4th Game Completed in 2024
Man, it's been an absolute joy watching the evolution of French developer Don't Nod over time. My first game of theirs was the ambitious but deeply flawed Remember Me, then I played Life is Strange and thought it was pretty good, then I played the criminally underrated Vampyr (which you should absolutely play if you're into late Victorian history or vampire fiction), and now this one.
Banishers is a game set in colonial New England, as two Banishers from England are dispatched to deal with a cursed town. Things go to shit pretty much immediately, and what follows is one hell of an interesting - if somewhat underachieving - story that's exceptionally well-told.
So there's two stories here: One is Banishers, one is The Ghosts of New Eden. The latter is significantly better than the first for a number of reasons, but let's first talk about the good one. The core focus of this story revolves around an exceptionally powerful spirit wreaking absolute mayhem on a small community trying to build itself up. Figuring out why becomes apparent pretty quickly, but actually setting things right is a lot of work. The people of New Eden are remarkably complex - there's a deep trauma in each and every individual story that led them to the events of seven years ago, and learning about those horrors and healing broken souls is a big focus of this game. At the same time though, the game also has moments of genuine horror. The subject matter is remarkably dark and bleak; true to the era it represents. It tackles complex social issues with a compassionate lens, while introducing a wide cast of seriously interesting characters. Whether you love a townperson's presence or come to despise them, they are exceptionally well-characterized, and very rarely is the morality of a situation black and white. Thickskin Newsmith, Ferdinando Miller, Helen Preese, Flora Abbot, Lammy Haskell and the O'Hara sisters are but a few characters that stick in my mind as, "Holy shit, I've never seen a person like this in a game before, and I'm totally here for it!" These are bizarre, flawed, authentic characters that are given incredible life with outstanding writing and acting behind them.
But the way these traumas manifest - in hauntings, in physical embodiments of rage, in the way the whole game constantly feels damp, and dirty, and off is really an achievement in storytelling. There's some truly exceptional stuff in here - even in the sound design and art direction. And there's some setpiece boss fights that are just some genuine WOW moments of theming, of art, of emotional impact... Absolutely stunning. The main story is exceptionally strong, though it's kind of divided into like three chunks based on the region you're traversing through. The entire Fort Jericho section in particular stands out as one of the better segments of a game in recent memory... There's some really cool shit going on there. The only real weak portions mostly occur through the Mire Lands, which is meant to be a sort of intermediary connecting the other three chapters together. Overall though, it's a fantastic narrative altogether, and there were a few segments where I was literally sitting there stunned, in complete awe of what I just experienced. Like, just holding my controller, staring at the screen like, "Wow".
The side quests are... A mixed bag. While all of them present an interesting commentary on humans and their relationships, I want to say like 75% kind of feel flat. Not BAD by any means! But just kinda even-keel. But then there's that 25% where you're just like, "Holy shit, that was outstanding," and you just kind of sit there in a state of mild awe. Broadly speaking I think there could have been room to reduce the number of these haunting cases and increase the quality, perhaps adding some better sub-bosses or more intricate event planning. But collectively it's some solid, "7/10, mostly worth your time" kinda thing.
Now the other story. Banishers. sigh Okay. Red is a really well-written, interesting protagonist. A really patient, calm, tolerant dude with a bit of a jokey side. He's, for all intents and purposes, your main character. Antea, the other lead, dies early in the game, and you're given a choice on whether or not you want to give her ascent to the afterlife, or sacrifice the townspeople to revive her with black magic. But here's the thing. Antea sucks. She's miserable, brooding, petulant, constantly berates and condescends Red, starts arguments for no reason, and comes off as extremely manipulative as she's his mentor, on top of being his lover. Yes, she does have a character arc. There's reasons why she's the way she is. But you don't learn any of that until the last, like, 10% of the game. Similarly, she does have some great moments where she stands up for women and marginalized people, but those won't come until several hours in. So when you're given a binary choice AT THE START OF THE GAME of whether to kill people to save this woman, the choice kind of becomes a simple one. Not only that, but that game HEAVILY discourages you from sacrificing the townspeople as, no matter what mistakes they've made, none of them are perfect. There's some good in most people. Not everyone - I did banish two totally irredeemable ghosts. But broadly speaking, you're shamed for killing innocents. So if you're going to make this a choice, and if you're going to heavily market this game as a love story, why do you then write such a toxic, abusive relationship? I'm kind of baffled. She is, nevertheless, a realistic person who has problems, and I do think she's overall quite well-written and well-acted. I just don't like her.
Antea also becomes a bit annoying for the same reason Navi is in Ocarina of Time... EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. you do certain actions in the game world, Antea will chime in with a voice line. Every time an enemy takes aim at you, whether you see it or not, she shouts "Watch out!" like Red is a dumb apprentice. Every time there's a ghost ward, she will mention it, even if the path you're on takes you in and out of a warded zone. And while I know this is a bug, I do think it's hilarious... Even while she's actively fighting, sometimes her voice line, "Can I get a chance to fight too?!" comes out and it's like, GAME, WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME. XD
So that segues nicely into the gameplay stuff. I've seen reviews say the combat in this game sucks... It most certainly does not. What sucks is the balancing. On easy, the game is a cakewalk, most of the time. On normal, the enemies are way too damage spongey. But this is also a game that lets you create a set where you can add knockback to every rifle blast, and that knockback causes a shockwave that staggers surrounding enemies, and it will never not be fun to stun-lock some idiot, from range, running at you with a pitchfork. XD It has enough going on mechanically to stay fun, and it's not drowning in systems bloat like a lot of games tend to be nowadays. I do think the encounter rate during traversal of completed areas is too high though, and it doesn't even make much sense in lore. I hit the level cap without ever trying to grind - though I did get like 98% world completion.
So the overworld gameplay itself... Absolutely loved it. Truly. It has some trappings of open world design, and the map does feel maybe like 30% too big, but I got damn near 100% world completion in 64 hours, which I think is totally reasonable. But where the game REALLY shines is in navigation and like... Navigation puzzles. Getting around feels fun. Paths are almost never a straight line, you will frequently wind in and out of caves and crevasses and woodlands and old ruins, and that's aided by an EXCEPTIONAL compass tracker thingy that guides you on the optimal path at all times. Collectibles and items are gated behind these really great environmental puzzles that are well-designed without being too "guess what the developer is thinking". Plus the world itself is GORGEOUS, with lots of really interesting things to see and diverse places to explore.
One thing that does bother me though? The fast travel system. You must run to a campfire to travel to another campfire. You cannot fast travel from the overworld. This alone added several hours to play time that I wish I could have back. The guided navigation mitigates this a lot, but you also can't set a pin manually. You have to rely on whatever waypoints the game gives to you.
It has some technical issues too. It seems to have some weird issue with the cache (PS5 version played) where play sessions of a few hours, or passing through several dense areas in a single session, will cause the game to drop frames and reduce graphical quality. I've seen this in most PS5 and XBSX games, but never this bad. It's a non-issue if you close and restart every couple of hours, but it's a weird problem. I also hate that the map takes like 5-10 seconds to open, which is a massive pain when you're trying to find a specific place that does not have a waypoint.
Overall, I was really impressed with Ghosts of New Eden, and while it does have its issues, it's a very strong package when taken as a whole. I think this is a very strong framework for better games to come, and given some easter eggs that hint at Vampyr and Banishers occuring in the same universe... I'm excited to see what Don't Nod puts out next.
I strongly recommend this one to people who play games for story and atmosphere, though people who demand super complex combat may not jive with it.
