Where Winds Meet Review (PS5, PC, iOS, & Android)

There’ve been a good number of games that have been great hits in the Eastern market. And as a result, caught on with the Western audience. Often hailing from the Japanese anime markets, but lately, we’ve been seeing more Chinese-developed games steal the spotlight. 

Black Myth: Wukong, Wuchang: Fallen Feathers, Genshin Impact, and Honor Kings have been the recent jaw-droppers in the action, open-world RPG, and MOBA fields. And now, Where Winds Meet is making a play to join the ranks of these highly successful games.   

As many as 2 million players hopped on the Where Winds Meet bandwagon just 24 hours after launch. And I suppose, those staggering numbers should be reason enough to give the game a shot in the dark. Or better, a quick read through of our thoughts about the game in our Where Winds Meet review below.

Not a Dull Day

First things first, what exactly is Where Winds Meet? Well, it’s an open-world action RPG set in ancient China. However, Everstone Studios chooses to create a fictional fantasy setting instead, very loosely adapting historically or culturally accurate notations of the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period.

You’re a Young Master raised away from the official tutelage of the martial arts. Aunt Han and Uncle Jiang oversee your upbringing and prepare you for the mysterious but dangerous ventures ahead, trying to figure out your purpose and identity in this world. 

Where Winds Meet wastes no time immersing you in the lore of the epic Wuxia world Everstone Studios has created. Such lavish and breathtaking natural embellishments of this colorful and immersive world. So many varied environments that you’ll want to explore with a fine-tooth comb.

Over 20 distinct regions await you, from bustling palaces to tranquil villages and eerie wilderness: Where Winds Meet has it all. And every push to discover the secrets and mysteries of this world rewards you with not only gameplay items and collectibles but also satisfying ambiance. 

Weather changes through day-night cycles, and areas like dark caves need lighting up with fire arrows to illuminate your way around. While you can stick to the beaten path, trudging the main story along, it’s much more fulfilling to bear curiosity. 

Plus, the traversal mechanics help freshen things up, with the ability to wall climb, run on water, and practically fly for short distances. These come in handy when chasing side quests, puzzles, and crawling through dungeons, busting open a staggering number of items and resources for crafting. 

Roamer Round

It’s, indeed, a living, breathing open-world as engaging and involved as any other. A myriad of things to do and NPCs to talk to, who enrich your journey with new stories, side quests, skills, etc. It’s a dense world that not only reacts to your presence but also looks rich and detailed through and through. 

In that sense, exploring Where Winds Meet can quickly feel like sandbox gameplay. You aren’t restricted to a set path, freely choosing where and who to talk to. And your choices often influence your experience, enriching your journey with newfound secrets and discoveries. 

Is it perfect? For the most part, Everstone Studios has truly nailed the engagement factor of open-world exploration. And partially because of the myriad things to do. But jampacking side quests, NPCs, resources, minigames, and more suffers the risk of quantity over quality. 

Some NPCs are genuinely interesting to talk to and interact with. Others, though, use AI chatboxes that are unnatural and jarring. Where tons of resources and rewards are appreciated in character progression, they run the risk of growing stale. Mind you, Where Winds Meet is a free-to-play game that does well not to gatekeep its resources, possibly a little too generously.

Shenanigans Galore

You’ll probably go into Where Winds Meet expecting a serious martial arts game. But boy, is there utterly ridiculous stuff featured here. You have ambitious features like uploading your own TikTok dance moves for your character to learn. These don’t always translate smoothly.

When vegetables are thrown at you, they serve as reprimands from other players—or throwing live bears at secrets to unravel them. Animals, in fact, are a big part of the Where Winds Meet experience, where geese can beat you in combat. But also, they can be screaming nuisances at enemies, or perhaps goats might be more fun to summon into battle.

There are pretty funny and fun surprises here: pulling enemies off their mounts will never grow old. So will a few of the minigames that genuinely entertain: debates, dancing, horse taming, etc. Or stealing items and skills from NPCs, careful not to get spotted. Speaking of, stealth-based mechanics are a nice addition to have. Unfortunately, they aren’t always consistent.

Stealthy Kills

You know, the usual suspects: sneaking up on enemies to perform a silent takedown, careful that enemies don’t see you. Walls and vegetation provide nice cover as you crouch away. But the most interesting is the Veil of Stillness, which gives you temporary invisibility. 

Is it temporary invisibility, even, because its actual ability is “partial”? I’m not sure what good that is, when enemies will still see you up close. And the invisibility cloak will break completely if you enter combat.

Sekiro Sekiro

Parry, parry, parry is the motto in Where Winds Meet as much as Sekiro: Shadows Die Twice. But in this case, the timing window is more lenient, adding the freedom to adjust the difficulty. If you can master parries, then combat, including against bosses, should go more easily for you.

Anyway, it’s nice to have different weapons with unique skills. These are tied to specific sects (or factions) you align with. The umbrella is an interesting addition, thriving in providing healing support or ranged DPS. But the sword looks and feels the most satisfying, with Wuxia’s flashy and stylish effects excellently realized.

Your martial arts skills are varied enough, offering individual upgrade paths. And when you’re keen on experimenting, you should find pretty powerful synergies. But you also have mystical arts that aren’t tied to sects. And these are special abilities that are versatile across combat, solving puzzles, and exploration.

So, really, you do have a nice breadth of tools and skills to dispatch enemies. It’ll be most fundamental against bosses, who range from the main story ones to world and optional bosses. And onward into the PvP and MMO lane.

More the Merrier

That’s right, Where Winds Meet adds multiplayer modes as well, literally just about every major gaming genre that might leap to the front lobe of your mind. While the multiplayer PvP and MMO modes are still up for reviewer scrutiny just a few days after launch, it does show great promise.

Where Winds Meet might not be on the World of Warcraft MMO level, but Everstone Studios promises future story and gameplay content and updates. These will definitely further enrich the current guild wars, raids, and dungeon crawling offerings. And with the already satisfying combat, hopping back in shouldn’t be a problem.

Well, if the overwhelming generosity of upgrade and crafting items and resources is tightened with future updates. Because, as of now, you get rewards for practically doing anything: quests, chests, defeating bosses, completing challenges, etc. And with 12 currencies, hardly helped by the cluttered menu, Everstone Studios does have a decent amount of work cut out for them for Where Winds Meet to truly reach the heights it deserves.

Verdict

Where Winds Meet might have slipped your radar, but thanks to the staggering number of concurrent players on Steam, it has pretty much caught the attention of gamers, Eastern and Western markets alike. And sure, it might not be the perfect open-world action RPG. It has, for starters, crammed way too many things to do in its world and exploration. 

This works well in favor of density and enjoying an enriching playthrough regardless of where in the world you wander off to. But it comes at the expense of the quality of the myriad side quests, minigames, and more weird stuff you run into. It’s all surprisingly fun, with plenty of twists and turns, but certainly a mile from perfect.

Fortunately, combat holds its own. Built on a martial arts system with complementary sword and special abilities, you truly come into your own Ninja down the road. Your skills and abilities have plenty of room and depth to grow and expand. And it is all boosted by a deep customization and upgrade system.

This all meshes well with its free-to-play status. It allows anyone to jump in for quick rounds of raids, dungeons, and guild wars in PvP and MMO modes. But soon, the resources available to you overflow with variety and staggering options, so much so that the next new item or reward barely excites.

Everstone Studios will need to do pathwork on the NPC AI chatboxes or get rid of them altogether. Plus, refine the character progression system to encourage mindful engagement and replayability. We’ll have to watch their pace via the promised upcoming content updates.