From Aery to Windborn
I’ve been following EpiXR Video games’ ‘Little Hen’ video games pretty carefully, just about because the launch of the very first Aery – Little Hen Journey again in 2019.
Since then, because the years have handed, issues have advanced barely. Aery has most positively been the prime sequence, the primary focus of EpiXR, however they’ve managed to wrangle out a number of different franchises, with Lifetime of Fly working as an umbrella for the Homicide Diaries, Paper Flight, Paper Airplane Enviornment and Paper Sprint video games.
Mainly, each a kind of has you taking management of a flying protagonist, left to soar excessive into the sky, as enjoyable overtones play out. I’ve not performed each single a kind of video games, however I’ve actually frolicked with the overwhelming majority of them; some are good, some are, frankly, not.
And now we have now Windborn: Journey to the South. I don’t assume I’m being too harsh to say that it’s the worst of the lot. It’s the one which has pissed off us essentially the most, in any case.
Taking Flight with a Flock
In Windborn: Journey to the South you are taking cost of a bit chook (shock horror), flying excessive above quite a lot of landscapes (a seashore setting, farmland, an icy-world and extra), every signifying a special stage. Nothing to shock there it’s possible you’ll assume, as that’s what EpiXR have supplied with each single a kind of video games talked about beforehand. The distinction then? The allowance for a change of identify and – probably – debut of a brand new sequence? Properly, you aren’t the one little chook on this huge open sky. You’ve gotten pals. A flock to tag on to.
Your aim in Windborn: Journey to the South is to comply with your fellow avian pals by way of a sequence of rings, every opening up a pathway to the following. Holding in contact with them will, finally, see you occur upon an finish ring, a remaining aim, earlier than you’re left to flap your technique to a brand new stage; 11 of that are current in whole.
Irritating Flaws: Visible Glitches and Gameplay Annoyances
Alongside the way in which, velocity increase rings assist support your flight, and flying by way of these ensures you’ll be able to nearly sustain along with your flock. Fall too far behind, take a unsuitable flip, and your mates will attain their nest, leaving you battling a brief timer. If the clock ought to hit zero, Windborn: Journey to the South pushes you again to the beginning of the stage, left to try to show your self as a part of this flock as soon as once more.
On the floor, that sounds nice. It takes the solo adventuring of Aery and supplies some sort of companionship; a purpose for being, a have to fly. In follow although, Windborn: Journey to the South just about fails to ship.
In actual fact, we’ve walked away from our 90 minutes or so with Windborn: Journey to the South totally irritated by an entire lack of polish and care. Bear in mind how we stated this was the worst of the EpiXR Video games titles we had performed…
Windborn’s Technical Points and Stage Design
11 phases make up the easy marketing campaign that’s current in Windborn: Journey to the South, though solely 10 truly play out after one another. To entry the ultimate stage (the one one with out an achievement connected, seemingly tagged onto the tip with out a care), you’ll want to move into the menus, the extent choose display screen, and choose it out from a listing.
Whether or not you want to play Stage 11 although will most likely be dictated by how the earlier ten phases work. In case your expertise is something like ours, that will probably be a case of discovering extra failure than success.
Why? Properly, let me run by way of issues for you, so you may get an angle on how Windborn: Journey to the South performs.
Stage 1 is totally nice, and also you’ll fly by way of it with ease, rising excessive, diving deep, barrel-rolling with all the liberty you want, all as you hit these rings, pathways evolving there on out. However then issues take a flip.
Stage 2 is terrible, with extra visible pop-in and hesitant graphical drawings than we ever care to see. We failed that stage a number of instances, largely as these all-important rings didn’t materialise, leaving us misplaced excessive within the sky, unable to trace our route or hit an finish aim.
The identical occurred in Stage 3, and 5 (with one ring popping in a complete jungle of timber that have been close to impassable), in addition to ranges 6, 7 and 10. The visible pop-in being about as unhealthy as we might ever think about.
Weirdly, ranges 4, 8 and 9 have been a lot much less trouble, largely because the landscapes and requirement for Windborn: Journey to the South to populate the world with background belongings was much less intensive.
No matter, we’re making that a couple of 40% hit fee on whether or not the phases in Windborn: Journey to the South can be satisfactory with none type of trouble. In our eyes, that’s utterly unacceptable. Think about that this took us 90 minutes or so to finish, and every stage is over in round 5 minutes, and also you’ll quick see how the variety of frustrations have been all that padded out our Journey to the South.
Weirdnesses proceed as Stage 10 is accomplished and the sport chucks you again to the primary splash display screen, all as the ultimate achievement pings, 1000 Gamerscore within the bag. Maybe EpiXR don’t need us to play Stage 11? Who is aware of.
Silence within the Skies
In case you do handle to battle your approach by way of, you’ll discover that, other than that visible pop-in, Windborn: Journey to the South is clean sufficient. Your little chook is simple to manage, and while we see zero purpose to take advantage of some barrel-rolls, and inverted controls ought to 100% be switched on by default, guiding this man by way of the rings is easy sufficient. Till these rings vanish, reappear after which vanish once more, in fact.
There are additionally annoyances in any hit reactions and must you get too near the remainder of your flock, could effectively end up being pinged this manner and that. At one level, as we approached a stage finish, clock counting down, we mysteriously whacked into one other chook, acquired thrown into the ceiling of the stage, left to glitch on the spot for a great few seconds. One other event noticed us pushed again a number of rings earlier, possibilities of finishing the stage gone.
It’s solely in these collisions with different birds the place any sound results come to the fore, and even then Windborn: Journey to the South depends on a easy old-school beep-boop to indicate a collision. Apart from that, there may be not a single sound to return from this little chook’s adventures; not even on the flap of the wings. Though, and we assume we imagined this, we could have heard a flap as soon as. That’s bizarre too, as a result of we quickly dived into the settings to change off the ultra-repetitive, phone-hold soundtrack that was accompanying our flights. However to play in close to utter silence simply compounded the weirdness of the sport.
A Disappointing Flight with Technical Turbulence
You’ll be glad when Windborn: Journey to the South is over, totally understanding why EpiXR have determined to separate this from the in any other case first rate Aery sequence. With visible pop-in that’s off the dimensions, whether or not you possibly can full a stage with out trouble and annoyance very a lot seems like it’s within the fingers of the avian gods. And no quantity of zen-like promise will ever overcome that.
Essential Hyperlinks
Windborn: Journey to the South Takes Flight on Xbox – https://www.thexboxhub.com/windborn-journey-to-the-south-takes-flight-on-xbox/
Purchase Windborn: Journey to the South on Xbox – https://www.xbox.com/en-gb/video games/retailer/windborn-journey-to-the-south/9PPTBGBWZ06F