By pairing the resource management and RPG advancement mechanics with story decisions and powerful vignettes, I found myself rapidly absorbed into the unfolding drama, battles, and character progression. The Banner Saga’s most enjoyable feature is its story, and the tale told in this finale is a tremendous achievement. The battle before that ending is beautiful and powerful, however. A fighter knows that any gut punch, no matter how devastating, is rendered more palatable by the final bell. Still, seeing the end credits play so quickly after I’d made some devastating choices with real consequences couldn’t help but numb the pain of those results for me. There are enough points of divergence in this trilogy that make a second or even a third playthrough worthwhile, just to see everything that might happen. This brevity aids in replayability, certainly, and The Banner Saga and The Banner Saga 2 are of similar length. The ending was put before me before I’d had an opportunity to sit with what I was experiencing and digest it. I spent eight or so hours on it, start to finish, including several reloads and experiments I undertook to test the potential twists and eddies of the story. Events, tragedies, and battles keep coming, with no more than a minute or two between them, and it is this brisk pace that exposes how disappointingly short the Banner Saga 3 is. Days are passing in the Saga’s world, but it never feels so. “It is this tension that horsewhips the story and keeps it pressing forward at breakneck pace.
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