Little Big Paradox

Gamereactor UK has put together a quick write-up of Paradox Interactive's recent press event in New York City, during which we first learned about Mount & Blade: With Fire and Sword, King Arthur: The Role-playing Wargame II, and a few other titles. Apparently they'll also be publishing a Majesty-based tower defense game:
One of CEO Fredrik Wester's favourite game of recent times was Mount & Blade: Warband, a game he has played more than 120 hours of (as per his Steam log), mainly in the multiplayer also gets an expansion of sorts. Mount & Blade: With Fire and Sword started out as a mod for Mount & Blade, but with the help of Mount & Blade developers TaleWorlds it is now a standalone product that builds on the fundamentals and engine of Warband, but adds firearms, new maps, a new multiplayer mode called Captain where up to 14 players, each commanding a squad do battle, as well as several enhancements of the siege mechanics.

Another new announcement was Defenders of Ardania - the next game set in the lighthearted fantasy world of Majesty. The game offers up a slight variation on the tower defence genre, as you will also produce your own troops to march across the board to confront your opponent. It's definitely one of the more casual titles in the Paradox line up for 2011, but it still has enough depth to stand out in a rather crowded genre.

Last week Paradox announced that they are once again teaming up with Hungarian Neocore Games for King Arthur II, sequel to King Arthur: The Role-playing Wargame. A mix between real-time strategy and role-playing is what's on offer. There are lots of enhancements on the old game, but perhaps one of the more intriguing ones is the addition of air units. The new engine will also allow battles with up to 3000-4000 units and dark story of a crippled king with a wound that won't heal and a country that has fallen apart is an interesting fictional take on the legend of King Arthur and his knights. The game is still early in development so it wasn't shown in playable form at the event, but the developers are aiming to have a playable build at E3 and are targeting a release late in 2011.