They are far from perfect, and some motions still have oddities about them, but the step up from “horrifying to look at” to “fine” is significant.Īs before, Windstorm has four gaits called Walk, Trot, Gallop and Sprint instead of using the word ‘Canter’ anywhere because this is a German game and equestrian language differences are a bit tricky. The horse animations in Ari’s Arrival are a vast improvement. In the first Windstorm game, the animation quality was somewhere between weird and awful. Dialogue and voice acting are solid, with the English translation being of noticeably higher quality than that of its predecessor.
Impulsive tomboy Ari is likeable enough as a main character, with her deadpan skepticism and destructive tendencies making for a nice change of pace. The narrative tackles aspects of finding home and family, with some missions and dialogue delving into the mythical to hint at why exactly the energies of Mika, Ari and Windstorm are linked. In some parts of the story, the budget constraints are obvious when action is told through text rather than showing it, but it does feel like the team did well within said constraints. It is told through 2D character art, text boxes and voice acting, with very few animated cutscenes. The story still follows a few well established horse girl tropes, but mostly manages to skirt around being too cliché. Unlike the first game where missions had very low narrative stakes, your main mission tasks in Ari’s Arrival eventually revolve around saving the Kaltenbach Ranch from the influence of its new manager Isabell, whose ambitions prioritize fame and money over the wellbeing of animals and people. After the first few linear missions, you thus land out in the wild with the horse by your side and a wide open world at your feet and hooves. The game does a decent job of introducing all the characters you need to know though, and you soon realize that Ari and Windstorm are just about perfect for each other and can help each other get better. Since I didn’t watch the movie nor the two other films that lay between beyond trailers and rough plot summaries, I’m obviously lacking some context here. She soon meets the stallion Windstorm, who is having issues because Mika – magical horse girl extraordinaire and the only person who could ride him – is in a coma. Like the movie it’s based on, Ari’s Arrival replaces previous main character Mika with troubled child Ari, who comes to Kaltenbach Ranch after her latest violent outburst cost her a foster family. The first one does nothing at all to introduce relevant characters in any case, making Ari’s Arrival a vastly better entry point. One note before we start: Although I make some comparisons between the two games in this article, I strongly recommend not playing the first one and jumping right into this one instead, if you have an interest in this franchise. If you have not read it yet, I strongly recommend a look at my interview with Aesir’s CEO Wolfgang Emmer, where he shares a lot of valuable insight into this game’s development, and why the version that was launched in early 2019 differs so significantly to the version I’m reviewing today.
And at the same time I have to admit that we’ve all been sleeping on this one, because it really gets a whole bunch of things right, and deserves vastly more attention from horse-loving players than it has been getting. In a way, this may have worked in the game’s favor: since its initial release, there have been two patches that made drastic improvements. But after being severely disappointed by its predecessor, seeing that the game only had “mixed” reviews on Steam and noticing a lack of interest in the community whenever I held votes for what to cover next, this review got pushed back multiple times on the priorities list. I’ve been meaning to review it basically ever since – promising articles and then taking a year or two to write them is a bit of theme on this site. Windstorm - Ari’s Arrival, created by German studio Aesir Interactive, was released along with the movie of the same name in March 2019.
0 kommentar(er)
