How Haunting Cases Work in Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden

Haunting Cases are mandatory and optional quests where you’re investigating the strange happenings around individual settlers in Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden. They’re crucial to the overall narrative and contribute to the game’s multiple endings, so here’s everything you need to know about Haunting Cases.

How Haunting Cases Work in Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden

As you progress through Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden and find settler communities, you’ll encounter mandatory Haunting Cases that will kickstart you into the major story investigations surrounding the leaders of those civilizations.

Your job as a Banisher is to bring closure to these Haunting Cases, whether through a Blame ritual that kills the haunted settler or ascending the vengeful ghost plaguing their daily life.

Usually, these cases involve resolving possessions step-by-step or finding a connection to a settler refusing (or unable) to give up information. By the end, you have a well-rounded deduction about why a settler is haunted, who the ghost is, and the object that keeps the phantom tied to the living world in order to bring closure. Each Haunting Case is unique and will reveal details about settlers you wouldn’t discover otherwise. 

As a reminder, however you decide to bring closure to a Haunting Case will ultimately determine the game’s ending based on your oath to Antea. Because of this, Haunting Cases are very significant to your experience in Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden and could potentially convince you to change your closure choices in the long run.

Related: Should You Resurrect or Ascend Antea in Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden?

How to Get Essence Points in Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden

Also, it pays to finish Haunting Cases because you’ll receive an Essence point and a bulk of experience in Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden. Specifically, Essence points are necessary to unlock Antea’s skills from the Evolution menu. You can only get this resource after completing Haunting Cases, unlike Red, who gains skill points with each level up.

Antea’s skills can be powerful upgrades and help deal with the more challenging battles where her attacks are most potent against specific enemies, so I’d recommend doing the Haunting Cases whenever possible.

Cases will pop up after key story moments over the map or through a vision while resting at the campfire, but don’t feel pushed to do them immediately. You can let them build until later if you don’t need an Essence point since the skill tree only unlocks further as Antea gains more powers.

Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden is available on PC, Xbox, and PlayStation.