, and we’re excited to share more about our progress today. As you’re aware, we were acquired by Microsoft late last year, and they’ve been a truly amazing partner, providing us access to new resources and refinement processes, and allowing us to take the time we want to ensure we make this the definitive edition of The Bard’s Tale IV. The good news is that the wait won’t be that much longer, as we’re targeting late summer for a Steam release of the Director’s Cut on Windows, Mac, and Linux.

We’ll be sharing more news on specific dates in the near future, but for now here is a video on the changes from the game’s Creative Director, David Rogers, detailing what you’ll find in this new Director’s Cut.

https://youtu.be/LkJzadDLGa8

Hello everyone,

We have just released a hotfix regarding the following issues:

• Loading time improvements. These improvements are targeted for people with non-Solid State Drives.
  
• Reported push block puzzle issues with free movement are now resolved.

We also have an additional known issue:

• If player charges characters on elevated platforms or cliffs, there is a chance that the combat will start off-grid or the player will not be aligned properly to the combat. We are working to address this in the next full patch.

Thanks for helping us to continue improving the game for everyone. Please keep letting us know if you are still having any issues with The Bard's Tale 4: Barrows Deep.

The team at inXile

Hello everyone!

Today, we are pleased to bring you the Second Sight Update, which brings a number of requested features (most notably an option for “save anywhere and anytime”) and a host of fixes. It also brings our previously mentioned Legacy Mode features, which we’re thrilled to finally deliver, especially to our long-time fans of the series! For details on this patch, please check out the notes below.

Work on the game continues. Certain major milestones, such as a revamped inventory system and controller support, are still on their way. That is in addition to continued improvements and optimization based on your feedback.

In addition to the above, we also continue to work on the Mac and Linux versions, as well as a few other nice things that we can´t talk about yet. Please let us know what you think of the update, and we look forward to talking with you again soon.

The team at inXile


What is Legacy Mode?

With the Second Sight update, we’ve added a whole suite of options to customize your play experience that we call Legacy Mode. You can play the game like a modern first person adventure or wind back the clock, turn off auto-mapping, activate grid based movement, and step your way through our dungeons and overworlds like you’re back in the 80’s.

Legacy Mode Features:

• Grid Move (BETA): You can now play using grid-based movement! This feature has been a long time coming and we worked hard to get that classic game feel while still working with all our more modern elements and overworld design. You’ll have the option to grid move with full free look enabled at all times or play in a more classic mode in which your camera is rotated for you as you walk forward along the grid. There's still polish on this feature left to do, but rather than holding back for longer we wanted those of you who are passionate about this feature to try it out and let us know what you think, and what you feel the most important improvements to the system would be. Let us know what you think on the forums!
  Note: For those turning this feature on in an pre-patch 4 save game, you’ll notice many NPC’s aren’t looking directly at you in the world while moving on the grid. We adjusted NPC’s to better align with the movement grid, but to make that change propagate in existing games it’d require wiping out the NPC’s save data That would reset things such as their inventory, which we wanted to avoid at all costs.
  
• Save Anywhere: This has been our most requested feature. You can now save the game (almost) anywhere in the game. Save through the pause menu, or use F5 and F9 to quick-save and quick-load. While save anywhere is active, you cannot consume luck-stones for bonus experience. A small price to pay.
  Some areas have been blocked off from saving for technical reasons, and if that’s the case you’ll see a prompt appear letting you know that’s the case. Usually just moving somewhere else in the room or level will resolve that issue.
  
• Auto-Resurrect: For an extra bit of difficulty, you can deactivate auto-resurrect. This will cause characters who fall in combat to only resurrect upon finding a luck stone. Food will also not revive characters while this is active.
  
• Perma-Death: This mode is only for the bold. If your entire party is incapacitated, your save file is permanently deleted. Don’t say we didn’t warn you. This option cannot be changed once it’s been set and can only be set on new games.
  
• Enemy Reactions: Deactivate enemy reactions to stop enemies from chattering and taunting.
  
• Auto-Mapping: You can deactivate auto-mapping entirely, resulting in all your maps appearing black with no icons. Break out your graph paper.
  
• Mini-Map: You can toggle how prominent your mini-map is on screen. You can set it to always show, only show while your adventurer’s HUD is up, or never show at all.
  
• Show Waypoints: Toggle waypoints on or off, if you hate being told where to go.
  
• Show Enemies On Map: Toggle weather or not enemies appear on your map and mini-map, for an extra challenge.
  
• The A-Team is back: You can spend 8 mercenary tokens at Mercy the mercenary vendor to hire 6 adventurers who are fully geared for war and ready to rock.
  Brian the Fist, the Fichti Paladin
  El Cid, the Dwarven Fighter
  Markus, the Elven Bard
  Sir Grady, the Trow Rogue
  Merlin, the Einarr Conjuror
  Omar, the Elven Magician
  
• Adventurer Re-Spec’ing: By spending a mercenary token at the Review Board, you can refund an adventurer's skill points.
  
• Legendary Difficulty: A 4th difficulty tier has been added, increasing enemy difficulty by 100% over normal mode.

Balance Changes:

• The caster of All Together is now able to cancel the order, taking all his/her allies out of the stance that he/she granted them.
  
• Increased the damage per spell point dealt by the Veteran passive to +3, up from +2.
  
• The Veteran skill now grants max spell points.
  
• Guardians, when absorbing re-directed physical damage, now benefit from 1/3rd of their total armor.
  
• Increased the damage per spell point dealt by Spell Blade to +2, up from +1.
  
• Several skills in the Cleric tree now grant bonus spell points, to help Rogues and Fighters spec into Cleric.
  
