Quick Look: Ori and the Will of the Wisps

I've played about an hour of this game, so it's not a ton of time to get used to the visual styling and kind of play that's expected of me... but holy shit, I cannot see anything in this game. I'm constantly getting swiped by enemies and hit by projectiles and not even registering that they're happening. The main attack, the Light Sword, is so blindingly bright and massive that it buries any enemy tells underneath. It's extremely frustrating, and not in a good way. I had the same problem with The Blind Forest, so it really feels as if they've just doubled down on that visual philosophy.

I thought this was just going to be Brad by himself, but Ben is there.

@the_nubster: Part of that might be the atrocious performance. Even on XB1X I’m getting what looks like sub 20fps, the gameplay is visibly slo-mo.

At Home Quick Look.

This will be my first Ori game

the system requirements on the XBOX pc beta were so high that I figured I'd have no issues on a 1060, but maaaaaaaan this game doesnt seem to like my pc at all.

For people who are having issues on PC, installing it on the SSD fixed most of the problems for me. I was getting stutters on my 5700 XT until I reinstalled it on the SSD.

Loved the first Ori when it came out, haven't played it since but Ori 2 feels as good to move around in as I remember the first one feeling, which based on Brad's comments may be rose coloured a bit.

I really like how they're expanding on the combat and powers. Like Brad had mentioned before it does feel like it's gained quite a bit of inspiration from Hollow Knight, which imo is not a bad thing, it mixes well with what Ori does best, tough but flowing traversal, where HK imo felt clunky to even jump around in.

Also teared up at this prologue too, but for different reasons.

8 hours in and it's a f'ing masterpiece. Game is incredible in every way.

About six hours in and holy cow they just keep addning thing after thing after thing, which I normally don't like because it becomes too much, but in this game it's just perfect and makes total sense! I really liked the first one and man do they deliever on the second! It's a true masterpiece and I'm loving every minute of it.

Playing via XGP on my PC (x3700, 1080ti, 32gb ram, ssd) and it's so beautiful and runs really really great. The audio seems a bit strange here and there (like if the character that speaks is on the left his/her voice is only in the left headphone) but nothing game breaking.

The music is on point in this game, especially the part when Ku dies, right in the feels with that scene!

If you like the first one you'll not be disappointed!

Whomever made this game sure loved playing Hollow Knight.

@k4rst3n: severely injured, not dead.

@nameredacted: finally the comment I was looking for. Jeez. Its so similar enemy design and everything.

Vague similarities to Hollow Knight that are also found in many other games. Also the combat in this game is so much better than Hollow Knight that it isn't even funny to compare them. Thomas Mahler the game director said in a reset era thread about the game that he didn't like Hollow Knight, so it wasn't much of an inspiration at all and he listed a large number of games where similar mechanics were used.

Also, the first Ori came out 2 years before Hollow Knight. I think the similarities are more due to them being part of the same trend than direct inspiration.

@the_nubster: Yeah, those spiky clusters of vines that blended in with the background, as well as having that fog-of-war style darkness, made some sections in the first game way more frustrating than they would have been with some visual clarity. Really bummed they haven't improved it.

@doncabesa: link to that post: https://www.resetera.com/threads/ori-and-the-will-of-the-wisps-ot-give-it-your-owl.173949/page-34#post-29837149

Funny that he cites materia as the inspiration for the shards, since the resulting system morphed into something so different. I'd bet most differences are more apparent in actually playing it; I had a sudden feeling I'd seen the "spirit shards" screen before, which probably makes less sense if you compare the actual systems (not that Hollow Knight's version is particularly novel here).

I'm 5 hours in at 33%. This game is absolutely incredible, and I'm already feeling sad that if this pace keeps up I'll be done w/ it at 15 hours because I feel like I could play this for much longer.

It feels so good to just explore because you get some super powerful traversal abilities very early, including a triple jump that lets you cheese some traversal puzzles in fun ways. I've gotten some upgrades and finagled my way into some areas that really feel like I wasn't supposed to get to yet.

I do agree that the visuals are gorgeous, but can also become a bit too much during combat. Brad said it was an unforgiving game, and I'm kind of mixed on my feelings there. I found it harder in the first hour or so than anything since. I have so much health and mana that the enemies are trivial at this point. I just did a combat shrine and easily cleared it without any issue. If anyone is looking for difficulty similar to Hollow Knight, I'd recommend playing it on Hard. I started on normal, and I wish it was a bit tougher.

I'm fortunate enough that I've had absolutely no issues on my PC via GamePass on my SSD. It's running perfectly and I've only experienced one bug. The map said an NPC would be in a spot he wasn't.

Couple hours in, and it's every bit as good as I've been hearing. The visuals and audio are so great that I turned off my podcast to focus, as if it was a narrative game. The combat no longer feels like an afterthought (on hard) and the exploration does indeed feel like Hollow Knight. It's able to pull off the sense that every direction has something worthwhile to find like HW did.

It's been updated a few times and I should mention that the technical stuff has been a non-issue on the X outside of a few split second hitches when hitting a new area.

Thanks for posting that link, @kleingordon.

Everything I'm seeing leads me to think this game is more combat-centric than the first, so I guess that's a bit of a confirmation there. I'm still not quite sure what to make of it though... maybe I'm a little disappointed? I was SUPER into the additional concept videos they included on PC and was very interested in what ideas they would be able to include in the sequel, but if you'd asked me what I'd want in a bigger, better Ori game, the one thing I probably would have never said was melee combat. I've been looking forward to this for so long, I hope I find some coverage somewhere that puts my fears at ease so I can pick it up.

LOVED the first Ori and also loved Hollow Knight. If we weren't at the end of the generation, I would buy an XB1X for this.

From the music, the aesthetics, map design and character design this looks really dull.

It's too lavish if that makes sense, and the platforming sections just seem to come out of nowhere, there's nothing natural to their placement. Rayman Origins is a similar naturalistic style, but I feel there was flow and theme there. This is objectively beautiful, but everything else just looks so thoughtlessly overindulgent.

Finished this yesterday, incredible game it is. Hope it gets remembered well when we get to goty time, best 2D platformer I've played in a loooong time. Enjoyed it a heck of a lot more than Bloodstained from last year and that game I was fairly fond of as is.

I recently finished it, as well, and it rules. Currently in my top 3 for the year. I might have to replay it since there are so many incredible moments.