A Valley Without Wind

A complete mess of a platformer. The controls hinder the platforming in general, but what hinders the game from the very beginning is its ghastly visuals that just look like stock images. And if you thought the visuals were bad enough, it gets worse from the fact that the brightness in the game is abysmal. I don't think the developers thought that well ahead with the effects of darkness in each corner to the point where you are unable to see anything to progress. The combat is also very shoddy and just like the controls, it's extremely difficult to dodge enemies and get around places.

Imagine a game that might be fun but 90% of the time you don't know what the ♥♥♥♥ is going on. There are help bubbles but they don't even make sense. EDIT I played more and now it makes sense but isn't fun yet You need to place wind shelters which make you do missions where you constantly lose health in a game where you get hit for 30 just going through a door You just need to avoid Anchronism missions because you die, endlessly You need to send people on missions to lower final boss level or he'll be X levels over you (depends on difficulty) but if your town is rolled with no one having the right spec....IDK what to do If you are killed by a boss and your ghost decides to stay youre ♥♥♥♥♥♥, I couldnt find a way to kill my ghost, and the boss is still there killing you You can't go through doors while in combat even though theres nothing saying you cant in a tooltip or a "this door is locked" text thing The games concept is good tho

I know it's clunky, and starting a new game is AGONY if you are used to having triple jump and near infinite mana before, but I still like it. A Valley Without Wind will always be one of my top "Games I'll randomly go back to every now and then." For me at least, the only bad part is simply that getting legendary enchants is dumb and takes like a thousand years. I want that 100% achievement rating, yo. >:o

UPDATED REVIEW FOR 2024 I honestly love this game, and I can't bring myself to think of it as bad, I still play it once in a while,so i'll still thumbs it up, but it's one of those rare cases where I also understand and agree with the negative criticism it received. Take this part as warning, old review is kept at the bottom. Basically the game is guilty of two things. The first one is that it tried to blend too much genras into a single game. Sometimes this can be good, but here every genra taken individually got dumbed down from their initial material. If you expect a perfectly crafted Procedurally generated RPG Roguelike Metroid Dread feat terraria feat civilisation, this isn't it for you. To go further into the genra rabbithole, some missions are taken from freefall and missile command, and the city building is more akind to an upgraded version of Utopia on intellivision (if you even know that game) Great game for it's time, but it's perfectly understandable why it might have felt lacking in 2012. The second one is that a lot of core base mechanics in any of those genras are hidden behind either lore technobabble or interact with each other. For instance, usual platforming mechanics like double tap run, powerslide, double jump, negate fall damage, immunity to acid water is on the enchants(gear) you find. Or in most RPGs, they will tell you that your main character has the fire element. Here you might wonder what even forgical arts is.(It's the fire element). It makes the game appear more complicated than it actually is. But there are a few good things that aren't apparent at first that should be said about the game. Every area has an era and a element tied to it. So you want your earth buildings on mountains, you want your farms on grassland, you want to bring fire spells in the ocean, you want to rescue survivors in this specific area because different eras gives different bonus and so on. The procedurally generated levels can also go into rabbit holes where you can get a dungeon that has a secret mission, then the dungeon also has a sub dungeon that has an house in it and so forth. All in all, it's some kind of weird unique mash up with a very distinctive vibe to it, Pablo Vega made an awesome soundtrack, and if you don't expect much of it, can wrap your head around it and you like the vibe, there is some enjoyment to be found. ------------------------- I recently reinstalled all my ARCEN games, and wanted to make a review of AVWW1,because yes, while it is mostly a 2D sidescrolling game (most reviews will tell you it is), to understand the game completely requires a different mindset. A Valley without Wind 1, is a Real Time strategy game where your character is both the worker and the only unit you have. There it is. That's what makes the game special. You have to balance exactly three things perfectly in order to win against the overlord and go to the next continent. Do I have enough resources? Are my spells high level enough? Have I pushed the wind far back enough? These questions entangle themselves beautifully in the actions you are going to make and the choices you can make for grand strategy purposes. Gathering resources requires exploration, and completing missions. Doing this requires the appropriate spells, having the right buildings on the map, pushing the wind back so you can build more and explore even moreso. And so on. The main complaint to have about the game is that, to really be two feet into how it works, and have a bit of challenge, you need to beat the first continent, which is about 10 hours of play. Though you can start the game, when creating a new world, to the second continent, which is greatly appreciated. Everything is procedurally generated, the exploration is nice, there is a bit of a melancholic feel to the game that I appreciate as it makes it more a relaxing experience than anything. The graphics are not top of the line, but are quite pleasing, and ARCEN games are not about graphics in the first place, more like niche gameplay mechanics you cannot find elsewhere. The replayability is literally endless. I mean, you could literally play the game until your computer buffer overflows.

A Valley Without Wind is a hard game. After my 3rd attempt to play it I actually could like it a little. There are lots of things to do in this game but only if you are up to spending many hours exploring places, fighting bosses and such. The biggest turn off and reason why many players give up on this game is red slime on the beginning. But everything you can learn is included in-game tutorials, or on Steam forums/guides. I'd love to give this game a mixed review and since I can't do that, I'm giving this one a "No". Try out the demo version before buying and decide by yourself if you want more of it.

An ambitious mess with pretty ugly graphical style, and fantastic soundtrack. Arcen do very interesting things, and while this is not exactly the most playable thing they have done, it is still pretty interesting.

Pros: 1) Weird lore 2) Great variety of enemies 3) Beautiful locations 4) Amazing OST 5) Replayability Cons: 1) Story 2) Platforming 3) Some spells are useless 4) Needs polishing Verdict: grab on sale, there's something captivating about the game atmosphere.

An oddly compelling and enjoyable game with an amazing setting.