Banquet For Fools review

Banquet for Fools' opening drops me straight in at the deep end, a blood-soaked fight for survival against festival-goers gone mad while I'm surrounded by piles of corpses, given a gentle kiss by… I'm not even sure what that kindly oversized bird-person was, actually, and then shoved three centuries into the future without apology or explanation. After creating my own questing party filled with people and skills that largely reject familiar RPG stereotypes, I'm plunged into a memorably unique land filled with its own imaginative little phrases ("Topa-din!" is a common greeting), and a surprisingly detailed social structure that I haven't got a hope of grasping yet.

It's about now I realise that "trying to uncover why everyone in the nearby Din Varens settlement have gone missing" and something about "reaching a lighthouse" isn't as specific as I normally like my RPGs to be. Still, I suppose it would be unreasonable for a quest-giver to supply me and my party of random pub-going guards with details about an unexplained mystery. No problem, I'll check my quest log.

There isn't one.

There isn't a conversation history tab either. Or a "Go here" marker on the map. There is a notes section, but it's completely empty. Because I haven't typed any notes in it yet. Myself. With my own fingers.

This freeform adventure not only expects but demands my active participation; if I want to remember the location of somewhere on the regional map I have to type it in myself. If I want to create a customised magical spell then I'll have to name it and then draw its icon by hand. What little information I am given to keep is found on elaborate scrolls and hand drawn pieces of paper I must keep close by if I want to refer back to them later, the value and meaning of these sketchy scribbles and meandering passages left for me to decipher.

It's a daunting prospect, but one that quickly encourages a slower, more attentive mindset. I have no choice but to become fully invested in this society and the people within it. I can't help but notice how much they worry about their upcoming peppura harvest as I pass by, and I even remember what time of day the guard captain I want to talk to stands by the front gate. I come to appreciate the work of each settlement's wandering ghost-repelling chanter, because I'm not going to get very far without their help.

My travels across this barely settled land follow a similar tempo, giving me the choice of either walking to wherever I need to go, with every route taken a conscious decision, or rowing there by boat, which isn't all that different in terms of the time and thought required. The biggest convenience the game's prepared to offer is a network of boat services, though the geography of the landscape means not every boatsman can take me to every port, and the fare is at times steep enough to make me think twice.

This friction transforms travel itself into an event, even if I've already found every treasure and killed every bandit in the area. Clear paths are rare and signposts even more so, leaving success (and survival) largely in my own hands. It really does feel like I'm alone in the wilderness—and this difficulty and isolation heightens the tension of any events I stumble upon while I'm out there.

A friendly group with capable guards and a warm campfire are more than the promise of a quest, they're a welcome reprieve from the harsh landscape. A simple group of enemies becomes a nerve-jangling threat when I'm far from home and my restorative food supplies spoiled a day earlier. Dropping an entire person's weight in meals by a disinterested harvest god's shrine is a nervous act of piety instead of a simple task-ending transaction given how much time I had to spend organising, sourcing, and then carrying it all to them.

Combat in this mostly untamed land is done in a uniquely engaging real-time with pause-ish way, mixing tactical commands with the need to keep an active eye on my opponents. As with everything else, I'm expected to pay close attention and take a proactive approach if I want to get anything done. I learn to focus on the oversized abomination rather than the endless underlings, for example, or to take out poison-spitting monsters before less-vicious alternatives. Dodging is an active ability here, something I manually trigger myself when I see an incoming sword swing. The strength and success of powerful rally attacks hinges on me stopping a QTE-like marker at exactly the right moment.

The end result is a little more Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance than plain old Baldur's Gate. Control, action, and reaction is more direct—more personal, even. Attacks naturally follow the arc or thrust of the weapon in hand; an axe swing connecting with everything along its path, even though this "feature" is refreshingly common sense rather than a formal ability. Attacks can be avoided simply by being far away enough to not get hit—not out of range, in terms of stats or specific measurements, but beyond the visible tip of a sword. It's busy, but not chaotic. A slow-filling bar determines the space between my actions, and this reserved pace gives me time to keep an eye on my party members and manually switch between them if I need to tactically deploy a specific skill or spell, rather than leave their highly customisable AI to the job.

The actions I unlock over time add valuable tactical capabilities rather than just another numerically potent attack on a list. My party will live longer if I think to order a burly character to pin down a strong monster, allowing their allies to get in a free hit or two. Alternatively, I could have someone charge straight into a huddled group of enemies, scattering them and dispelling whatever bonuses they gain from sticking together.

The straightforward nature of many moves—I'm as likely to kick an enemy down as I am to unleash a fancy spell—gives combat a scrappy, improvised feel that underlines the "making do out in the wilds" aspect of the game. I care more about my little party because I can feel their fight for survival through the rough, by-any-means nature of the options available to me. Since many enemies don't respawn, hours worth of tense, brutal battles out in the wilderness eventually lead to a game's worth of relatively safe hiking paths—but, as with everything else in Banquet for Fools, only if I'm prepared to make the effort.

It is always an effort, and there are times when Banquet for Fools crosses the line into frustrating exhaustion. Being told by NPCs that the one person/monster/point of interest I think I need to focus on is somewhere "on the mountainside" or "in a marsh" without even so much as a vague compass direction to aim for can unravel into an aggravating waste of time. The game's strict day/night system means it's possible to be in exactly the right place at the wrong time. The answer to an obtuse puzzle could be within some lengthy scroll I found hours earlier and forgot about, or skimmed over an elaborately inked detail in.

One uncounted, uncommented-upon minor monster out of dozens already slaughtered idling away in a forgotten corner of one map has, on at least one occasion, been the difference between a successful clear and a quest left mysteriously in limbo for hours. Another could only be cleared after casting one very specific spell learned in an entirely unrelated location on a bunch of frightened children I happened to stumble upon on a random island, revealing the monster hiding amongst them.

Yet even in these moments, Banquet for Fools keeps me coming back for more. I've cursed when a promising lead's gone nowhere, angrily reloaded after trekking too deep into dangerous territory unprepared, and scribbled weird fragments of notes about fairy-sayings in a grump, and pushed on anyway. The entire game feels like one big personalised secret to unravel, with every stumble something I can fix, and every failed battle something to return to later.

Not everything in Banquet for Fools is important in my quest towards the game's multiple endings. But by making me tread and retread its paths and scattered islands until local names become familiar, and the sight of tillers working the fields feels like coming home, simply existing inside this place becomes its own reward. Life's hard out here, but I wouldn't change it for the world.