Akliz has added Windrose to our list of supported games. Since we've done that, I have racked up 89 hours in about 11 days, and completed every main and side quest, every collection, visited every unique location, and crafted or found every item in the game. Needless to say, I may have liked the game a little bit. I'm going to review Windrose and give you the good, the bad, and the unfinished. Grab a lime and do some crime, because it's pirate time.
This review will contain major spoilers for every part of this game, including all mechanics and the story.
Initial Impressions
When I first heard about this game, I thought, "Oh no, not another pirate game." I mildly enjoyed Sea of Thieves, but with that, Black Flag, and Atlas, I was about pirate-d out. Little did I know, I was not actually tired of the pirate theme, but tired of how it was implemented.
Loading up the game, it initially looked like your bog-standard survival crafting open world cookie cutter blueprint of a game. There are millions like it. Pick up sticks and stones and plant matter, make a wicker hut, some stone tools, and you're well on your way to riding robot dinosau- wait, wrong game. It did strike me as extremely similar to ARK in the early game, though.
Due to these and other reasons, like annoying menus, higher than usual early game difficulty, early access, and very familiar crafting gameplay loop, my first impressions weren't the best. However, this game aged like fine wine. My enjoyment steadily and quickly increased.
In this review, I will compare this game to a few other games. Mostly Conan Exiles, ARK Survival Evolved, and the Soulslike genre in general. This game shares DNA with all of these, and in my opinion, it mostly does so in a positive way. If you like any or all of these, chances are you will find at least some enjoyment in this game. Now let's get to my favorite part of the game - exploration.
Exploration
Exploration in Windrose isn't just sailing. Each island is pseudo-randomly generated. In other words, the general shape and features of the island are hard-coded, but there is variability in the precise shape as well as the selection of points of interest and resources on each island. This ensures most islands are realistic and high quality, but every player will have a different experience discovering them on the world map and exploring each island individually.
There are 3 main regions, each containing several islands in a random order. Some islands are huge, and some are small. Not every single island is required for the quests, so it's actually quite easy to miss an island here or there, which was slightly annoying while I was trying to discover all of them. The map is quite large, so if you want to see everything there is to see, you may be doing a lot of searching by the end of the game.
There are several unique points of interest on each island. If there are loot chests to discover there, the total will be shown on that POI's map marker, and you will get to see how many you have opened. This is a fantastic quality of life feature, and eliminates my fear of missing something while exploring. These chests often have unique weapons or armor in them, so finding all of them is very important. Each POI other than generic mines are interesting and often have environmental storytelling to engage with, which I'm a fan of.
However, not all of the exploration gameplay loop is perfect. I have issues with two main aspects - fast travel and the treasure maps. I have a complicated relationship with fast travel. I don't enjoy doing it most of the time, or at least I don't enjoy the idea of doing it if there is any gameplay to be had while traveling. This game has plenty to do while traveling, so I tried not to fast travel too much, but I found myself getting lazy in the late game and fast traveling everywhere. You can place down several fast travel points on docks on any island you want. I only used 1 at a time, along with the built-in fast travel points on important islands. If you wanted to, you could get through most of the game by only sailing to most islands manually a single time. You would miss so much emergent gameplay - both combat and discovering unknown locations. However, if you don't have time for that, this game facilitates it very well with highly convenient fast travel. You can also cheese your way out of many naval fights by fast traveling before the first shot lands.
The other complaint I have on this topic is the treasure maps. When you get a map, it is added to your journal, and you can look at it at any time. However, you will never need to because a big red X is added to your world and mini-map. You can sail to the island, walk right up using the mini-map, and find the treasure. There is no treasure hunt. There is only a treasure errand. For contrast, in Sea of Thieves, you get a paper map. There is no UI for this. You just hold the map and look at it, then compare it to the paper map on your ship to find an island that kind of looks like that. It feels real, immersive, and rewarding. You actually expend effort in hunting for it, rather than being told right where it is. I was deeply disappointed to find that one of the most thematically pertinent adventures a pirate game can have was boiled down to an errand, no harder than running to the store to get some milk.
