Ori and the Will of the Wisps
Last updated: 2025-03-09
- Visually stunning, an artistic masterpiece.
- Dynamic, challenging combat system.
- Fluid platforming, rewarding exploration.
- Moving, emotionally impactful story.
- Inconsistent and frustrating difficulty.
- Poor map design and navigation.
Verdict
Mostly positive
Summary
Positive 92% · Negative 8%. Score: 8 / 100
Positives:
- The game features stunning visuals, often described as painterly, with detailed environments, fluid animations, and a vibrant color palette. Reviewers consistently praise the art style, noting its emotional impact and seamless integration with the music and gameplay. Many consider it a benchmark for artistic presentation in gaming.
- The game features a dynamic and engaging combat system with a variety of unlockable and upgradeable abilities. Boss fights are well-designed and challenging, requiring players to learn mechanics and utilize skills strategically. The combat improvements are frequently highlighted as a major strength compared to previous installments.
- The game offers fluid and responsive platforming mechanics, making movement enjoyable and precise. New abilities enhance exploration, encouraging players to revisit areas and discover secrets. The level design is clever and rewarding, providing a satisfying sense of accomplishment.
- The game features a deeply moving and emotionally impactful story that explores themes of friendship, sacrifice, and hope. The narrative is often conveyed through visuals and music, evoking strong emotions in players. Many reviewers found the story to be a highlight, with some even brought to tears.
- The game boasts an exceptional soundtrack and sound design that enhances the atmosphere and emotional impact. The music adapts to different scenes and characters, blending seamlessly with the environment. Many reviewers consider the soundtrack to be among the best in video games.
Negatives:
- Many reviewers found the game's difficulty to be inconsistent and frustrating. Specific complaints include an unbalanced normal difficulty, damage-sponge enemies, reliance on external factors in boss fights, and a lack of invincibility frames, leading to a reliance on trial and error.
- The game suffers from a lack of clear guidance, leading to player frustration, getting lost, and reliance on external guides. This issue manifests in unclear objectives, confusing map design, and a lack of tutorials for new mechanics, making progression difficult and potentially discouraging for new players.
- The game's map design and navigation are frequently criticized. Reviewers cite issues such as confusing layouts, a lack of useful map markers, excessive backtracking, and an unintuitive UI, making exploration tedious and hindering the overall experience.
- Several reviewers reported experiencing technical issues such as frame rate drops, stuttering, screen freezing, and game crashes. Some also reported save data loss, which can be particularly frustrating and discouraging.
- The game's controls, particularly with keyboard and mouse, are often described as difficult, uncomfortable, and requiring significant practice. Specific issues include awkward keybindings, key conflicts, and a lack of smoothness, leading many to recommend using a gamepad instead.
Gameplay:
- The game is a 2D Metroidvania-style platformer with a large, interconnected map that encourages exploration and backtracking. Players acquire new abilities and upgrades to access previously inaccessible areas, solve puzzles, and discover secrets. The level design is masterful, with areas flowing seamlessly and guiding the player using visual cues.
- The game features a shard system, similar to Hollow Knight's charms, where different shards can be equipped to dynamically change the gameplay experience. Players can modify Ori's abilities using spirit shards, such as increasing arrow speed or firing multiple arrows. Players can change active and passive skills at any time, even during boss fights, allowing for quick adjustments to tactics.
- The game features a central village area with NPCs offering optional side quests that extend the game's duration and enhance exploration. Side quests have small stories, and player actions in them have consequences that are reflected throughout the playthrough. The game also features a progression system, inventory, trading, and village development through resource collection.
- The game requires players to use their brains to solve puzzles. The powers are varied and the puzzles are well designed. The game presents occasional challenges.
- The game features numerous boss fights, some with story significance, creating epic and melancholic moments. Bosses have unique attack patterns and combat styles, but are not the main focus. Some boss battles incorporate chase sequences as phases, enhancing tension and immersion.
Performance:
- Many players report that the game is well-optimized and runs smoothly, even on lower-end hardware. This makes the game accessible to a wider audience and contributes to a positive gameplay experience. Some reviewers specifically praise the smooth animation and improved graphics without performance drops.
- Several reviews mention long loading times for maps, new rooms, and warping, as well as slow menu navigation. Additionally, some players have experienced desynchronized cutscenes with audio playing at incorrect speeds. These loading and synchronization issues detract from the overall experience.
- The game supports HDR, with some players finding it amazing. However, others note a lack of options to properly configure HDR settings, such as example pictures, which could improve the user experience.
- Some players experienced slowdowns with VSync enabled in specific areas, creating a slow-motion effect. Disabling VSync resolved this issue, suggesting a potential conflict or optimization problem related to VSync implementation.
- One reviewer reported that water textures sometimes appear as pixelated mosaics. This is a specific graphical glitch that detracts from the visual fidelity of the game.
Recommendations:
- The game is overwhelmingly praised as a masterpiece, a must-play, and an unforgettable experience, with many reviewers considering it one of the best games ever. Reviewers highlight its artistic merit, emotional impact, and overall quality, often awarding perfect scores and recommending it to a wide range of players.
- Many reviewers suggest playing the first game, Ori and the Blind Forest, before Will of the Wisps to fully appreciate the story and evolution of the series. However, some reviewers state that the first game is not necessary to enjoy the second, or even recommend playing the second game first due to its improvements.
- Reviewers frequently mention that the game is worth its price, especially when purchased on sale. Some even suggest it's worth full price or more, highlighting its value for the entertainment and experience it provides.
- Some reviewers found the gameplay frustrating, citing difficulty, repetitive combat, and design choices. A few reviewers strongly disliked the game, while others acknowledged its flaws but still found it worth playing.
- The game is recommended for fans of specific genres like Metroidvanias, platformers, and side-scrollers. Some reviewers also suggest it as a good entry point into the Metroidvania genre, while others compare it favorably to similar games like Hollow Knight.
Miscellaneous:
- The game requires a general PC configuration and has a workable size between 10-20 GB. The playtime is medium, roughly 20-40 hours, with around 16 hours of constant, non-repetitive gameplay.
- The game is primarily a single-player experience with no online mode. The story is a continuation of the previous game, but it can also be enjoyed as a standalone story.
- The story revolves around themes of love, care, and guidance, focusing on the relationships between characters and their personal growth. It's a touching tale of separation and reunion, with the main character, an elf, on an adventure to become a guardian spirit and protect the peace.
- The game is considered suitable for all ages, including kids, teens, adults, and the elderly, making it accessible to a wide audience.
- The game is best experienced with an XBOX controller or gamepad, as it was designed for Xbox, making it easier to play.
