Focus Home has built up a clear commitment to the supernatural. One of the highlights from their release schedule last year was their vampire-hunting title Evil West, and they’re looking to pull the same trick in 2023 with the eerie narrative-action of Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden coming from the award-winning Don’t Nod studio.
Banishers is about things that go bump in the night. As a Banisher, your role is to protect the land from spirits, curses and ghosts, using both your martial skills and your supernatural ones. You take on the role of Red Mac Raith, a Scottish former mercenary who had turned his life around when he met his lover Antea. Sadly, Antea has passed away, and in turn, become a phantom. Red is caught between his love for her and his duty as a Banisher, and in our hands-on, it’s clear he’s chosen her.
In action, that means you can control both Red and Antea, shifting between the two with the push of a button. You can start a combo as one character before seamlessly switching to the other halfway through, and some of the ghostly apparitions you’re going to be facing will be easier to despatch with one of the pair than the other.
Because of the difference in their corporeal bodies, they’re also able to interact with the world in different ways. Altea’s vision of the world is hyper-coloured, seeing the world bloom in a variety of inhuman colours. She’s able to help you navigate, and can even use her ghostly powers to leap Red to inaccessible areas, with some light puzzling where you have to line up Altea’s vision of various spectral marks in order to lepa through them.
Red’s keeping quiet about Altea’s ghostly form. He should banish her, as his role demands, but he obviously can’t bring himself to do so and effectively kill her a second time. She’s different from the spectres you encounter too, so something is clearly at work here, and this feels like a central wheel around which the rest of the drama will unfold.
That drama takes place in New Eden. In the year 1695, you’ve been called to the area in order to deal with a steady stream of curses and pervading nightmares. During our hands-on we experienced the Dark Woods and its settlers – known as the Wood Folk – and became thoroughly immersed as the story unfolded.
Whatever Red may be, he doesn’t always receive the warmest welcome in New Eden. His profession seems to mark him out as a less-than-salubrious visitor; it’s the same welcome that we see time and again in The Witcher. Red banishes ghosts and curses, so perhaps he’s not that far removed from Geralt.
Thickskin, this settlement’s toughened leader, sets you to work, despite her sister Kate’s reservations. You’re tasked with killing The Beast, a creature that’s terrifying the people in this homestead, though Thickskin thinks it’s nothing more than a bear or a wolf. A group of settlers had set out to find a more welcoming area, sent on ahead of the others, but no one has returned word that they made it.
What’s most interesting here as you talk to the remaining settlers is that your conversations and decisions have lasting effects. You can learn why these people are the way they are, about the brutal conditions they’ve survived, and you can choose to understand or appreciate them or blame them for their actions. In a genre that’s often very structured and set, it’s refreshing to see some personality and individuality. Don’t Nod are clearly leaning on their storytelling expertise from previous work like Life is Strange and Tell Me Why, and it feels like a perfect match for this evocative setting.
As you set out on the path taken by this lost group, you start to come across some of its members. There are human remains, which are never a good sign, as well as pieces of writing and records that show the grim reality these people faced on their way to an untimely death. As you go ever further into the woods the atmosphere becomes increasingly oppressive, and you soon discover that no one survived this journey. In death, the spirits of all those murdered settlers have become one, an embroiled, bitter, terrifying creature known as a Scourge, and one that takes all of Red and Antea’s skills to despatch. There’s an underlying melancholic tone to Banishers that sets it apart from other action RPGs; this is an unyielding depiction of human suffering, and raises questions of morality and ethics along the way. In other words, it’s a perfect vehicle for Don’t Nod’s storytelling.
More recognisable perhaps is the equipment page from which you upgrade your character’s gear, from weaponry to decorations in the form of amulets, rings, brooches and wristbands. There’s also crafting resources – we pick up a bunch through our playthrough from both the natural world and the remains of ghosts you’ve banished – though we didn’t get to see how these are put together.
The ghosts you fight come in a variety of shapes, with various spectres and ghouls of different sizes and strengths, and there’s an emphasis on tying combos together, dodging, and then using Red’s skills as a Banisher to finish them off. It feels weighty and satisfying, with a substantial level of challenge even on the Normal difficulty setting. It’s a natural match for the fiction Don’t Nod are building, giving genuine reason for the settlers to fear these aggressive spirits, and you’ll come to fear them too.
Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden stood out as one of the most narratively engaging titles we saw at this year’s Gamescom. The setting is evocative, the dynamic between the central characters is intriguing, and the tale that’s being told is both fresh and fascinating. Put it at the top of your wishlist now.