The final part of exploration that I'd like to mention is the unique faction locations. Each is dripping in style. Especially the city of Tortuga - it is the largest of these locations, and it is very interesting to discover initially. It is a bit small, and parts are clearly blocked off that should be accessible later in early access. I'm excited to see more of that area.
Combat
This is a close 2nd for me in terms of parts of the game that I enjoy. Windrose has a much tighter combat system than something like Ark or Conan, and leans more towards a Soulslike style. While not as punishing or exact, it still rewards patience, precision and knowledge of the enemy. The combat revolves around 3 main things: "Posture", melee, and ranged. You can block, which uses up posture, or dodge which uses stamina. If you block at the perfect time, it counts as a "perfect block" and the enemy loses posture instead of you. If you hit an enemy while they're not blocking, they also lose posture. If either combatant reaches 0 posture, they will be unable to guard or move for a short time. Your goal is to make your enemy lose posture and absolutely wail on them while they're down. Of course, you could also just shoot them with one of the many ranged weapons, which cannot be blocked. I particularly enjoyed this, and felt like Indiana Jones every time someone ran at me with a sword, only to lose their face to a blunderbuss.
The weapons in this game are very interesting. There is one generic version of each weapon type, like saber, greatsword, mace, pistol, blunderbuss, etc. There are also several unique variations of each. These are not randomly generated - each one is hand crafted to provide a unique and balanced experience. For example, the Rapier of a Thousand Cuts is a very weak rapier that does very little base damage, but each hit adds a stack of bleed, which can get up to 10 at once. Pair that with one of the unique pistols that adds a 10% incoming damage increase to the enemy, which does apply to bleed damage, and you can play defensively while your enemies melt in front of your eyes. All you have to do is poke them once in a while to top off the bleed. There are so many combinations of weapons that compliment each other, I beat the game and felt like I barely scratched the surface of the various combat styles.
This is made even better by the perks and attributes available to you. Attributes are your standard stats. One makes health go up, one makes stamina go up, one helps critical chance, and some improve certain weapon types' damage. The perks are the interesting part. There are several unique perks you can get upon gaining a level that synergize with certain damage types or movement abilities. With my rapier, I bought some perks that let me regain health upon inflicting damage, so if someone hit me, my bleed stacks would immediately start healing me.
The amount of viable builds with all of these factors combined is enormous. That being said, it doesn't feel overpowered. Some enemies are so punishing that all of these superpowers you get feel justified. The skill ceiling is very high, but it never feels like the enemies are worthless. Most importantly, the enemies aren't hard because they have a lot of health. They are hard because they can kill you just as quickly as you can kill them. You often must respect the enemies as much as you would respect a hostile human player. That is one of the most generous compliments I can give to any game's combat.
Sailing
The sailing in any pirate game is essential. It wouldn't be a pirate game without it. This game makes it very enjoyable, even if it's not nearly as immersive or realistic as some others, namely Sea of Thieves. There is a distinct lack of interactivity on the ship. You can steer it, change the sails (which work more like a throttle), fire cannons, and access an ethereal storage interface which is somehow smaller than your pockets. That's it. There is no ringing the little bell, you cannot climb up to the crow's nest, you can't interact with any of the sailors, or really do anything at all below deck. That being said, I loved it. The ship-to-ship combat was very satisfying. You can craft and upgrade cannons, hull reinforcements, and crew gear. The former two are self-explanatory, just improving damage and sometimes giving you some buffs, and the crew gear improves your crew's combat stats when you board another ship.
To board a ship, you just damage it to a low percentage and it will stop. If you get alongside it you can initiate boarding, and your crew hops over and starts fighting with theirs. Once you kill a certain number of enemies, it is considered won,you get extra spoils, and the ship will start sinking. This is fun, but it can get annoying if you die, and have to sail all the way back because you got stuck on an invisible wall, which happened 5 or more times in my playthrough.
Base Building
The base building in this game is mediocre. It's not bad, but it's not great. Not all styles have full tile sets. For example, if I want an arch in my stone brick castle, the only option is a plaster arch that looks out of place. This can be chalked up to early access, so I'm not too upset about it. Actually placing the objects is easy, as it has a nice snapping system. However, you are free to disable snapping for incredibly precise placement, which helps when snapping different size pieces causes inconsistencies with parts of a structure.
