Brian Fargo tweets the announcement of The Bard's Tale IV, a new installment in the classic RPG series, later noting that this year marks the 30th anniversary of the first Bard's Tale. He also directs us to more details on IGN, where they say InXile Entertainment plans a Kickstarter to support development. Here's word on what will me familiar and what will be new this time around:

From a story perspective, players will be returning to Skara Brae, where it all began. But on the gameplay side of things, Fargo is planning a deviation.

"Traditional turn-based combat," as Fargo calls it, bases turns on varying factors, creating battles in which different characters attacked at different times, often alternating between opposing sides. But in The Bard's Tale IV, teams attack all at once. This increases the pace of the combat, and allows for a different set of tactics than the traditional system might allow.

"There will be plenty of combat diversity and depth," Fargo said. "You look at something like Hearthstone, for example. It's sort of that going back-and-forth process, and you see the complexity and detail and strategy and nuance that can happen. It's really an amazing system. I love those modern influences. I took a lot away from that, and see things we need to do with our combat system."