• Mangar’s Mallet’s Spell Point cost has been increased to 8, up from 6. Its damage has been reduced to 1.5x your intelligence, down from 2.5x your intelligence. Trust me, its still an amazing value.
  
• Oscons Halt Foe is now battle ready. Its Spell points have been reduced to 5, down from 8. Its cooldown is increased to 4, up from 1. Basically, its cheaper to pull off, but you can’t do it as often.
  
• All Together’s cooldown has been decreased to 2, down from 3.
  
• If a warrior is wielding a buckler and grants Deflect to his allies via All Together, those allies will benefit from the Stubborn Defense passive.
  
• The damage ratio on Dueling Stance is increased to 0.8x your strength, up from 0.5x
  
• Dueling Stance’s opportunity cost has been reduced to 1, down from 2.
  
• Wayland’s Watch is now Battle Ready, while its cooldown has been increased to 2, up from 1.
  
• Deflect is now Battle Ready.
  
• Cultists Wizards have had their intelligence doubled, making their arcane barrages deal more damage, and their focus harder to break.
  
• The loot weight on Black-jacks and Razor Strops has been doubled, making them appear more often in chests.
  
• Blood Pact’s change to trigger has been increased to 50%, up from 30%.
  
• Last Breath has its cooldown increased to 3, up from 2.
  
• The damage of Passing Slash has been increased.
  
• Elixirs of Focus now grant a flat intelligence increase instead of a % based one. This will benefit low intelligence characters more, and high intelligence characters less.
  
• Lesser elixirs grant 4/8 intelligence.
  
• Greater elixirs grant 6/12 intelligence.
  
• Arcane Barrage’s damage now scales on a diminishing curve, instead of linearly. This means it’ll do slightly more damage early game, but characters with higher than 20 intelligence will see a gradual falloff in damage-to-intelligence ratio.
  
• Soul Leech can now only trigger 3 times per turn, instead of infinitely.
  
• The Inner Peace passive no longer increases the channel duration of meditate by +1 turns.
  
• Conjurors mark now deals damage equal to 33% your strength, instead of 40%. Additionally, its AOE damage has been halved and it can only be triggered by non-spell attacks. This was done because of how dominant spell spamming was as a strategy, and spells triggering the mark added too much bonus damage without any real coordination with your team.
  
• The 3 buff from vorpal plating are now mutually exclusive. Applying one of those buffs will remove any existing buffs that might be on that adventurer.
  
• Horrifying vorpal plating has its duration reduced to 1 turn, down from 2.
  
• The Rogue’s infiltrator passive no longer hides the entire party. It now hides the rogue and any adventurer’s standing directly to his right or left. This stealth now only lasts 1 turn, down from 3. This was done because infiltrator passive was simply negating too much damage, and there were plenty of ways for the party to effectively deal damage in that time (like razors strop or meditate) that wouldn’t reveal them. Hopefully rogues position at the start of combat, and who you choose to hide, will be more strategic, while still allowing the enemy to get hits in on some characters.
  
• The acidic boon line now works as such:
  
• Acrid now has a 50% chance to apply one stack of rend.
  
• Caustic now has a 100% chance to apply one stack of rend.
  
• Acidic now has a 100% chance to apply one stack of rend. If the target has no armor, it’ll apply the Melting status effect instead, causing them to take bonus damage with each attack.
  
• The Electrifying boon line now works as such:
  
• Jolting now generates a single stack of status each time a non-damaging ability is performed, up to a maximum of 3 stacks.
  
• Shocking now generates 2 stacks of static each time a non-damaging ability is performed, up to a maximum of 4 stacks.
  
• Electrifying now generates 2 stacks of static each time a non-damaging ability is performed, up to a maximum of 6 stacks. Each time an enemy is stunned in this way, there’s a 15% chance to stun the entire enemy team.
  
• All traps now deal true damage, meaning that armored characters can now take meaningful damage from traps.
  
• Fixed an issue where early access and backer reward items, like the Red Boots, weren’t showing interaction FX when they should.
  
• Fixed an issue in which Sundering Smash wasn’t displaying the correct amount of armor it should rend. The damage rent was higher than what was being displayed. The tooltip was fixed to match the higher value.
  
• Torches and the Blazing Star now correctly show their abilities while viewing them in the inventory.
  
• The rusty berserkers horned helmet has been reduced to its intended 1x1 size, down from 2x2
  
• Drunkenly Empowered rhyme of the duotime no longer affects itself
  
• Drinking, while already plastered, will not continue to double your strength with each drink.
  
• Clerics can now target themselves with Change Fate.
  
• The Lunge passive on Elven Boots now only triggers when the owner uses their move ability, and not when moved by others. Additionally, it can only be triggered once per turn.
  
• Poison damage was increased substantially and is now based on the level of the character it’s applied to, instead of being based on the applicators strength.
  
• On Fire status effect damage is now based on the level of the character it’s applied to, instead of the applicators strength. The damage shouldn’t be vastly different for most characters, but you’ll see low strength characters able to deal much more damage with fire, while very high strength characters might see a slight drop in the damage dealt by that status effect.
  
• In light of this change, Crux’s passive has been adjusted to deal only a token, comical amount of damage if he applies it to your own team.
  
• Alguin now has 34 intelligence, down from 86. This means Alguin is much more likely to have his focus broken during Alguin’s Gambit.
  
• Razor Strop had its base bonus damage reduced by 25%, and its base duration reduced to 2 turns, down from 3.
  
• The Razor Strop item had its passive, Finely Honed Blade, fixed so it now correctly increases the duration of Razor Strop by 2 turns.

Other Fixes:

• More improvements to performance and stability
  
• Fixed an issue where viewing the Red Boots tooltip in non-english languages caused a crash.
  