Similar to Valheim, there is a "structural integrity" mechanic that prevents you from noob poling to oblivion or making an infinitely long single block bridge. It is pretty generous in its limits though, so it never became a problem in my relatively large castle build.
The interior building leaves a bit to be desired, which I also believe will be improved during early access. There are quite a few decorations, but just not enough to match the type of decoration/base building they're going for.
Story and Progression
This is one of the weakest parts of the game, in my opinion. Each quest has someone to talk to or maybe a note you find to start the quest. Your character has no agency, and the entire questline feels like it could be completed without the input of any NPC involved, aside from a few key items or plot points provided by those NPCs. The writing is fine, but if you were expecting any sort of character development, or any NPC to have any investment in the story, you will be disappointed. Still, games in this genre aren't known for these things, so it comes out ahead of games like Valheim and ARK. Conan may have it beat, but much of Conan's story comes from environmental storytelling and lore.
Pirate Style
This is the keystone of the entire experience. This game has some great things going for it, but I feel like it would all fall apart if it wasn't so thoroughly dripping with style. Even if some parts of the game aren't the most immersive, every single step of the way you can easily get into the role of a pirate. During the game, I knew it was a game, it felt like a game, not a simulation, but I felt more like a pirate than I have with any other pirate game, even Sea of Thieves. Everything is so perfectly orchestrated to facilitate you giving off a pirate vibe, that it's easy to ignore most of its shortcomings in favor of "doing cool pirate stuff".
The way NPCs talk, the music, the visual design of every single inch of the game, and the actions that you are encouraged to take all add to this. This game knows exactly where it wanted to be on the "fun vs realism" spectrum, and it leans towards the former. The rule of cool is the #1 rule in this game.
Technical
Now it's time for everyone's favorite part of any review - technical nitpicking! Yay!
While on average, this game has been very fun and impressive, on the technical side it was a constant annoyance. Luckily, gameplay bugs weren't very common, but that's where the good news ends.
The game does not run very well. I play on Linux, but to give it a fair shot I also installed it on Windows. (It ran slightly better on Linux.) This is understandable, as the game is in very early access. I am sure it will get a hefty optimization pass closer to release, which is very much needed.
Another issue the game has is its menus. Sometimes I had to click twice on certain menu options. If I tabbed out, I would have to click on the game window once to make it active, then again to click a menu item, even if the menu item highlighted on the first click. And the most annoying one - the game doesn't save your direct IP, port, or password when you connect to a dedicated server. You have to type those things every single time. If you use a join code, it does save that, but you still have to type the password in every time. I do like that it gives you multiple ways to connect to a server - direct IP should always be available for any game in my opinion, as I don't like relying on a 3rd party relay if I don't have to.
And this one could arguably go in the Story and Progression section, but it's more of a technical detail in my opinion. The quest progression in this game is shared among all players on a server. Meaning if you log off for a couple days and your friends are playing without you, you can come back to a completely different situation, have missed several plot points and have access to tons and tons of resources and waypoints that you didn't earn. It's the same as games like Core Keeper. I prefer how Conan and Valheim do it, where each boss and quest progress is tied to each player, and you can complete it at your pace even if you share a base with someone.
Conclusion
There are several points, both good and bad, for this game. However, I think the good far outweighs the bad. It was an absolute blast to play through, and I would recommend it to anyone who likes any of the games I've compared it to. One of my favorite parts about this game (I know I've said that a lot, but there are so many good parts I have a hard time deciding) is that it doesn't overstay its welcome. You get in, have a 30-90 hour adventure, and get out. There's an end to the story, an end to the progression without a massive grind for endgame gear and XP (looking at you, ARK), and a hard level cap that is easy to reach before you finish the game. Of course, this will change as new areas and bosses are added. But seeing as how the team has done so well crafting it up until this point, I have faith it will keep this feeling throughout development.
In short, if you enjoy crafting or combat, or you just want to have some fun pirate shenanigans, this is the game for you. The game facilitates cooperative play very well, too. While I would still recommend it if you go solo, I would highly recommend playing it with friends if possible. And the best way to do that is with a dedicated server from Akliz, which you can do here.
All images are either official artwork/screenshots from Kraken Express, or my own screenshots.