Don’t Nod is one of the most intriguing studios around right now. It doesn’t seem afraid to take big swings into new genres as long as its games are rooted in a compelling narrative.
Jusant was one of my favorites of last year. As a vertical puzzle-exploration game where you mostly piece together the story through notes you find along the way, it could hardly be much different from Banishers: Ghosts Of New Eden, an RPG set in the 17th century. While players are rewarded for exploration here, Banishers is more combat- and decision-orientated.
Protagonists Antea Duarte and Red mac Raith are a pair of ghost hunters who are romantically involved. They’re recruited to help deal with a curse that has fallen upon the colonial America settlement of New Eden and to help rid residents of ghosts from their past.
The duo must investigate why each spirit lingers — they all have some form of unfinished business — and find an object that ties it to the mortal realm. As you unearth clues, the game pieces the various elements of each case together for you on a handy progress screen, leaving you to make the final fateful decision for each investigation.
The core concept is compelling enough, but there’s a twist an hour or so in that upends everything. Don’t Nod and publisher Focus Entertainment have revealed that twist in the marketing, but just in case you want to go in with as few details as possible, let me give you the TL;DR before we get into mild spoiler territory:
Pros:
- A captivating world and story that pits professional obligations against personal bonds
- Moral decisions that have major, tangible consequences
- Gameplay mostly aligns with the narrative
- Outstanding performances and a beautifully written central relationship
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Cons:
- A lack of enemy variety outside of bosses
- An unnecessary gear system makes the game feel slightly bloated
- Some minor performance issues on PS5
Mild spoilers for Banishers: Ghosts Of New Eden lie ahead.
I found the pace of the first hour and change pretty slow as the game taught me its base mechanics, including combat and how to solve mysteries. But it doesn’t long until Antea and Red face their first major opponent. It’s a fight that Antea does not survive.
Red does, barely, and he wakes up sometime later in a far-away place. This being a story of ghosts and ghouls, Antea is still present.
After each investigation, you’ll typically need to decide whether to let a ghost ascend peacefully to the afterlife, banish it to Hell or blame a human who is connected to their fate. Should you decide to let Antea ascend once you finally reach her link to the human world, you’ll likely choose one of the two ghost options. But it’s only by blaming and sacrificing enough humans that you’ll be able to resurrect Antea.
This places an inherent conflict on your ascend/banish/blame decisions. You might learn that a vengeful ghost was actually an abusive partner but opt to banish one of the connected humans just to have a chance of resurrecting Antea.
In another case, you’ll wrangle with whether to punish someone for sending weaker members of a community to die so that the rest may live. Actually, that decision was pretty easy. The person concerned referred to Red as a “Scotchman” instead of a “Scotsman.” As a fellow Scot, I was deeply offended and had no problem with sending that character to their demise.
You’ll be asked fairly early on to commit to resurrecting Antea or letting her ascend. For me, making the decision to resurrect Antea meant that I was going to blame the human in each case no matter what, even if the circ*mstances of the case didn’t square with the outcome or Red’s purported professional obligations. The decisions you make may not line up with your vow to Antea, a factor that will have an impact on the ending you get.
Despite the moral choices the game asks you to grapple with, they are somewhat limited. It might have been more interesting to allow a murdered ghost to pass peacefully into the afterlife and turn their killer into the authorities, rather than to take the guilty party’s life yourself.
Whatever choices you make in terms of the story, you’ll have Antea by your side until the very end. She can aid with uncovering clues and resources, traversing otherwise impossible gaps and during combat. In battles, you’ll likely find yourself starting out as Red to deal damage with a sword and rifle to build up a meter that allows Antea to deal more powerful blows. Other times, Antea will need to weaken a spectral enemy’s defenses before Red can finish them off.
Being able to instantly switch between the characters creates a fun push-pull of making the most of their capabilities, especially as Antea grows in strength and unlocks more devastating abilities.
But — other than bosses — the baddies you face are limited to just a few archetypes of basic goons, wolves, brutes and ghosts who deal long-range damage. Despite Antea having a growing arsenal, combat does eventually grow tiresome and starts to feel like a distraction from the captivating story. I had some issues with the lock-on feature as well, as that sometimes drifted from the enemy I was targeting.
On PS5, I ran into some performance issues too. The framerate dropped from time to time, even outside of fast-paced fights or doing something as relatively straightforward as scouring a room for clues. That was disappointing, but at least it’s an issue that can be resolved with performance patches. Expanding the variety of enemies would be a trickier problem to tackle.
One other thing that I felt bogged down the game is the gear system. You can find new outfits, accessories and weapons as you explore the world, but for me these didn’t really add anything to the experience. They gave a false sense of progression. Having skill trees (which are impactful here) and item upgrades is quite enough.
I appreciate that Don’t Nod is telling a fresh tale in a world that’s dripping with atmosphere and killer design. The audio mix sounded terrific on my spatial speaker setup, with Antea’s voice often coming from unexpected locations. Dripping rain from my rear speakers sounded great too. And while I might have had issues with the framerate, Banishers by and large looks terrific.
The beating heart of the game comes from tremendous work from Amaka Okafor (Antea) and Russ Bain (Red). The pair deliver beautiful performances that make the relationship between their characters feel deeply authentic and believable as they share jokes and tender moments.
Honestly, I don’t think Focus could have picked a better time to release Banishers than Valentine’s Day. At its center, this is a dark love story that asks you what you’re willing to do for the one you love, even if that means going against your professional obligations.
Rating: 8 out of 10
Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden is out now on PC, PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S.
Disclosure: I was provided with a PS5 review code.
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