• Fixed the Swiftness, Clear Mind, Fleet Footed, and To Me! Passives to only work while your language was set to English.
  
• The Master Thief passive now works correctly. Burgle to your heart's content. For the record, the chance rob a merchant is set to 40%.
  
• Fixed a bug in which the Rabble-Rouser and Commander passives weren’t properly saving their bonus opportunity if the party member was moved out of the party and back in, or if they gained the skill directly inside character creation.
  
• The master 1-handed weapon skills in the bard’s skill tree will now properly save.
  
• Baedish Mercenaries now correctly benefit from their bonus skill points granted to them by their cultural passive.
  
• There’s now a pop-up window warning you before you pick up the Hungering Blade that this action initiates the end game, and that you may want to complete and side quests before doing so.
  
• Lumbering Strike now reaches enemies 3 spaces away, as advertised in the tooltip.
  
• Your Guild Roster can now hold any number of benched adventurer’s while they aren’t in your party.
  
• Fixed a bug that could result in Fichti party members sometimes unnecessary saving nearby allies from non-lethal damage.
  
• Mercenaries who learn dancing lights during character creation will no longer have that ability forced onto their mastered abilities after level loads.
  
• Fixed several text overlap issues, several of them pertaining to localized text.
  
• The Long Bow’s passive, Blot out the Sun, now correctly reduces the cost of Rain of Arrows from 2 opportunity down to 1.
  
• Fixed several issues involving characters not having a body while not wearing armor. They now correctly show their potato sack cloths when not wearing armor.
  
• Taunt no longer causes enemies to trigger move twice, which resulted in some instances of bleed triggering twice from a single taunt.
  
• Improvements have been made to NPC beards.
  
• The descriptions of the Throw Bomb and To Me! Abilities have been updated to better reflect their functionality.
  
• Cleaned Hutar, Captain Beckwith, and Fatherite Paladin AI so they’re better able to seek you out in combat.
  
• Improvements to character teeth
  
• The Scorcherer no longer appears after his quest has been completed.
  
• Several gameplay options are now correctly quarantined to your save file. Options, such as difficulty, will now be local to your save file. If you have multiple active saves, they’ll each maintain their own difficulty settings.
  
• A new HUD raise/lower sound has been added that’s subtler.
  
• Harmonic Shielding now correctly adds and subtracts armor. There is still a known issue where the UI doesn’t always update correctly, but we confirmed the armor is being applied and so you’ll still benefit from it.
  
• Additional artistic points of interest have been added to Skara Brae Underground.
  
• Fixed several instances of combats starting in or below collision.
  
• Fixed an issue that resulted in dragon’s bile puddles persisting after combat, and having blocking collision that made it hard to move around. Both issues have been fixed.
  
• The Razor and the Source Dagger now correctly synergize with the Spellblade passive.
  
• Fixed a visual bug in which drunkenly empowered Sanctuary score would heal you just before you died, making it looks like a bug, when in fact the damage you took was great enough to kill you through the heal. It’ll no longer show the healing if you’d die as a result anyways.
  
• The Feast and Famine abilities have been fixed to do the correct amount of damage, as advertised. Their tooltips have been updated to display what damage type they deal.
  
• All characters can now wield the Hungering Blade. All practitioner parties can now defeat the mad god.
  
• Fixed an issue where characters would appear incapacitated but have positive health.
  
• You can now talk to Kian regardless of what quest step you’re on.
  
• A Model Quality setting has been added to the options menu
  
• Fixed an issue where the static charge status effect icon would persist after combat.
  
• The bonus focus buff from Elixirs of Focus now correctly last for 2 turns, instead of only one.
  
• Fixed a lock-pick panel in the Glade of Mathan so that you could interact with it.
  
• Fixed several issues relating to status effects not stacking atop each other properly, including Drunken Wayland’s Watch, Drunken Falkentyne’s Fury, and Rend.
  
• You can now view tooltips in the options menu.
  
• Fixed a crash related to winning combat while a Siambra Dhu had an explosive arrow attached to one of your adventurer’s.
  
• Fixed an issue where existing the game and re-opening the game at a certain point in alguins tower would create an invisible barrier, blocking progression.
  
• The Logician Dinner Party quest no longer updates how many books you have simply by moving the books around in your inventory.
  
• Song of Compulsory Cavorting now breaks enemy focus, as intended. When this happens you’ll see the enemy isn’t dancing, but is still stunned as intended. We opted to push this fix without the dancing animation fix rather than leave the bug in.
  
• Several optimization, LOD, and culling fixes in the Forest of inshriach.
  
• Fixed an issue where you could charge enemies right when being spotted, or walking into them, and you’d start combat with the enemies behind you.
  
• Fixed an issue in which Sanctuary Score’s status effect icon wouldn’t be removed if it were removed from enemy damage.

Known major issues

• Important Hotfix Note! We've pushed a hotfix today (11/21/2018) to address certain push-blocks not being traversable in free movement mode. We wanted to get this fix out as soon as possible so you would be able to complete the main quest line. All main-quest dependent push-blocks have been fixed with this hotfix, but sadly 2 optional push-block puzzles remain un-traversable in free move mode. If you encounter push-blocks you cannot walk over in free move mode, you can switch to grid move mode and traverse over them just fine. We’ll work to get these remaining issues fixed soon.
  
• If you attempt to save and load during the end-game credits and re-battle the final boss fight, the game may crash. To avoid this bug please avoid saving during the credits and load your last save game from the main menu instead. You can skip the credits by pressing escape and going to the main menu.
  
• Non-english languages will not re-color or highlight ability keywords. Ex: Battle Ready or Stance.
  
