E3 2018 - Ori and the Will of the Wisps Hands On

There was something special about Ori and the Blind Forest, the game was beautiful to look at and even without any conversations, it was still able to create a story that made you care, there are videos of players crying whilst playing it. The sequel was announced last year and was playable at E3 this year and I was able to go hands on with it.

Of course, getting it right out of the way, the game still looks beautiful, perhaps even more so than the first game, there is more layers, that are added to the game, to help sell the world. The demo started out with Ori just standing in an open space, surrounded by lots of dead trees and sand, in fact the entire space was desolate, but that does not mean peaceful. There were a number of enemies around the world, from the purple slug things that would shoot out projectiles in multiple directions, to the nasty and fast coyote looking thing, who, if it spotted you, would leap towards you and deal some significant damage.

The most important to know though is that the game still plays as well as the first, but there are now more skills and options available to you, the best being the burrowing ability. In order to get that one, I had to wall jump, air dash and grapple my way around the map and once found, the giant piles of sand that are filling in gaps everywhere, became a massive playground for me. However, they were not all safe, some contained worms that would burrow through the sand, only to lunge out from it to attack Ori.

The demo required that I collect two tablets, to unlock the door, just like the first game, so its not going to vastly change things up, at least not at this stage, but for those what just wanted more Ori, it looks like you are getting your wish here. One thing I did notice, but not dive into, was that you could swap out a lot of abilities to the face buttons, so instead of a ranged bow attack, you might change it to a ground pound, I honestly can’t recall if this was in the first game, but it is here now.

Ori and the Will of the Wisps may not be changing the game too much, but that’s ok by me, given that it is expected to be bigger than the first and now has more powers and skills to use, this could be one impressive game when it releases in 2019.