• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

The Banner Saga Arrives on PS4 January 12th, 2016

L

Loudninja

Member
Lance from Versus Evil here to share some great news about The Banner Saga! It’s officially launching for PS4 on January 12th, 2016.
Click to expand...
John Watson has been working on bringing the game to consoles for quite a while. The process involved not only getting Banner Saga playable on consoles, but redesigning the user experience to better fit PS4 and DualShock 4. John and Mark Cooke spent quite a while narrowing down the specific user experience and ensuring that the Banner Saga experience was true to form while holding a controller in hand. We’re all happy with the work that went into the PS4 version of The Banner Saga and we’re eager for all of you to start your own saga.
Click to expand...
We’re also pleased to announce that the game is localized in French, German, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, and Italian languages. We’re eager for people to experience this epic Viking tale around the world, and we can’t wait for you to begin your saga on January 12th, 2016.

Thanks again for all of your support and a huge thank you to Sony for being so great to work with! We’re looking forward to Banner Saga 2 and we’ll be sharing more information about that very soon. Be sure to keep your saved games from The Banner Saga as you’ll be able to import your saved data and continue your exact caravan, character, and story choices straight into Banner Saga 2.
Click to expand...
http://blog.us.playstation.com/2015/12/16/the-banner-saga-arrives-on-ps4-january-12th-2016/

Xbox One as well:
CONSOLE LAUNCH DATE ANNOUNCED
FOR AWARD WINNING VIDEO GAME, THE BANNER SAGA

AUSTIN, TX – December 16, 2015 – Stoic, an independent game development company and Versus Evil, one of the leading independent video game publishers, today announced that the epic Viking RPG strategy game The Banner Saga is coming to the PlayStation®4 computer entertainment system and to the Xbox One via the ID@Xbox self-publishing program on Tuesday, January 12th, 2016.

The Banner Saga, which launched to much critical acclaim on both PC and mobile devices has received several awards and nominations, including winner of the 2014 Geekie Awards for “Best Video Game”, winner of 2014 Game Developers Choice: “Best Debut” award, finalist placement for “Excellence in Visual Arts” category at the Independent Game Festival, 3 BAFTA Award Nominations, and winner of Pocket Gamer’s 2015 Best Adventure/RPG Game and Best Android Game of the Year.

“We have been working on porting Banner Saga to consoles for some time” said John Watson, founder and technical director at Stoic. “Porting the game certainly presented technical challenges that we needed to overcome, and gave us an opportunity to redesign the user experience for console controllers. We have managed to merge the story and gameplay from Banner Saga with a refined controller interface to make it a very enjoyable console gaming experience.”

The Banner Saga is a single player driven Viking saga, where a player’s choice in travel, conversation and combat determines the outcome of their own personal story as well as the survival of an entire civilization. The game also features stunning 2D animation and art, a unique tactical combat system and a cast of unforgettable characters, all of which drive this epic journey forward. Players will enjoy a beautiful and haunting original score by Grammy nominated, two-time BAFTA winning composer Austin Wintory conducting The Dallas Winds orchestra, as well as a powerhouse trio of acclaimed YouTube sensations: Peter Hollens, Malukah and Taylor Davis.

“Launching the Banner Saga on next gen consoles is a huge step forward for Stoic and the brand” said Steve Escalante, general manager of Versus Evil. “With this latest achievement, the Stoic team is able to work on more platforms and reach more customers with its games and technology. This is not a small thing to consider for such a small team. Looking ahead at what this could mean for Banner Saga 2 gets really exciting.”

Localized in French, German, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, and Italian languages, The Banner Saga was one of the earlier funding successes on Kickstarter, which originally launched in partnership with independent games publisher Versus Evil.
Click to expand...
 
J

Jake!

Neo Member
DarkLordMalik said:
Maybe it is coming, but likely at a later date. Same as Bastion.
Click to expand...

I hope so, I was really looking forward to playing this on Vita. I thought the touch screen would be a great integration. Hopefully they'll at least come right out and say it's not happening or it's just coming later and not leave people hanging.
 
D

deleted

Member
Great game, I can only recommend it! It has a few flaws, but it's rather unpredictable with how your choices hunt you and it can be unforgiving too.
Love the visuals and the fighting system.

Hopefully part 2 is not taking too long anymore.
 
R

RexNovis

Banned
Yay!!! I've been anxiously awaiting this since it was announced. Can't wait to play it. Is it just PS4 now or is the vita version still coming?
 
S

Spider_Jerusalem

Member
That's Xbox One, too:

CONSOLE LAUNCH DATE ANNOUNCED
FOR AWARD WINNING VIDEO GAME, THE BANNER SAGA

AUSTIN, TX – December 16, 2015 – Stoic, an independent game development company and Versus Evil, one of the leading independent video game publishers, today announced that the epic Viking RPG strategy game The Banner Saga is coming to the PlayStation®4 computer entertainment system and to the Xbox One via the ID@Xbox self-publishing program on Tuesday, January 12th, 2016.

The Banner Saga, which launched to much critical acclaim on both PC and mobile devices has received several awards and nominations, including winner of the 2014 Geekie Awards for “Best Video Game”, winner of 2014 Game Developers Choice: “Best Debut” award, finalist placement for “Excellence in Visual Arts” category at the Independent Game Festival, 3 BAFTA Award Nominations, and winner of Pocket Gamer’s 2015 Best Adventure/RPG Game and Best Android Game of the Year.

