Weekly challenges on the way to fantasy strategy game

Fans of Stoic Studios' Banner Saga will have reason to step back into the beautifully animated and unforgivably tough fantasy world next week. An update to The Banner Saga 3 will add a ne?w mode for all your sword ?and shield smashing shenanigans.

The update will include a mode previously offered as a stretch goal during the game's Kickstarter campaign. Eternal Arena mode will bring?? cu??stomisable maps and enemies for skirmish battles, as well as weekly challenges and leaderboards so you can be the best realm king or queen on your block.

The Eternal Arena mode is currently available in beta, so Stoic can stomp out any remaining bugs or glitches, ahead of its full release on December 12. The Banner Saga 3 is available now on PS4, PC ?Xbox One and Nintendo Switch.

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Live and let die

The Banner Saga began as an inkling of a Kickstarter in 2014 from Stoic, a studio with just a few people under its banner at the time. Slowly gaining a strong fanbase over the years, The Banner Saga has now ev??olved into a three-part story of loss, endurance, and camaraderie.

In its finale, the caravan has reached its literal wits' end as an ominous darkness closes in on the last bastion of humanity in the city of ??Arberrang. The gods are dead, society is crumbling, and there’s a giant god-like serpent on the loose. This time it’s n?ot just about survival, but about the depths to which people will go to protect their loved ones and weigh them against the lives of others.

The Banner Saga 3 (PS4 [reviewed], Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, Windows, Mac)
Developer: Stoic 
Publisher: Versus Evil
Released: July 26, 2018 
MSRP: $24.99 

At the conclusion of The Banner Saga 2, our heroes split into two caravans: one to seek an end to the darkness and the other to find safety within the walls of Arberrang, the human capital. At the start of this installment, the story picks up right where it left off in the middle of the fray. If you’re importing a save, you’ll carry over your renown (your “currency” to buy supplies or upgrade your characters) along with your choices that carried you this far ?(aka any characters you managed to save from death in the first two?? games).

I had the good fortune of owning each Banner Saga on three separate platforms, allowing me to start fresh with all available characters alive, plenty of renown, and a good assortment of items (a stark contrast to my playthroughs in the previous games). The only downside to playing the game in this way is that your choices from the first and second games definitely affect some major plot points, including the ending of the game and whether or not critical characters die. The “illusion of choice” mantra is definitely not present in The Banner Saga and certainly affects the m??ajor outcomes in this particular installment.

The Banner Saga 3 is a little more mechanically interesting and different than its predecessors. Rather than focusing on supplies, rest, and clansmen/fighter ratios, the two caravans have different gameplay goals and elements. While your caravan in Arber?rang focuses on fighting against internal political conflict, the dredge, and the looming darkness, your other caravan is racing against the clock to fix the source of the darkness. When the countdown of days runs out, it switches back to your party in Arberrang where yo?u have the chance to buy more time for them through battles and savvy plot choices. However, this can only be done a number of times before the darkness reaches Arberrang and it’s essentially game over.

To make things more interesting, your caravan in the darkness has some slight twists on battles. The characters have some fun new abilities including Juno, who has the ability to be reborn. In addition, the horn of willpower is replaced with Eyvind’s staff which holds up to three charges and can send a shock of lightning to the battlefield, taking away enemies’ streng??th. Wave-style fighting is also introduced, which allows you to swap characters in and out in between waves of enemies. If you defeat the waves along with the boss (usually a beefed-up version of an enemy), you gain an item and more renown.

Even with the addition of the new battle and gameplay elements, I found this installment to be a tad t?oo easy compared to the previous two?. Although the battle mechanics are a lot of fun, it also made things much less challenging given the ability to swap fresh characters in between waves.

