The combat feels kind of disjointed, for example, especially when you’re armed only with a knife. This second playthrough proved to be much more substantial, but it also highlighted some of the game’s bigger problems. I eventually gave up and restarted the game from scratch, figuring the deck was stacked against me/Kara. Eventually, I scrounged together enough grasses to build a boat, only to arrive at my second island and find it populated by a giant, aggressive, bull-like creature that wouldn’t let me get anywhere near any other resources. There were no materials for a fire, so I had to eat the meat raw, which in turn did something to my stamina. On my first playthrough, my first island was pretty much barren save for a wild boar that I had to chase and stab to death (which, as a side note, was kind of unpleasant, seeing as the boar seemed to be smiling). You have to keep her fed to keep her energy up to allow her to hunt, gather, craft, and all the other elements you’d expect from a game like this.įirst, Windbound is procedurally-generated, which means that you’re surviving at the whim of a game that didn’t seem entirely balanced, at least in my experience. The whole game is built around keeping the main character, Kara, alive as she navigates across the seas from island to island.

Instead, as I said, it’s all about survival.

Sure, I knew that the game was about a lost explorer/warrior trying to find her way home, but I’d based my expectations for the game on the reveal trailer, which gave off a Wind Waker/Breath of the Wild vibe - and needless to say, Windbound is definitely not either of those games. I’m putting that right up front in this review, because I wasn’t fully aware of that fact going in.

Windbound review switch