Ori and the Will of The Wisps is the long-awaited sequel to Ori and The Blind Forest which is often deemed as one of Moon Studio’s best works. The sequel builds upon the first installment and improves on almost every aspect.
Astounding Graphics and Animations
During my entire playthrough, I couldn’t help but just wander around in awe at the beauty of the game. Each 2D level is designed with an unbelievable amount of detail. Layers upon layers of animation frames are stitched together in such a way that it makes each level look as immersive as possible. From the depths of the green forest to the Inskmarsh waters, each new location seems like a totally different world.
The beautiful environment is also widely tied to the gameplay. Wisps encourage exploration as some of the most powerful abilities you unlock require much of it. After all, it is a Metroidvania game at its core.
Other than that, Wisps has something for all types of gamers, whether you are in it for the intense boss fights, the beautiful animations, the heart-wrenching story or the novel score, it is bound to instantly hook you no matter what.
The platforming is breathtaking. The huge skill and ability tree are slowly built throughout your playtime. Yes, each of the abilities takes a fair bit of grinding, but by the time you unlock the next ability, the previous one will become your second nature thus revealing the brilliance of the game design.
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Immersive Gameplay and Combat System
Combat is by far the area that has seen the most amount of change. This time around, the game is heavily focused on the combat system. Attacks in Blind Forest were minimal while it is the core of gameplay in Wisps. You have a bow from the start and can unlock more weapons as you progress (even a perpetual lightsaber! ). The wide variety of skill sets also make the game unique to match every play style. The heavy emphasis on combat, however, doesn’t mean it will suddenly become Hollow Knight-ish game but for those who are looking for something different, it is definitely a breath of fresh air.
Boss Fights after Boss Fights
The huge increase in boss fights over the last game is highly noticeable. Not only the boss encounters have increased, but the fights have also grown longer and harder. This particular section was however somewhat deviating from the original spirit of Blind Forest as this game puts heavy emphasis on boss fights rather than the seance or intense platforming that its predecessor offered.
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Heart-Wrenching Story
Without going into too many details, the story is just as beautiful as the previous one. Moon Studio has managed to deliver such a beautiful story without any voice acting. A lot of depth is also present because of the new interactive NPCs who provide more to the lore and the ongoing story. All of that results in one of the best story experiences in a game.
Performance
This game is reviewed on a PC. Even with mid-range specifications ( An RTX 2060 SUPER w/ Ryzen 5 3600X), Ori suffered from more than a few hiccups. There were FPS drops, random freezes, clutters and many other performance issues. Also included were the huge number of bugs. Future updates are however supposed to fix these problems and Moon Studios are already mentioned that they are working on it.
Verdict
Will of the Wisps is everything you would want in a sequel. There is so much stuff other games could learn from the book of Ori. 5 years is a long time for any sequel and its good to see that Moon Studios put this amount of effort in the sequel to polish it as close to perfection as possible. Ori and The Will of The Wisps is a certified must play and recommend by Gameriv. Just keep an eye on the latest patches as bugs are the only reason this game isn’t a 10/10 right now.