I get the impression it wasn't even properly implemented, as the NPCs lining the hall looked more like they were partying than enduring an attack outside on two fronts.

One of the weakest consisted of a besieged greathall with a room-long firepit, where I outwitted the AI by staying put and watching as they idiotically ran through the flames. My favorite maps were the ones where I found myself having to work around crevasses cutting through the grid, while others involved little more than barrels strewn across the map, seemingly randomly. Sometimes a harrowing battle can end with the death of an enemy leader at other times I found myself struggling to clear away snow while Dredge beat on me.Ģ0 Images As for the obstacles, they're only occasionally used to good effect. Battlefield BarriersTheir associated tactics find their stride on the new combat maps, which break up tidy strategies by altering victory conditions or forcing you to plan combat around obstacles both indestructible and destructible. Bog people and their bears and a nasty entity that resurrects your fallen comrades and pits them against you enrich the tactical possibilities further. Or consider the 'Horseborn' centaurs, some of whom can trample distant enemies and still ride out of danger on the same turn.

Take the new Tracker class, which can disappear on the battlefield and then unleash a stunning attack that rips away an opponent's armor. It keeps to the excellent design of the original, in which your heroes duke it out with the guys on the other side of the field, but it avoids its predecessor’s slump into monotony by introducing new units for both friendlies and baddies. “The strength of the turn-based combat fully satisfies where the story does not. Sometimes it even gets downright trippy, and the world breaks in ways I never would have imagined two years ago. In contrast to the 2014 original’s reliance on gray mountains and dark conifers, The Banner Saga 2 takes us into places like russet deciduous forests where creepy villagers skulk beneath the canopy, into caverns where Lovecraftian horrors lurk, across swamps with self-resurrecting bears, and over sprawling plains where centaurs hunt with spears and flails. It's partly because of him that the surrounding tragedies don't feel quite so stifling as before, as his gruffer outlook keeps the melancholy at bay and allows some of remaining wonders of dying world to shine through. Mountains No MoreHe is, in a sense, the right kind of man for this unforgiving world. By the end, Bolverk effectively becomes the main character, and his rough-edge tale of transformation cuts more deeply than those of his counterparts. He and his loyal shieldmaiden companion Folka are in it for the gold, which means it's just as much in character when they leave poor refugees to their fate or help them out in the expectation of an advantage. He accidentally hits comrades in battle during his berserker rages. Bolverk is the kind of guy who can end up killing his (incredibly useful) friends over drunken insults. At least half of the story follows Bolverk as he leads his own caravan in Oregon Trail-style sequences away from the menacing Dredge, and The Banner Saga 2 ends up the better for it. Enter Bolverk, a hulking Varl who runs a mercenary outfit and who allegedly crafted the handles of his twin axes from his own horns. “But both Rook and Alette are both too charitable for this world.

The banner saga 2 deluxe edition