More and more I'm realizing just how much I love tactical rpgs. The ability to take your time and plan out your moves is very relaxing despite some of the incredibly tense situations you're put in. This is especially true in The Banner Saga. In this game the odds are almost always against you. There are many very tough battles and a lot of very tough decisions to make. That said, this game does feature a very clever combat system that is quite enjoyable once you get the hang out it. And although the story is quite bleak the characters and decisions you make will really get you drawn into this wonderful experience.
The story has things looking more and more like the end of days. You have three species of characters; humans, varl and dredge. The varl are gigantic, about four times bigger than the humans. A long time a go the two species had been at war but the appearance dredge force them to unite. The dredge appear to be a robotic species and little is known about them. The humans and varl have defeated them twice before but this time their numbers seem relentless. What makes the story much more personal is the characters you meet and the choices you are faced with. Choices such as who to let join your caravans, how to handle tension between clansman, and what tactics to take when dredge appear.
The tactical combat system featured in The Banner Sage is fairly easy to learn but provides for incredibly challenging and rewarding gameplay. Battles take place on standard flat square grids with a little variety forced by the limited starting positions. Once the battle has started the player and enemy will always rotate turns unless someone is down to just on character. This is really interesting as its a valuable strategy to keep enemies weaken but not kill them. The strength stat determines how much damage you can deal and it doubles as your health. This makes The Banner Saga on of the most realistic RPGs because as characters lose health they become weaker. Armor reduces the amount of damage that can be done to a characters strength. Go after armor to make it easier to hit characters but risk them doing more damage. You also have willpower to either activate special abilities, enhance standard attacks, or gain extra movement.
As you defeat enemies and make smart decisions you're rewarded renown points. Renown is extremely valuable as you need it to buy food, items, and promote your allies. If you ever don't have enough food to feed your caravan at the end of each day you'll lose clansman and fighters from starvation. Also you won't want to rest and recover morale when you know you'll going to lose people. You can equip one item per character and the higher their level the better the equipment you can give them. Some items give you extra strength or willpower after every turn, while resting, or after a kill. Promoting your allies not only lets them equip better items but is essential for raising their stats and making them more useful in combat. You'll first need to get a set number of kills before you'll be able to promote them.
This is just a wonderfully unique videogame bursting with personality. The visuals have a very stylized look and fit the world perfectly. The story and the choices you have to make really draw you in and make you vested in the well being of your caravans. The combat system is super polished and really rewards clever tacticians. I only wish it kept going but thankfully this is just the first chapter of a trilogy. Also this kind of game highly promotes being replayed to try and make better decisions and have more prosperous run-throughs. I really can't think of anything I don't love about this game. After playing it on both PS4 and PC I highly recommend sticking to PC over consoles as this was clearly designed to be played with a mouse and keyboard. Either way don't let this masterpiece slip by.