• Attacking a concerned citizen before Jarnels Eyes effects have faded results in bugged materials on the enemy model
  
• There’s a small edge case in which you’re able to transform a goblin into a cultist during the illusory Dalgliesh fight if you’re able to hit both Illusory Dalgliesh and a goblin at the same time before Illusory Dalgliesh has transformed. The bug is aesthetic only, and shouldn’t block completion of the fight.
  
• In the main menu, if you go into the load game menu, hit escape to close that menu, then press escape again, the buttons on the main-menu will hide. You’ll need to just restart the game to proceed at that point.
  
• Purchasing the “Wand of Peace” book from Feargal will not start the Wand of Peace quest as intended. Instead, the quest automatically starts when you enter the Lodge of the Siambra Dhu dungeon.
  
• While on “The Hungering Blade” quest, no waypoints appear to guide you to Mother Nain while in the Baedish Lowlands.
  
• Using the new Save Anywhere feature you’re able to avoid combat with Mangar in Kylearan’s Tower, save/load inside his chamber, and place your game in a bugged state that might require loading a backup save to resolve.
  
• If you right click on an item in your inventory, move your mouse away, right click again, select destroy or split, and then leave the destroy or split confirmation window, then the escape button will not close the inventory and you’ll have to use either I or the close button at the top-right.
  
• Repeatedly pressing Esc during the fade in transition to any NPC conversation, may cause soft lock for players
  
• Trow are wearing ill-fitting boots.

Hello everyone,

We have just released a hotfix to solve the following issues:

• German - Fixed the issue where cogs were unintentionally stacking as a single type versus three different types. The tooltips aren't localized at the moment, however, all new German players will not be blocked. For German players with previous save games, please adventure to Boar Temple and Skyhenge to find additional cogs waiting for you so you can progress your adventures.
  
• Fixed players having a small chance to suffer odd behaviors, including crashes, when using a Practitioner’s Dragon Breath & Conjurorer’s Mark on groups of skeleton enemies.
  
• Fixed an issue with Fairy Powder Bomb that would cause hangs with multiple wave combats.
  
• Fixed an issue with the Zanta fight in regards to killing multiple skeletons in the first turn of combat.
  
• Fixed a crash during combat when stacks of ‘On Fire’ are damaging Yadis and Primeval are also on the grid.

In addition to the fixes, enemy difficulty on hard mode was increased to +60% enemy difficulty over normal mode, up from +40%.

We apologize for the inconvenience. Please keep letting us know if you are still having any issues with The Bard's Tale 4: Barrows Deep.

The team at inXile

Hello everyone!

Today, we are pleased to get you the latest patch for The Bard´s Tale IV: Barrows Deep.

Patch 3 introduces additional enhancements to graphic settings, character art, localization, as well as further addressing remaining issues like ability bugs, optimization of loading times, and stability across the game.

With Patch 3 done, please allow us a few personal words: Here at inXile, we are always committed to making quality RPGs, and we are totally devoted to what we are doing. The Bard’s Tale IV: Barrows Deep is a game that we poured our hearts into, and every single one of us is very sad that the release of the game we are so proud of was overshadowed by performance issues. Of course, we wish that we had caught these things at launch and have been working overtime to correct them as quickly as we can. For those of you affected, we are truly sorry for any bad experience that you might have had.

We hope you will enjoy the changes and if you do, we would be very grateful for a user review if you haven't written one yet. Of course, the same applies if you were forced to write a negative review in the past, but would be so kind to reconsider now if the issues that prevented you to enjoy the game were addressed in the meantime.

Thank you very much for your patience, and your ongoing support. It means the world to us.

With Patch 3 being released, we are now focusing on our original goal of enhancing the game by adding many additional features after launch. Legacy Mode, controller support, and grid movement will only be some of them and we will talk more about those items and more in the near future. Friends of Mac and Linux will also be happy to hear that we are working on those versions as well.

For details on this patch, please check out the notes below:

Stability:

• Improved how our graphics benchmarking determined the correct graphics settings for your system.
  
• Several optimizations for improved performance.
  
• Players who played in non-English languages and encountered issues with placing cogs into gear puzzles and had their save files corrupted should now have working save files again.
  
• Fixed a crash related to using Jarnel’s Eyes in certain dungeons.
  
• Fixed a crash related to skipping the post combat screen after defeating Mangar for the 1st time.
  
• Fixed several combat placement bugs across the game.
  
• Fixed a crash in the Cellars of Kylearan's Tower caused by defeating Mangar and then defeating any remaining fights in the dungeon.
  
• Fixed a bug relating to how push-blocks reset themselves after being pushed into a hole multiple time. They'll now properly reset each time Stone Remembers is sung.
  
• Fixed a crash relating to using Mangar’s Mind Jab in the fight against Mangar.
  
• Fixed several issues relating to certain performance actors not saving properly after escaping to main menu.
  
• Fixed an issue in which players could not access vendors after reloading a save game under some circumstances.
  
• Fixed an issue in which hidey bides wouldn’t work correctly if you exited the game before looting the cache or the cache reset itself.

Gameplay:

• Fixed several issues where certain doors and puzzles were not saving when exiting to the main menu or to desktop.
  
• Fixed a bug that caused Sharp, Keen, and Honed puzzle weapon boons to reduce your damage to 0 when you critically hit with a dagger or a bow ability.
  
• The description of the Wrecking Ball passive has been updated.
  
• Fixed a bug that caused 2-handed weapons to corrupt your characters stats when equipping and unequipping that item after purchasing skills.
  
• Fixed a bug in which the bridge to the Orkan Rookery could get stuck if you ran into it while it was assembling.
  
• Fixed a bug that resulted in Arthur de-spawning if you defeated the ritualists around him, but save/loaded your game before speaking with him.
  