The items granted were also fairly overpowered, and since they were easy to get I didn’t have trouble equipping my entire team. There’s so much renown to go around with the lack of supply-buying that you can go crazy with promoting your team, and to top it off, TBS3 added &??ldquo;heroic titles” which allow you to boost your characters even further with permanent stat upgrades. All of these factors allowed me to fly seamlessly through the? last part of the game during the countdown phase, which is a problem for plot reasons as you need to “fail” your countdowns traveling through the darkness to see additional storylines in Arberrang.

The story and dialogue is still quite impactful, despite the fact I didn’t experience a good portion of it. The hand-drawn animation is vibrant and beautifully illustrates the depths of which humanity is at the brink of despair. Coupled with the instrumental music, they fully capture the emotion of battle and the dreariness of the overarching realities. There’s a certain grandness and desperation in the scenes more so in this installment than the previous two, which comes out not only in the dialogue, but is also hammered home by?? the art, down to the bags under people’s eyes.

There are few trilogies out there that will grip you until the very end, and The Banner Saga is one of them. The Banner Saga 3 does a more than admirable job in seeing us through the desperate times, with some of the most determined characters conceived in modern storytelling. My only true disappointment is the lack of resolution or epilogue for most characters. In my ending, it left me with a single (but beautiful) illustration depicting the outcome of Arberrang, and a small cutscene due to one of my main characters dying. The rest is left up to ?interpretation.

Alas, main characters sometimes receiving a single line of dialogue to describe their end, if anything at all, is what makes The Banner Saga so unique. Life is fleeting, as it is for the hundreds of clansmen I lost throughout the past four years, as it is for my characters who wandered off and never returned, and as it is for the ultimate conclusion to The Banner Saga.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the pub?lisher.]}

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505 has a trilogy collection too

The sun is about to set on The Banner Saga. More than four years after the original first launched, the conclusion? to the trilo?gy is nearly upon us.

Publisher Versus Evil revealed today that The Banner Saga 3 will release on July 24. It's la?unching simultaneously on PC, PS4, Switch, and Xbox One; mobile platforms will follow sometime later this year. It's going to be priced at $25, but there will also be $30 and $40 versions th??at have bonus items.

For anyone who's new to Banner Saga, this might actually be a fine time to jump into the series. 505 Games is manufacturing physical editions of the Banner Saga trilogy for PS4 a??nd Xbox One that will run $40. It's a lot of viking fighting but someone's gotta be a hero. Might as well be you.

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Backers can play the first Alpha Battle

Oh, right! Banner Saga 3 is happening. That tidbit slipped my mind in the months since the Kickstarter wrapped up, but today's video -- a key a??rt trailer -- is a pleasant reminder of what's to come.

Well, maybe pleasant isn't t?he right wo??rd. No surprise: this won't be a feel-good game.

Along with the video, Stoic is letting certain backers check out its first playable Alph?a Battle, "single-serving battles where you get a first look at new features and may help us tune them and tweak them."

The studio would prefer folks to not share video or screens of this stuff, noting, "A lot of this work will be updated and polished before the game launches." If you contributed to Banner Saga 3's Kickstarter at the Banner Bearer tier or higher, though, dig in. "The goal here is to show you a new feature (in this case, the new 'Battle Waves' system) so we can hear what you think," according to Sto?ic.

The first Alpha Battle is here! New Art Reveal! [Kickstarter]

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The first two games are free on Twitch Prime

[Update: Twitch's PR director, Chase, informed us that Twitch's funding will not go toward any of the Kickstarter goals. Their money is going directly to the publisher of The Banner Saga 3, Versus Evil. Also, the custom items for Twitch Prime members will be created by Penny Arcade, so I'd expec?t at least a passing reference to the Cardboard Tube Samurai.

The original story is left below.]

Twitch is currently holding a promotion that is far too complicated to spell out in a simple headline. Right now, The Banner Saga 1 is free for all Twitch Prime members until February 28. Then on March 2 until March 6, The Banner Saga 2 will be free. Twitch will donate $1 to the Kickstarter for The Banner Saga 3 for every person who plays either one of those games through? the Twitch launcher during those periods. If you're worried this is because the campaign is currently not funded, put ?your fears to rest; the game has easily surpassed its $200,000 goal and this effort seems to be solely for the extra stretch goals.

