It shouldn’t, in essence, be this enjoyable-it should aim to be more harrowing-and it’s this that detracts, ironically, from the narrative that is unfolding. It makes for a more streamlined experience, one that turns out to be more engaging, but there was a graceful monotony to combat in the first game, a feeling that is lost this time round. Characters will appear, Dredge will lurch from the darkness, dialogue will play out, and the environment will shift opening up new, previously inaccessible areas. But, in The Banner Saga 2, narrative is better integrated into the combat. Through its combat, The Banner Saga (2014) gave you, however small, some insight into the situation-it managed to convey something of your party’s plight. In the case of that first game, though, he’s wrong. Tom Bissell, in his book Extra Lives: Why Videogames Matter (2010), spoke about challenge being antithetical to narrative, a barrier to both the progression of story and emotional investment. Life is shitty for these people and you will get, at the very least, some sense of it. It felt arduous, you felt tired playing it, and it compounded the feelings that were wrought from the game in its narrative stretches. This combat was routinely criticized for its repetitive nature but, to me at least, it was a beautifully if heftily-designed creation. But there was a crushing inevitability to a blow wrought by the Dredge, that moment of impact given more meaning by the slowness of everything else occurring around you. You’d chip away incrementally at the armor of your enemy, laboring to maneuver your characters about the grid. The turn-based nature of combat stretched time, dragging out the skirmishes. That first game’s battles, too, were a nightmare. Depression was built into a system that rarely gave you an opportunity to rectify the situation. And morale would slip not only when you lost fighters and clansmen, but also as your decisions adversely affected the plight of those who were now dependent on you. Resources would dwindle as your party trudged through the thick snow, a ticking timer to starvation. The first entry in The Banner Saga series did slog extremely well. ĭecision-making is woven into the tapestry of play These characters grow, and when they die, you genuinely care for the loss of their personality. Yet, in spite of the potential limitations that framework might present, The Banner Saga series goes beyond the seemingly unavoidable artifice of the genre to deliver an experience in which you feel for the characters. These are tactical RPGs, a genre famed for its stringent compartmentalization rather than emotional resonance. Stoic, the studio behind The Banner Saga series, has made an odd choice in genre for laying out such a complex and fluid world, and one susceptible to change. Decision-making is woven into the tapestry of play and it finds meaning in the story that unfurls before you. Those choices are there in the dialogue, in the small esoteric details of conversation, in the events that unfold, and in the combat that ensues. There’s an inevitable doom to the proceedings but your choices will give those that follow you a chance, at least. It’s delivered in a sigh, an exhale, and carries with it the weight of responsibility you bear-not all of those entrusted to your care will make it through the ordeal. This is what you’re told at the outset of The Banner Saga 2.
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