• Fixed several instances in which waypoints were not deactivating when you switched which quest was being tracked.
  
• The Power Rush passive and status effect have a clearer description, and now correctly work with AoE abilities.
  
• Lute of Compulsory Cavorting no longer has question marks in its description and its Drunk effect works properly.
  
• Fixed an issue in the Sentry Tower that resulted in buttons on the 3rd floor getting stuck in the depressed position if you exited the game before they reset themselves.
  
• Removed extraneous waypoints in Castle Langskall.
  
• Fixed an exploit that allowed you to dupe items inside the merchant inventory.
  
• Fixed an exploit in which you could duplicate items via offering statues.
  
• The Guardian passive now has a clearer description of what it's doing.
  
• Fixed an issue with status effects, like On Fire or Rend, stacking from different sources and not correctly calculating the effect. If two status effects aren’t the same strength, they’ll no longer stack on one another, and instead create a new stack.
  
• Fairy Powder Bombs will now play their explosion when they detonate, and will no longer harm your own team.
  
• Lowland Park Whisky now changes your next melee attack damage type to mental damage, as intended.
  
• Traps in the Sulfur Springs are now more lethal.
  
• Fixed a bug in which caltrops could trigger on dead enemies, causing caltrops to not trigger properly on living enemies.

Etc.

• A Sharpness post process effect and slider was added, which allows you to adjust how crisp or blurred the game appears.
  
• Anti-Aliasing & Post Processing settings are now updated when you adjust your Effects Quality in the options menu.
  
• Running the game in borderless window mode will now correctly match your monitor’s current resolution.
  
• Greatly improved the user interface when playing with 4:3 aspect ratio.
  
• Improvements to non-English localized text.
  
• Several graphical updates in Baedish lowlands environment.
  
• Fixed an issue where several settings in the Options menu weren’t properly saving.
  
• Updated the mesh seen in the inspection window for staves and Lowland Park Whisky.
  
• Street signs, offering altars, and elven altars now properly display in the correct language, based on your language settings.
  
• You can no longer choose to not help the Selkie sisters. When destiny calls, you answer.
  
• Fixed several backer quotes in the Main Menu.
  
• Fixed a bug in which the music on the Main Menu would stop playing after completing screen calibration.
  
• Fixed several typos in character dialogue.
  
• Updated how fullscreen tutorials show text in other languages, better accounting for increases in text size after translation.
  
• Adjusted the amount of time subtitles stay on screen.
  
• Fixed several issues relating to localized text over-running its boundaries in the interface.
  
• Added additional audio in a few areas where it was missing.
  
• Updated Fairy Golf music so that it plays through the entire fairy gold arena.
  
• The crafting menu now displays how many of a given item will result from crafting.
  
• Additional decals, statues, and effects added to Skara Brae underground.

Known issues to watch out for until fixed:

• If you escape to the main menu during the final animated scene in the game (the cinematic after defeating the final boss), your save file can get into a state in which you cannot complete the final step of the main quest. To avoid this issue, please allow all the animated scenes to play out without exiting the game.
  
• We found that player’s have a small chance to suffer odd behaviors, including crashes, when using a practitioner’s dragon breath & conjurorer’s mark on groups of skeleton enemies.
  
• Player’s zoning into Skyhenge for the first time have a small chance to experience a crash. This only happens on the first time transitioning into the zone.
  
• Player’s summon creatures that last till the end of combat will create a checkerboard icon on the victory screen.
  
• Tarjan boss fight can be completed without utilizing the hungering blade by using the melting boon from puzzle weapons.This is an exploit and not as designed.

The team at inXile

Hello everyone!

The second patch for The Bard's Tale IV: Barrows Deep is live, and it is a big one. Once again, thank you for all the feedback you provided. We really appreciate it.

In this patch, our team's main focus was continuing to improve optimization of the game across both the GPU and the CPU. We have made some great gains in this area across all quality settings and we will continue to improve it in the upcoming next patch.

We also continued our improvements to loading times. Additional notable fixes in this patch include a resolution to a problem some people experienced during launch where non-ASCII characters in Windows usernames would cause a game crash, UI support for widescreen and non 16-9 aspect ratios, large localization updates across all languages, clean-up pass to the mini-map (including adding save totems to it), lots of ability clean-up and description work, and various balance tweaks.

Moving forward, we are already working on the third patch that will have additional optimization and load time fixes. We expect this to be out in approximately 10 days when this work has been completed.

Beyond that, we will be focusing on additional optimization, fixes, and Legacy Mode. Unfortunately, Legacy Mode will not be part of the third patch as we originally suggested, as this feature is a larger project, and we did not want that feature to reduce the cadence of our updates in the meantime..

For details on this patch, please check out the notes below.

Patch Notes:

• Fixed a crash on launch issue for Windows accounts that contained non-ASCII characters
  
• Optimized lighting and baked lightmaps in Baedish Lowlands, Skara Brae, Inshriach, Castle Langskaal, Mangar’s Tower, Boar Temple, Necromancers Spire, Orkan Rookery, Barrows, and Einaar
  
• Optimized combat lighting to make it less taxing on the GPU
  
• Large optimization pass to reduce unnecessary ticks happening to reduce load on the CPU
  
• Large pass to LOD additional static and skeletal meshes all over the game
  
• Various spelling fixes for typos
  
• Optimization to animation process system
  
• Large group of fixes for combat actions among a variety of enemies that were timing out, creating unnecessary delays. Also sped up attack animations on some slower attacks to improve pacing of combat
  
• Fix to hallowed passive of the Blessed boons line and Red Boots passive to work as the descriptions state
  