“We have been working on porting Banner Saga to consoles for some time” said John Watson, founder and technical director at Stoic. “Porting the game certainly presented technical challenges that we needed to overcome, and gave us an opportunity to redesign the user experience for console controllers. We have managed to merge the story and gameplay from Banner Saga with a refined controller interface to make it a very enjoyable console gaming experience.”

The Banner Saga is a single player driven Viking saga, where a player’s choice in travel, conversation and combat determines the outcome of their own personal story as well as the survival of an entire civilization. The game also features stunning 2D animation and art, a unique tactical combat system and a cast of unforgettable characters, all of which drive this epic journey forward. Players will enjoy a beautiful and haunting original score by Grammy nominated, two-time BAFTA winning composer Austin Wintory conducting The Dallas Winds orchestra, as well as a powerhouse trio of acclaimed YouTube sensations: Peter Hollens, Malukah and Taylor Davis.

“Launching the Banner Saga on next gen consoles is a huge step forward for Stoic and the brand” said Steve Escalante, general manager of Versus Evil. “With this latest achievement, the Stoic team is able to work on more platforms and reach more customers with its games and technology. This is not a small thing to consider for such a small team. Looking ahead at what this could mean for Banner Saga 2 gets really exciting.”

Localized in French, German, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, and Italian languages, The Banner Saga was one of the earlier funding successes on Kickstarter, which originally launched in partnership with independent games publisher Versus Evil.
Click to expand...
 
Y

YianGaruga

Banned
YaoCYVb.png
 
G

GeeTeeCee

Member
Glad I'll finally get to play it.

As expected, I checked the EU blog and 90% of all comments are about the Vita. I love my Vita but the cult that has embedded itself into the comments section there is just bizarre.
 
M

Mifec

Member
Glad to see console only people will be able to play it, it's quite charming and definitely worth your time.
 
xrnzaaas

xrnzaaas

Member
It was a good game on PC, but way way too short. And there's not a lot of replayablity since it's not that nonlinear and you can get most of the encounters in a single playthrough.
 
Y

YianGaruga

Banned
I actually didn't enjoy the game much. It looks and sounds great and the setting/story is promising, but the battle system is terrible. A combination of a number of design decisions just made it very annoying to me.

Maybe they fixed some of that in the console ports, who knows.
 
Y

YianGaruga

Banned
GeeTeeCee said:
Glad I'll finally get to play it.

As expected, I checked the EU blog and 90% of all comments are about the Vita. I love my Vita but the cult that has embedded itself into the comments section there is just bizarre.
Click to expand...

The game was announced for Vita/PS4 and the article never mentions the VIta version once. Of course there will be questions. How hard is it to at least mention what is up with the other version in an official blog post? I don't see what makes it a cult. People like the Vita and it wouldn't be the first time a port was silently cancelled.
 
G

GeeTeeCee

Member
YianGaruga said:
The game was announced for Vita/PS4 and the article never mentions the VIta version once. Of course there will be questions. How hard is it to at least mention what is up with the other version in an official blog post? I don't see what makes it a cult. People like the Vita and it wouldn't be the first time a port was silently cancelled.
Click to expand...

They're fairly calm in this thread, but there's usually a core of comments that are often openly hostile towards devs if there's no Vita version of a game, or if the Vita version is released after the PS4 version. It's just annoying that a comment section on an official blog spends less time talking about the merits of a game and more about "Sony hates Vita users."
 
Y

YianGaruga

Banned
GeeTeeCee said:
They're fairly calm in this thread, but there's usually a core of comments that are often openly hostile towards devs if there's no Vita version of a game, or if the Vita version is released after the PS4 version. It's just annoying that a comment section on an official blog spends less time talking about the merits of a game and more about "Sony hates Vita users."
Click to expand...

That's just PS Blog comments (or internet comments) in general though :)
Every single post is full of people angry about something
 
G

GeeTeeCee

Member
YianGaruga said:
That's just PS Blog comments (or internet comments) in general though :)
Every single post is full of people angry about something
Click to expand...

Yep. If only everyone else could be on GAF's level (Kojima salt thread is the current exception). Look at this thread, we're all happy about The Banner Saga being released on PS4. All is as it should be.
 
K

kevin1025

Banned
Those Vita comments on the blog are vicious! I'm hoping it's not too far behind the PS4 release (like Axiom Verge or Volume...). Now let's hear the Ronin release date!
 
S

Shizuka

Member
Maybe the Vita version will be based on the mobile version and have touch controls only, that's why he doesn't want to announce both at the same time.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

Circana January 2024: #1 MWIII #2 Tekken 8 #3 Suicide Squad ; PS5 #1 Units + Rev, Switch #2 Units Xbox #2 Rev
Sales-Age 2 3
105
6K
mckmas8808 replied
Coming to Xbox Game Pass: Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, Resident Evil 2, Hell Let Loose, and More
News Platform 2 3
143
7K
adamsapple replied
  • Poll
Rate The Game Awards 2023
News 2 3
107
5K
Shakka43 replied
Lara Croft Crowned Most Iconic Video Games Character of All Time, According to BAFTA Poll
2 3 4 5
208
7K
ResurrectedContrarian replied
Coming to Xbox Game Pass in February: Bluey: The Videogame, Tales of Arise, Warhammer 40,000: Boltgun, and More
Hype Platform 2
64
3K
Mr Hyde replied
Top Bottom