You know how some games are laptop games? Well, The Banished Vault is a handheld game, no two ways about it. Of course, in theory you could make precise notes of all the planetary symbols and construction costs of the various buildings you’ll need to collect and convert resources into fuel, alloys and elixirs as you race through space trying to escape the terrifying Darkness based on his in the game manual. But when there’s a physical paperback that replicates it all for you in a much more accessible format, with some gorgeous illustrations of his mysterious space monastery to boot, not to mention infinitely better explanations of what it all does than I could ever hope to describe, it quickly became an essential part of my gaming experience.
I’m still working on my review for The Banished Vault (hopefully coming later this week), but as it launches on Steam today, I’d highly recommend spending the extra £5/$5 to get one if you’re at all interested in managing your survival in the Lunar Division universe. I don’t think I could survive the game without it.