• Updated some save totems that weren’t operating correctly and added save totems to the mini-map
  
• Fixed a crash when obtaining a party passive that grants opportunity award during character creation when you had another member in your party that granted an opportunity award already
  
• Fixed a crash with skeletons using Woodsman Chop on someone with counter strike when they would die because of the counter strike
  
• Fixed a random crash that was due to multi-threading
  
• Fix to ensure proper resolution is displayed in windowed fullscreen
  
• Fix for gear puzzles not saving correctly in some languages
  
• Optimization to Unreal blueprint continuation
  
• Fix to unequipping offhand when equipping a 2 handed weapon if Vanguard isn’t active
  
• Fix to Granny Maurag conversation
  
• Consolidated map legend to remove some unnecessary icons
  
• Adjustment to various enemy voicepacks
  
• Fix so players won’t be able to save masteries from one adventurer on another adventurer
  
• Fix for item meshes that weren’t previously showing up when inspected
  
• Fix for end game scenario where Anvil Fist would no longer be a store as his conversation option wasn’t showing up
  
• Fix to prevent arrow keys from selecting disabled dropdown widgets
  
• Fix to a few animations that weren’t looping properly and had a hitch
  
• Fix to subtitles not showing up properly in some instances for human male and female variants
  
• Updated Thomas Hoff mesh so he no longer clips
  
• Fix to Gerund conversation to not auto-trigger at such a large distance
  
• Updated skill tree icons that weren’t unique
  
• Updated Songs of Exploration ability usage so the party HUD will hide after using the ability
  
• Fix for gold sense continuing to trigger on chests that have already been opened
  
• Fix where Tarjan and Zanta camera sequences were missing subtitles
  
• Added effect and sound when Shadow of Mangar spawns in
  
• Fixed a level streaming issue in Iwon Reg where player could see through the world
  
• Fixed an issue where, in rare instances, game could softlock upon interaction with a secret door button in Castle Langskaal
  
• Fix an issue where a UI softlock could occur in rare instances in a cutscene in Castle Langskaal
  
• Fix for Dragonsbile Bomb puddle audio that could persist after combat had ended
  
• Various audio improvements to characters and levels
  
• Fix to Arcane Barrage muzzle flash not cleaning up properly where the particle would stay in the world after combat
  
• Fix to various abilities where All Out Assault wasn’t applying to the entire ability, Storm of Blades damage preview wasn’t working well with multiplicative effects, Razor Strop tooltips displaying incorrect info
  
• Fix where archer’s beat VFX were staying around after an enemy was killed
  
• Various VFX optimizations
  
• Fix for songs of exploration tooltips no longer showing range diagrams that were unnecessary
  
• Fix where Compass of MACO did not, in fact, point north
  
• Updated to setting of view distance for NPCs based on user settings
  
• Updated materials on Ham in Fettercairn
  
• Reduced clutter on mini-map icons
  
• Fix for some enemies like floating wizards and giants when hit by specific damage types freezing their animation
  
• Fixed a performance hang that would happen when certain enemies would trigger caltrops
  
• Updated weapon, item, and armor tooltips to reduce redundant text.
  
• Updated tooltip text (where applicable) to explain that an item can be equipped from an ability
  
• Fix for crash where the player could inspect an item in the character sheet while an item was on the cursor
  
• Moved stat plate locations on giant and wraith enemies
  
• Fix to an issue where it wouldn’t save the location of your masteries after trying to rearrange them.
  
• Fixed an issue with 16:9 monitors that have a greater resolution than 1920x1080
  
• Fix on materials on Father Rythe in Fichti
  
• Added missing audio to various UI elements
  
• Reduced Falkentyne’s Fury damage by 35%
  
• Large amount of fixes to localized text that was showing in an incorrect language
  
• Updated Russian font assignments for handwritten notes
  
• Fixed spot in Castle Langskaal where a player could fall through the world when triggering a combat
  
• Fix for wrecking ball incorrectly showing it would deal 0 damage if the boots weren’t yet equipped
  
• Fix for Dragonsbile Bomb text incorrectly showing amount of turns the effect will last for
  
• Rebuilt lighting in character creation
  
• Fix for a softlock that could occur if your last alive character kills the last alive enemy and themselves with Blood for Blood at the same time
  
• Fixed Sinister Street fog showing incorrectly in quality settings lower than Ultra
  
• Fixed issue where some normal abilities were always showing the range diagram, even if they do not need it
  
• Updated cinematic UI to handle different aspect ratios
  
• Updated UI layouts based on various aspect ratios, including widescreen
  
• Reordered PAK files to help increase loading times across all scenes
  
• Fix for What The River Takes Ghost spawned from combat not saving their state and staying in the world
  
• Fix to notification for when the Wraith is killed to notify the owner to go back to Gate ability from Banish Wraith
  
• Slightly increased difficulty on skeletons and charn skeleton health and power level
  
• Turned of mipmapping for hair alpha cards to prevent beards and hair from disappearing when texture resolution changes
  
• Added some status effect types to determine how a status effect stacks when another status of the same class is added to the combatant
  
• Added internal setting to adjust type of fog being used based on quality settings
  
• Adjusted optimization settings for texture streaming and various texture qualities
  
• Optimizations to animals and ultra dynamic sky to reduce amount of ticks
  
• Updated AI for Cultist Sorcerers to be more active on the combat grid and reduce them not having an action on their turn due to cooldowns
  
• Added ravenous null audio to Duke Kingston’s lair

The team at inXile

Hello everyone!

Today we are releasing the first patch for The Bard's Tale IV: Barrows Deep.

