Scaling with Dragonkin: The Banished

Eko Software’s (How to Survive, Warhammer: Chaosbane) latest provides a rousing first impression. Like many action titles, Dragonkin: The Banished’s prologue provides a brief taste of its playables in a fully powered-up state. You’ll begin with the Knight class, where you can use your fire lance to spear through hordes of foes like a demented Dynasty Warriors character. If you have enough energy points saved up, you can also opt to use the weapon like a powerful flamethrower.

Alternatively, there’s the half-human, half-monster Barbarian, capable of spinning around like a homicidal Beyblade. Across the game’s preface, each character has access to five different offensive abilities, so you can send the hybrid leaping across the screen, leading with an icy and injurious area of effect attack.

Favoring ranged protagonists, I liked the Oracle best. Not only is she capable of showering distant adversaries with a nice showcase of particle-effects, but the Oracle can also summon ground lightning that fries crowds of creatures. As The Banished advances through Steam’s Early Access program, a fourth playable is promised.

There’s Potential, If Eko Nails the Balancing

As enjoyable as this test drive is, harnessing the abilities of Dragonkin’s classes quickly grows tedious. While some of this is rooted in their overpowered status, monotony mostly comes from the introduction’s linear pathing. But fear not, once you head into the main game, The Banished’s maps open up as you trek across landmasses to chase your party’s next objective.

Yes, that means you won’t be fighting alone. Occasionally, other AI-driven co-adventurers join you, attacking any adjacent hostiles. And then you have a choice of one of four different Wyrmlings- flying dragon pets that can dish out status effects. The Banished doesn’t veer far from Diablo’s and Titan Quest’s formula, as you eradicate groups of foes and pick up any dropped loot. At present, level scaling is an issue, diminishing the sensation of development, with enemy stats correlated to character progression. As such, players can spam abilities with little concern for cooldown management, making Dragonkinfeel like a basic hack-and-slash.

Do We Need an Outrageously Large City?

While adversity is muted, there are a few interesting novelties to be found. Skills are slotted into a hexagonal chart known as The Ancestral Grid. Here, skills have different sizes and are affected by both rotation and positioning, with the latter providing access to assistive modifiers. Currently, the first chapter offers about ten hours of questing and I’m eager to see what Eko does with the Grid across subsequent chapters.

Another positive attribute is the game’s introductory cinematic, where dragons once banished below the ground are now emerging, generating chaos in the process. Sure, we’ve seen the ‘unleashed monster’ set-up countless times, but this is aided by quality voice-acting, sounding suspiciously like Donna Burke, the voice of the Tokaido Shinkansen. Perhaps the most promising aspect is that your in-game actions contribute to the development of the absolutely sprawling city of Montescail, potentially creating an absorbing gameplay loop.

Currently, Dragonkin: The Banished has a solid handle on the fundamentals of action-role playing, providing players with access to a trio of prospective powerhouses. Hopefully, Eko Software can engineer these different elements into something that’s gratifying over the long haul.

Dragonkin: The Banished is currently in Early Access and is available on Steam for $24.99