Banner Saga 2

Banner Saga 2 picks up right after the satisfying but definitely open-ended finale of Banner Saga 1. That goes for every aspect of the production: story, gameplay, production values, everything fits neatly into the holes of the first part of the trilogy. The Banner Saga 2 does an excellent job continuing the story, raising the narrative stakes and catching us up with our favorite characters and introducing great new dramatis personae. It maintains the evocative art style and contains some of my favorite god stones. All these things are good things. But this sequel only does an ok job expanding the gameplay. A whole new category of characters is introduced. There is a new category of skill you can invest your level points into, which gives you percentages to inflict critical damage or completely avoid incoming damage. A bunch of new artifacts are there. The classes can now learn more than one special ability. And that’s it. Everything else about the tactical combat and the VN style travel mechanic is the same. Should you make the commitment to the whole trilogy then? To my mind, that entirely depends on your engagement level with the story. If you want to find out what happens to our plucky collection of horned giants, psychotic vikings and shady Gandalf wannabes, The Banner Saga 2 will happily tell you the Dark Middle Chapter, and do a good, at times even great, job of it. If you are here for gameplay experience that expands upon the first game in interesting and engaging ways, you might have to switch franchises. TLDR: If you remember your time with The Banner Saga 1 with affection, do not miss this one. If you didn’t, don’t bother. If you haven’t played Part 1 and are interested in Part 2, start at the beginning like a normal person.

Great artwork. Combat system has been improved. The story being in the middle of the saga is a bit, in the middle, as most such stories will be. The game ended somewhat quickly with battles that were somewhat anti-climatic. Overall pretty good and will be interested to see the 3rd addition to the series.

Good visuals, strong tactic, good story, can't wait for banner saga 3 and multiplayer mode

The story of this game takes off exactly where the first one ended. Therefore it is in my opinion required, to play the first game before this one, otherwise you won't understand much of the story. Like its predecessor, this game has a great narrative that is set inside an interesting world. Throughout the game you have to make decisions that will massively change the outcome of the story. The battle system is also very well made. It is round-based and really challenging. It hasn't changed much from the first game, but that's not a problem, since it was already pretty good. If you enjoyed the first game, then you will like this one, too.

An otherwise pretty good game - not that it's the best tactical strategy game around - the boring and tedious end-fight kill all the joy you ever got out of the previous hours of gaming. It's unrewarding and takes too long, needing you to play totally defensive while kiting your one enemy. And retrying the fight is even more gruesome, forcing you to watch the drawn-out story sequence over and over again. That really is the worst part about that: that this is not skippable... It's a shame, really. I can only hope part 3 does not include such a miserable "mission".