Riot Games gave me the chance to view an exclusive early preview of Bandle Tales, their upcoming Yordle-centric crafting adventure game. After the exciting sneak peek at what’s to come, I got the chance to interview Lazy Bear Game’s Creative Director and Co-Founder Nikita Kulaga as well as Riot Forge Creative Director Rowan Parker, who gave me exciting insight into LBG and Riot Forge’s process when making a game like Bandle Tales.
The Bandle Tales preview opened with the game’s tutorial, where some of the game’s wonderful humor was displayed alongside the basic introduction to crafting and farming in Bandle City. I asked the team about the game’s limitations on placing objects and what the player’s housing situation was, and they immediately answered by whipping out our protagonist’s magical backpack.
In Bandle Tales, your player home and crafting area are larger on the inside backpack and the magical carpet you roll out to craft on. This placeable-player-home is just the first in a series of uniquely whimsical mechanics present in Bandle Tales, which players can use to make themselves feel at home in any part of Bandle City. Following an explanation of how the backpack system worked, I watched Vlada Redko (associate producer of Lazy Bear Games) play a restaurant mini-game where glowing bananas were served to hungry Yordle customers.
LBG then took me on a tour of the many different locations in Bandle, including Gadgeton and Inspiration Isle, and showed me another cool minigame in the form of a party. Nikita and Rowan emphasized the importance of strategic party planning to get the most out of the shindig.
It was hard to grasp the amount of craftable decorations, crafting stations, and other objects shown to me, each one requiring players to work down the deep skill tree and discover the recipes for making them. I could tell Bandle Tales was going to be a great game for the collect-a-thon and farming enthusiasts, with so much to see and do that boredom is never an option.
I was absolutely blown away by the gameplay Lazy Bear Games and Riot Forge showed me, and I was eager to jump into my questions.
By now, Lazy Bear has proven itself as a studio with visually impressive and highly creative titles like Graveyard Keeper and Swag and Sorcery. What was the process of getting ‘the job’ with Bandle Tales? Did the Riot Forge team approach the studio directly?
Rowan: Yep, that’s it. It’s as simple as that. I played Punch Club. I played Graveyard Keeper. Not only are they great games, but the guys have a really good sense of humor. I think if you’ve played their games, you know they have a quirky sense of humor. I liked Graveyard Keeper in particular, so I reached out to them and asked “Hey, would you maybe be interested in making a game with us?” and they were nice enough to say yes.
And when you reached out to Lazy Bear, did you already have a game idea in mind?
Rowan: No idea, no. We never have a pre-planned game idea in mind when we reach out to studios. We reach out like “Hey, I love and respect the things you do, what would you make if you wanted to make something?” and then we start talking about the idea.
Nikita: We had a couple of ideas of what we wanted the game to be, and we just stopped at this idea of Yordles and Bandle City. We found it quite unique and found it the perfect place to make everything that we like about crafting, storytelling, and jokes.
Rowan: I think the thing that I appreciate as well is that we get to leverage your expertise as well from Graveyard Keeper. You guys made one of the best lifestyle games, so you’re responsible for the innovations we have in Bandle Tale. Like with the backpack, you can take your whole base with you and move it around. Usually, when I play games like this, I feel like I have to walk further and further from my base as the game goes on. So being able to take your whole base with you is kind of handy, and it is a shortcut having to walk so far.
Something we’ve seen from games like Ruined King and Song of Nunu is the way Riot Forge’s partner studios greatly expand on the world of Runeterra, fleshing out the setting both visually and with new lore and stories. How closely did Riot’s greater lore team work with you when designing the world of Bandle City?
Rowan: Ultimately, the team is me on Forge, and we’ve forged connective tissue to lore and to Riot. I think the reason Forge games are so watertight on lore and true to the IP is that I myself spend oceans of time-consuming hours reading League’s lore. Also, everyone else on the team helps and supports studios like Lazy Bear. We don’t just leave them on their own to figure it out because that’s not fair. As far as Bandle Tales goes, it’s much lighter on story and heavier on gameplay and systems compared to titles like Ruined King.
I know that development can sometimes be a nightmare. Did you run into any big setbacks or hurdles during the development of Bandle Tale?
Rowan: Nikita, what’s your favorite?
Nikita: My favorite was the first year of development when we decided to completely change the concept. But I think it made the game better and much more unique.
Rowan: Yeah, the focus on crafting and to really go deep on crafting with the overlapped systems. I think it really added focus to the style and I think that’s why you guys thought up things like the backpack and the overlapping carpet, I think it really added focus to crafting.
As for my last question: Who is your favorite Bandle Tales character? Who is your favorite league champion?
Nikita: My favorite Bandle Tale character is probably Righty, the talking sock. He’s not a Yordle, but he’s cool. As for League champs, I really like Teemo, but as a player, my favorite champ is probably Kog’Maw.
Rowan: In Bandle Tale, I’m glad we put so much into Tristana. Tristana isn’t a character who gets a lot of time in the spotlight usually, so being able to have Tristana take the lead on some of the story parts and interact with Rumble and interact with Teemo is great. Seeing the Yordles bounce off of each other is fun, but with Tristana in particular, I’m glad we were able to give her some more showtime. For League, I’m a Jax main, actually. I have Godfist Jax as my wallpaper right now; I’ve been playing Jax for a long time.
Given Rowan’s predilection for Jax, I think we can safely assume that there might be a Jax-centric Riot Forge title at some point.
Bandle Tale will be released on Wednesday, February 21, 2024, for Nintendo Switch and PC platforms via Steam, GOG, and the Epic Games Store and is available to preorder now.
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