The Banner Saga - a sequel next year

Among the announcements at the VGAs: The Banner Saga is getting a sequel next year, Kotaku very tersely reports. It seemed important enough for a post, even though I can find absolutely no other details.

Okay found one: apparently there was a trailer which hopefully will be posted somewhere, which includied shots of the new, centaur-ish race pictured below.



More information.

Very nice. Hope we can get some more enemy & enemy skill variety this time.

Yes, both of those would be nice. Think i may hold out to play the sequel on Android. I enjoyed the first on PC, but it's always nice to have a truly good game on my tablet. The first one is out on Android now, though I haven't bought it yet. Would be nice to see some more top-notch turn-based games on Android. Touchscreens are a natural for turn-based games.

While the turn-based combat in the first game is simple but very solid, it definitely suffers from lack of variety. If they could also implement an explorable map or even a possibility to choose between at least two destinations for your caravan, the second game would be really great.

Will it also be a phonegame ported on PC?

I really liked the first game; hope the second is even better !

The first one was "meh". I don't know why it got such rave reviews. It was a cartoon with average strategy battles that became redundant. Story was decent, however. Probably not enough for me to buy the sequel until it's heavily reduced.

Originally Posted by joxer
Will it also be a phonegame ported on PC?

The concept of dumbed down and stripped down phone games makes me weep even more than dumbed down and stripped down console games.

SOME games, like say, something like Flow, where it's connect the dots, literally, that works great on a simplistic device. But games like RPGs that should involve a degree of complexity suffer horribly when stripped down.

To me when people say "I want to see this game on tablet" it's the equivalent of saying "I want to see this game gutted to barely be a game, have a horrific UI, and be a coloring book compared to a novel."

Well, on my Android tablet I have the following games running well: Fallout 1 and 2, Jagged Alliance 2, Stronghold 1, Stronghold Crusader 1, Sid Meier's Colonization and Alpha Centauri, Master of Orion 2, Master of Magic several Ultimas, Heroes of Might & Magic 2, Betrayal at Krondor, Ceasar 3, Sim City 2000 and some others I'm forgetting now. Then, there are the Infinity engine games remastered for touchscreens quite well.

There are some heavy hitters in there. Yes, these games were not written with touchscreens in mind. My only point is the only thing holding back deep, quality games being made for touchscreens is a lack of imagination and effort on the part of developers and publishers.

EDIT: Just in case anyone besides myself is interested, I just noticed Shadowrun: Dragonfall (Director's Cut) has been released on Android.

A fantastic game for what it was intended to do. A breath of fresh air in design, with a wonderful score and well-written, atmospheric story for a change. Gameplay-wise I don't get the butthurt in the comments, this is a shorter game and for that length I enjoyed the simple but often very complex (on normal and hard) combat and the caravan management and storyline bits. Kinda like reading a Fighting Fantasy book, really.

I'm glad there are news of the sequel, can't wait where they take the story. I'd pick this game any day over streamlined AAA games made to please everyone and anyone with abysmal writing, laughable characters and a drawn out MMOesque bloat of a gameplay.

Originally Posted by ChaosTheory
The first one was "meh". I don't know why it got such rave reviews. It was a cartoon with average strategy battles that became redundant. Story was decent, however. Probably not enough for me to buy the sequel until it's heavily reduced.

I never really new how important exploration was for me until I played the Banner Saga. I enjoyed the combat, story, and graphics. Still at the end I also felt that I had much less fun than I've had with a lot of lower rated rpgs, and I think it comes down to the total lack of exploration.

Originally Posted by Voqar
The concept of dumbed down and stripped down phone games makes me weep even more than dumbed down and stripped down console games.





SOME games, like say, something like Flow, where it's connect the dots, literally, that works great on a simplistic device. But games like RPGs that should involve a degree of complexity suffer horribly when stripped down.





To me when people say "I want to see this game on tablet" it's the equivalent of saying "I want to see this game gutted to barely be a game, have a horrific UI, and be a coloring book compared to a novel."

Baldurs gate is available on tablets and it's not gutted or dumbed down in the least. Done right,a tablet game can be just as deep and complex as PC game

They always intended for this to be a trilogy (it's right there in the original kickstarter), so this is no surprise.

Originally Posted by blatantninja
Baldurs gate is available on tablets and it's not gutted or dumbed down in the least. Done right,a tablet game can be just as deep and complex as PC game

This is year 2014.
PC games today are not the same as in 1994.
Sure, you'll probably be able to play Drakensang on tablets in 2034., but why should you?

For years now games are suffocated and dumbed down because of phones, tablets and consoles.
Some developers are forcing bloody checkpoints on PC and horrible inventory/crafting systems. Just so it gets mentioned, Ubisoft locked superb graphics stuff on PC just because Watch Dogs on PC looked way too good compared to so called "nextgen" versions which would affect sales on consoles and they have to keep sales on consoles above sales on PC because of whatever lousy contracts.