Once more, thank you for your patience and understanding while we continue to resolve all issues you may encounter as quickly as we can. In addition to that, we are also very grateful for all the feedback we have received from you since launch. Please keep sending us your reports and thoughts, it means a lot to us and helps us to hunt down all remaining problems (as well as considering other revisions).

Let's take a more detailed look at Patch 1:

Our primary focus has been to address the topics which most impact your gaming experience, based on your feedback and what we’ve seen pop up during the last few days:

• Crashes
  
• Dropping framerates
  
• Non-functional widescreen support
  
• Unusual loading times on HDDs
  
• FOV slider
  
• Localization concerns

As already stated in the road map we released earlier this week, some of these points are not easy to resolve and require in-depth changes to the game (and subsequent testing). This applies especially to stabilizing framerates, improving loading times, and taking care of resolution issues. Today's patch lays the overall groundwork for fixing these, and you will see more improvements with patch 2, currently targeting Friday 9/28.

While we continue building on that, a number of issues have been fixed in today’s patch. We added a FOV slider, solved some pesky crashes, overhauled some funky skills, and many other things. Please take a look at the complete list of changes to get the full picture:

• Added FOV slider to the options menu
  
• Added ability to delete each save independently
  
• Updated ordering of PAK files to improve loading times up through Skyhenge
  
• Tweaks to volumetric fog in many areas to reduce load on the GPU
  
• Optimization of Kael’s Rudiment VFX to improve performance issues in combat
  
• Fix for puzzle weapons not saving their puzzle state if they were equipped when solved
  
• Fix to puzzle weapon crafting icons to remove stretching issues
  
• Updated materials on some puzzle weapons handles not displaying properly on high, medium, low quality settings
  
• Increased speed of Rain of Arrows enemy animations to reduce slowdown
  
• Fix to a crash when pressing End Turn when the player has an exploding arrow on that would kill them after the turn
  
• Added skill tree icons in subterfuge for lockpick and mastery
  
• Raised FPS cap on smoothing to 260
  
• Fixes to Inner Peace, Mindful, and Quick Thinking to not activate only once
  
• Added windowed mode drop down to replace checkbox
  
• Fix for game softlocking if a tutorial popped up right as a note was read
  
• Fix for electric boon line crash with certain abilities proccing out of combat
  
• Fix for a combatants kill action that could be triggered multiple times and after the end of combat screen which could cause a soft lock, notably with conjurers mark
  
• Fix for activating a standing stone right as combat starts causing a soft lock
  
• Fix for 2 handed weapons with 2 skills that were losing the first skill when level loading or training skills
  
• Fix for issue where combat statuses weren’t being removed after combat
  
• Removed the ability to destroy ink recipes in Mangar’s Tower
  
• Updated Mangar’s horde fight in Mangar’s Tower so traps go away when defeated after save/load
  
• Fix for a fairy golf collision issue in Baedish Lowlands
  
• Audio improvements to final game scene
  
• Removed code that auto sets controller functionality if a gamepad is connected. Gamepad functionality will be added in patch 3
  
• Updated Blessing of Mathan VFX to remove untextured squares
  
• Drunk tutorial should no longer fire off when stepping into a trap
  
• Added aspect ratio adjustments when resolution is changed
  
• Fix for changing between resolution, language, and fullscreen in the options menu causing the game resolution to revert to 1 x 1
  
• Switched Sybale’s background VFX to the rogues set instead of the bards set
  
• Fix for issue where pausing the game in certain (spoilers removed) cutscenes could cause the game to be unresponsive
  
• Updates to floating damage text for readability
  
• Fix for Rabbie’s FaceFX for Snow in Summer song.
  
• Fix for issue where level transitions while dual wielding two main hand weapons would destroy the main hand weapon and dupe the offhand weapon
  
• Fix for Elven wine tooltip to show amount of spell points you generate on use
  
• Small walkability fix in Fichti forest
  
• Fighter’s mana bar shows up now if they have the Veteran passive
  
• Updated traps in base of Song of the Sentry to deal damage to the whole party
  
• Updated text on skill points tutorials
  
• Fix to Harkyn’s Castle and logic puzzle quests to properly complete
  
• Fix to secret doors in Iwon Reg that became impassable after save/load
  
• Fix for an issue where an equipped trinket would duplicate if a consumable trinket was swapped with it
  
• Made the Torr Fion key a quest item
  
• Can no longer spam a lever in Mangar’s tower that would restrict the skulls
  
• Fix for Show North so it’s not useable in combat
  
• Fix for bug where mana was using the current mana value and not the max mana value with certain items
  
• Fix for wraith sub-abilities not respecting mana costs
  
• Update to a combat space in Iwon Reg that was on top of spikes
  
• Fix for an issue in Baedish Forest where there was a chance to get stuck in a combat space

Hotfix:

• Fix for a possible sequence break in the Isle of Stronsea where the player could speak with the selkie sisters before they should be able to.

If you have questions, please do not hesitate to contact us at our support line.

The team at inXile

Hello everyone!

First of all, thank you for your patience and for your ongoing support. We are here to update you on the short-term road map for The Bard’s Tale IV so you can get a sense of what’s coming. We had a few more problems during yesterday’s release then we had hoped for, and we apologize for the inconvenience. We will try hard to solve all of your issues as fast as we can.

One of the biggest concerns has been the delay in delivering the final keys of the game. Both our partners Crowdox and Xsolla faced a situation where these were not distributed as planned and it took them some time to sort it out. Our partners have assured us that all remaining issues should be resolved by today.

We are also aware that some people are experiencing problems with dropping framerates, missing widescreen support, FOV sliders, or unusual high loading times between certain areas. In addition, a small amount of people are encountering a black screen on load. Thank you for all the feedback you have been provided so far, and we want to make sure you see what we are doing with it. Please take a look at our patch notes below for detailed information.

