The Banner Saga - Impressions @ Rock, Paper, Shotgun

Rock, Paper, Shotgun share their experience with The Banner Saga in and impressions article.

That said, I did have a few quibbles – mainly stemming from a clearly work-in-progress interface. Ordering anyone to do anything took multiple clicks and further “are you sure?” confirmation clicks – but when time is ticking down, every second counts. At one point, I actually lost a unit because my final click was one milisecond too late. That was exceedingly frustrating. On top of that, selecting special skills felt similarly clunky, forcing me to click on the space around a character instead of the character itself, then choose a skill, then pick a target and finally, mercifully hit something – when, in fact, simply targeting someone and picking whether I wanted to use a normal or special attack would’ve made a lot more sense. But Stoic showed me images of the new interface ideas it’s currently tweaking, and they seem much, much, much, much better.
I must admit to initially being worried that Banner Saga – with its silky smooth Disney-style visuals making raucously passionate love to my eyeballs – was just a pretty face. Playing it, though, pretty much obliterated that fear. If Stoic can maintain this standard of quality, it could have something really special on its hands – a mixture of ocean-like tactical depth and frantic mid-match pacing that feels impressively different. I’ve got high hopes, anyway, and November’s right around the corner. Winter is coming. But, you know, hopefully in a good way.

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I should point, just because the title doesn't make it very clear, that he tried (and talked about) only the multiplayer side of the game.

Ahh, my very first Kickstarter, and I still have no idea what this game is truly about.

I personally don't give a frog's fat arse about the multiplayer, but at least I didn't spend much money on it. Can't go too wrong.

Originally Posted by Capt. Huggy Face
Ahh, my very first Kickstarter, and I still have no idea what this game is truly about.

I personally don't give a frog's fat arse about the multiplayer, but at least I didn't spend much money on it. Can't go too wrong.

'Twas my second Kickstarter, again for not too much money. It's worth noting that what RPS was talking about is essentially the combat subsystem from the single-player game, ripped out into a stand-alone piece of software with a human opponent standing in for the AI. So observations about control UI and tactical depth are still on-point for the single-player experience.

Plus, any concrete information about how well Stoic is executing on their vision tells us something about how likely the final product is to meet their goals. So far, it sounds like they know what they're doing, which is promising.

Pledged $10 based on the art style alone. And it's turn based. Don't think I'm goingto be too disappointed. Just looked at my Kickstarter page. I've backed 13 projects now.

Originally Posted by Capt. Huggy Face
Pledged $10 based on the art style alone. And it's turn based. Don't think I'm goingto be too disappointed. Just looked at my Kickstarter page. I've backed 13 projects now.

if it's turn based, why was the reviewer complaining that he lost a unit by clicking 1 millisecond too late?

Originally Posted by wolfing
if it's turn based, why was the reviewer complaining that he lost a unit by clicking 1 millisecond too late?

Apparently there is a 45s timer to make your decisions (in MP at least), it's described pretty clearly in the actual article.