Forums > Game Forums > The Banner Saga > Hybrids will be the death of me.

user avatar

Indra was here (20756) on 2/3/2014 12:33 PM · Permalink · Report

I was going to recommend this game, until several hours later. Another game that can't make up its mind on what genre it is. Can't even imagine why they would have the audacity to promote this as a strategy game either.

user avatar

Alex Z (1856) on 2/3/2014 6:12 PM · Permalink · Report

How about the story? Is it any good? Is it similar to King of the Dragon Pass? I was very excited with this game initially, but the reviews were pretty lukewarm, and now I don't know whether I should wait for the next part/s in the saga or get the game now (or not at all). When you say that it's not a strategy game you mean the combat against the Dredge or also the caravan management stuff? And if it's the combat, how often do you fight in this game and how central it is to the entire story?

user avatar

Indra was here (20756) on 2/4/2014 6:46 AM · edited · Permalink · Report

[Q --start Alex Z wrote--]How about the story? Is it any good? Is it similar to King of the Dragon Pass? I was very excited with this game initially, but the reviews were pretty lukewarm, and now I don't know whether I should wait for the next part/s in the saga or get the game now (or not at all). When you say that it's not a strategy game you mean the combat against the Dredge or also the caravan management stuff? And if it's the combat, how often do you fight in this game and how central it is to the entire story? [/Q --end Alex Z wrote--] Story, not even close to King of Dragon Pass. In fact, it bears nothing in common except the Nordic theme. In KoDP, story events are randomly generated. In BS, the story is completely linear. Changes only occur when you make a different story decision. So basically, it's a Japanese visual novel at heart. Yeah, that bad.

Their idea of strategy is the war feature, where your army fights against the Dredge. It's completely optional (the other option being, you enter melee with your heroes, so it's not really avoidable) and it's basically just text of your army versus their and the outcome. That's about it really. And it's all in text. Yeah, that bad.

Fighting is more than often mandatory and quite often. Sometimes you can avoid combat (but why would you when it means leveling up and renown). They also introduced the most amateurish mistake possible in turn based combat. It's so moronic, you'd have to be (obviously) a complete moron to make this mistake: combat turns change alternately between enemies and allies.

Unfortunately if they have 2 units and you have 10 units, those 2 units will have more turns than your 10 units for no apparent reason. It doesn't get more stupid than that. It only changes when there is one unit left, then it's normal turn-based combat. So in that scenario, a single unit can technically whack an enemy unit 2-3 times in a single round. Making hero casualties particularly high. It's even worse in the war feature. If you win in melee combat with your heroes against the enemy, there's an option to chase the remaining enemy combatants. Which results in exactly the same enemy strength as the previous battle, with yours completely depleted, with no chance to change heroes or formations. Only once have I won this two battle scene, resulting in 5 out of 6 heroes being injured. And no adequate reward either. Yeah, it's that bad.

Caravan management? There is no caravan management.

Fighting is central to the story. Unfortunately, all combat scenes are story based, so there are no random events. So, if you opt to avoid a combat scene, that means you'll opt out on a permanent experience/renown chance. Yeah, it's that bad.

Only thing good about the game are the graphics and music. In fact, there is more emphasis on the graphics and the music than there is on the integral gameplay points. This is what happens when adventure gamers start getting ideas.

user avatar

Indra was here (20756) on 2/4/2014 9:29 AM · edited · Permalink · Report

Another annoying feature is the saving games. No manual save games. It's all automatic at certain check points (no one knows when the check points are, mind you, so someone saying this is a good idea is a confirmed twat).

Even worse, more than often it saves after you've made a really bad story decision (e.g. one of your heroes die...just because the dialog says so). The last load game was several days ago, thus you have to play it all over again, which usually also consists of fighting the same battles again.

The game's fine if you don't care what happens and don't have emotional investments in the story. If these game developers consider punishing the player constantly as entertainment, then fakk you too, game developers.

[edit] I really should review this game and give 'em some bad press they deserve.

Someone on Steam reviewed the game and his one paragraph basically sums it up as far as story goes:

"I'm NOT making decisions. I'm playing a random guessing game, in most cases with absolutely no clue on what the consequences of the 4 "choose your answer" alternatives might even be."

user avatar

Alex Z (1856) on 2/4/2014 6:59 PM · Permalink · Report

Thanks for the reply Indra! You've really broke my heart, though. The game was hyped (at least where I first heard about it) as a spiritual successor to KotDP which really excited me since KotDP's developers don't seem to want to make another game despite their great talent. It's sad to see this game turn out like... like most Kickstarter projects :(

P.S. You really should write that review (actually, just copypasting your comment would do). Maybe this will get the developers' attention and they'll fix some things in the next chapters. Otherwise they might get too comfortable in their current position as the infallible martyr of Candy Crush's tyranny and proceed as usual.

user avatar

Game Guesser (28) on 2/4/2014 1:12 AM · Permalink · Report

I looked through all the screenshots but didn't see any real hybridization, so I'm not yet sure what you're talking about. I also didn't see Alfred Chicken, but perhaps those screenshots were mislabeled.

user avatar

Indra was here (20756) on 2/4/2014 6:49 AM · edited · Permalink · Report

That's because I only put in the good/unique screenshots. If I used actual gameplay, 90% of those shots would be story dialogs.

user avatar

Indra was here (20756) on 2/9/2014 7:02 PM · edited · Permalink · Report

Just finished the game. As I expected, the ending was lousy and practically most of the loose ends in the game was answered story-wise...which means it's for an expansion or just plain lazy. After all that freakin time reading useless dialog stories, you'd expect a bit more from the ending. The ending cutscene was only 2 minutes long. Yeah, that bad.