We are working around the clock to solve these issues as soon as possible. Also, we would like to ask you to let us know if there are any other issues that influence your personal gaming experience in a negative way. We have spent a lot of love, time and effort into the development of The Bard’s Tale IV: Barrows Deep, and there is no bigger reward for us than if you are enjoying it.

The team at inXile


Patch notes:

Patch 1 – Est. Friday 9/21

• We’re starting initial work on improving load times to help people playing on non-SSD hard drives. There is more work to be done but it’s a big focus of ours in the near future
  
• Initial work on optimization and framerate improvements.
  
• Auto-detection of hardware and adjustment of quality settings on initial load of the game. While there is currently auto-detection in the options menu, it wasn’t happening automatically. The game defaults to Ultra settings which is likely causing FPS issues for those without high end hardware.
  
• FOV adjustment slider.
  
• Fixing wide-screen monitor support. This is part one of a two part plan.
  
• First is getting the resolution settings working as intended followed by an art pass on the UI elements in patch 2.
  
• Fixes for a few side quests that weren’t triggering as intended
  
• Fix to puzzle weapons where if a puzzle is solved on the weapon while it’s equipped by a player, it will result in the puzzle reverting it’s state to unsolved. As a workaround now, it can be solved in the inventory perfectly fine.
  
• Optimization to Kaels Rudiment that dropped framerate while in combat
  
• Fix in Magnar’s Tower where a lever can be spammed in the shadow combat room that makes a bell hint unreadable
  
• Fix for a softlock if a tutorial pops up when a player reads a note
  
• Falkentyne’s Fury will no longer persist on the players party team after a combat has ended.
  
• Fix where the Strifespear’s abilities don’t play nicely with the Vanguard skill
  
• Update to the save system that will allow players to delete saves as needed.
  
• Fix for a bug where killing Charn Cultists with Falkentynes Fury, which would result in a soft lock.
  
• Fix for spellpoints not updating correctly on the stat sheet when gear is equipped and unequipped.
  
• Fix where in rare instances, activating a standing stone of gratitude before going into a combat can result in a soft lock
  
• Fix for a duping item issue by replacing a non-stackable trinket with a stackable one.
  
• Fix so MACO compass can’t be spammed outside of combat, allowing for a stacked stun chance.
  
• Fix where pausing the game during a cutscene after killing Yadis can cause the game to enter an unresponsive state.
  
• Fix for the wraith where it shows 3 mana before summoning but actually costs 4 mana.
  
• Other smaller fixes

Patch 2 – Est. Friday 9/28

• Continued improvements to load times
  
• Continued work on optimization and framerate. By this patch, we expect to have some solid improvements in place for some areas that have higher than expected hits to your GPU.
  
• Part 2 of wide-screen monitor support. Updating the full screen art and layout of UI elements like the quest text and mini-map to extend to the proper edges of the screen.
  
• Update to the save totem system and adding mini-map markers for where save totems are in the world.
  
• Updating and improving localization in all languages for noted issues and some awkward grammar
  
• Fixes to a variety of abilities to make their effects more clear.
  
• Balance pass to some weapons and abilities after gameplay feedback.
  
• Fix to masteries sometimes not saving their ordering when changing them in the mastery page.
  
• Fix to some sounds not playing in certain parts of the world and in some UI elements
  
• Fix to the party HUD staying open if you use a merchant while party HUD is up
  
• Fix for removing range diagrams from Songs of Exploration where unnecessary
  
• Fix for caltrops not firing off if summoned enemies enter their space
  
• Update to some text spacing and flyouts in combat for readability
  
• Update to map legends and mini-map to remove unnecessary items and improve readability
  
• Fix for health bars showing up in front of giants and some bosses
  
• Fix for some FaceFX issues on characters
  
• Fix for some models not displaying when inspected from the inventory
  
• Fix for some redundant text in the ability tool tips
  
• Fix for gold sense where it doesn’t turn when near a chest after it has been looted

Patch 3

• Additional Loading time improvements
  
• Additional game optimization and framerate improvements
  
• Addition of a Legacy Mode (hardcore mode with grid move, option to turn off mini-map, the A-Team, perma-death, auto-resurrect)
  
• Ability to speed up combat animations
  
• Inventory sorting
  
• Controller support
  
• Continued bug fixes and general improvements

Hi everyone, thanks to all of you for helping to make The Bard's Tale IV: Barrows Deep the #1 Top Selling Game on Steam on its launch day!

In order to access the extras that you received when you pre-purchased or bought the deluxe edition of the game, here’s what you will need to do:

First install the game. Once Bard’s Tale has finished installing, you’ll want to navigate to the directory it was installed to.

1. You can do this either through manual navigation or by right clicking on The Bard’s Tale IV in your Steam Library, going to properties, then navigating to the "Local Files" tab.

2. From here you can click on “Browse Local Files".

3. Once you are in the directory where you install is located, you’ll see a folder Called “Extras".



4. Once in the Extras folder you will see the digital goods you received based on the version of the game you purchased or based on the amount you backed.

We hope you enjoy your digital goodies and The Bard’s Tale IV: Barrows Deep!

Three times before
Did evil's lords
Descend on Skara Brae

And thrice did rise
Brave heroes, wise
To drive them all away

Now comes a fourth
To shackle the north
And enslave the world of men

Thus heroes bold
As in songs of old
Must take up sword again

In dungeons vast
Do these evils past
Their ancient secrets keep

So down we go
To face the foes
That lurk in Barrows Deep

We are thrilled to announce that the second tier has been unlocked!

In other major news, the launch trailer for the game has been released! You can watch it here:
The Bard's Tale IV: Barrows Deep Launch Trailer