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Review: LostWinds Is Sweet, but Very Short

LostWinds is a great little WiiWare game. Emphasis on the little.

Arguably the premiere title for Nintendo’s recently launched games-on-demand service for Wii, LostWinds is in most every respect a model Wii game: It’s fun, it’s novel and it uses the Wiimote’s controls in a unique and fun way. Only problem is, about two hours in — just as I was getting into it and having a ball — the game ended.

It’s a shame, because I was completely engaged in the story and world. LostWinds is the tale of Toku, a young boy who as near as I can tell is cursed with the inability to jump. This is a crippling character flaw for a would-be hero of a 2-D platforming game. Luckily, he has help. The wind spirit, Enril, teams up with Toku to blow him hither and yon, up sharp cliffs and across wide gaps.

The clever conceit here is that you control both Toku (the charming young lad pictured above) and Enril (the blue square). You move Toku around with the joystick, and Enril is controlled like a cursor with the Wiimote. To make the wind blow, you hold down the A button and draw a line across the screen.

This will carry Toku away on a gust of wind, but it’ll also do a whole host of other things: Move objects, destroy enemies or activate switches, to name three. The gameplay thus revolves around using your powers to get Toku from place to place unharmed, finding new powers and upgrading Enril until the two of your are powerful enough to take on a boss monster.

It all works very well. The Wiimote control is accurate, and moving Toku around is just challenging enough at first that you feel like a total genius when you finally get the hang of it. Master LostWinds’ gameplay mechanics and you can easily move Toku (and anything else) anywhere you like, on the winds.

The graphics and music are fantastic. The art design is quite
reminiscent of Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker, and the soundtrack is a
lovely, calming, flutes-and-things arrangement. LostWinds is on the whole an entrancing game experience, and I enjoyed every second.

But only for about two hours and 11 minutes, in my case.

It’s actually not the length that left me wanting so much more. It’s the depth. LostWinds sets up a whole variety of different powers for Toku and creates a few clever puzzles out of them. But the whole game feels like an extended tutorial: The puzzles are basic and simple, and you never even get to the more complex ones that your gamer-sense tells you are coming.

Really, I don’t mind short games per se. I just believe that games should only be as long as they need to be. The trouble with LostWinds, and with Penny Arcade Adventures, which was released earlier this week, is that the end comes just as things are getting exciting. These are both the inaugural episodes in ongoing series — developer Frontier has said that a LostWinds sequel is forthcoming — so we’ll be getting more soon. But it’s like eating an appetizer and then having to wait forever for dinner.

So, should you buy LostWinds? If you like games with beautifully crafted atmosphere and clever gameplay concepts, by all means. It’s only $10. But don’t be surprised if you finish it in a single gameplay session.

– Chris Kohler

WIRED Beautiful graphics and music, clever use of Wiimote, quite fun

TIRED 2:11

$20, Frontier

Rating:

Read Game|Life’s game ratings guide.

Images courtesy Nintendo

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 10th, 2008 at 7:51 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Review: LostWinds Is Sweet, but Very Short

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