Twitch will match up to $200,000, effectively granting all current stretch goals for the upcoming game. All Twitch Prime users who participate will also get some unspecified content in The Banner Saga 3, should you need more incentive to take p??art in this promotion.

I think this is a neat promotion on part of Twitch, even if it is a simple marketing ploy to get?? users ?signed up for Twitch Prime. Apparently it comes free with a subscription to Amazon Prime, so there are probably a lot of you who are eligible for this offer without even realizing it. You might as well take a crack at these games and help the developers create the best possible finale.

Twitch Prime members get both Banner Saga games for free [MCV]

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Playable Dredge are the first stretch goal

I don't know that any of us were expecting Stoic to not bring in $200,000 to help fund development on The Banner Saga 3, but her??e's confirmation, about a week later: the studio has in fact done it.

With that funding threshold out of the way, it's onto stretch goals for th??e turn-based strategy title. First up, at $250,000 raised, is playable Dredge heroes -?- the Stoneguard, Hurler, and Stonesinger.

Playing a?s "the enemy" can be a fun concept, particularly when they look this cool.

Banner Saga 3's crowdfunding campaign will b?e up until Tuesday, March 7, so there's plenty of time left for fans to meet this attainable goal and whatever else Stoic might think up after that.

Fully Funded! And 1st Stretch Goal! [Kickstarter]

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Seeking extra funding through Kickstarter

Two down, one to go. Stoic has returned to Kickstarter for The Banner Saga 3, the final title ?in its turn-based strategy Viking series. This $200,000 crowdfunding campaign is meant to give the team "a little more breathing room for developmen??t to ensure the game is fully baked before launching it."

"We're still solidly indie, not accepting any investor funding so Kickstarter is still a great way to rally the community to show support for the game, while letting us call the shot?s on the games we make," wrote the developers. "We're paying for most of the game ourselves, but the funds we're asking for will enable us to take the time we need and bring the band back together one more tim??e!"

If you've played any of these before, you k??now what you're getting into, but a recap never hurts.

"Banner Saga 1 threw you into a deep, strange world where the gods were dead. The sun had stopped. A colossal serpent leveled mountains, searching for answers hidden in an ancient language as darkness roiled on the horizon. You guided your flock against overwhelming odds, ??to protect the ones you loved. How did you fare as the world began its end?  

Banner Saga 2 remembered your deeds, both wise and foolish. Calamity tested your leadership. Friends became enemies and enemies, allies. You walked in deep places, and glimpsed places deeper still. Always one more hill to crest. Did you endure to the great city of Arberrang? Were you welcomed or feared within its black wall while the world outside wa??s breaking?  

Banner Saga 3 concludes the tale. Steel your nerves, step forth into the approaching abyss. Cross the threshold from daylight without end into untold darkness. Warped lands within threaten your sanity, and a writhing wyrm tests your mettle. But here, in the darkness, is where secrets are brought to light and motives are made clear. Are your fr?iends who they claim to be? They all look to you. What story will your banner tell?"

Pledges for $20 or more act as a pre-order for the PC and Mac version of The Banner Saga 3, and if you're coming in fresh, you can add another $20 on top for instant access to the first two games.

Whil??e the "estimated delivery" on the Kickstarter page is listed as December 2018, the game's launch date "has yet to be co??nfirmed," according to Stoic. I imagine it'll be a while.

One final note: this crowdfunding drive is only for the PC/Mac version, but the team does intend to get The Banner Saga 3 on "as many platforms as possible [including mobile and console] and backing our Kick?starter will certainly help make that process easier as well as deliver a more robust game too!"

Banner Saga 3 [Kickstarter -- Thanks, Rene]

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