I am not one to play survival games much, and typically need to be in a very specific mood to play them. Those that I have played in the past skew either toward brutally hard or mind-numbingly boring. Developer Muse Games and Publisher Kwalee have brought us ‘Wildmender’, a survival game which in my opinion nestles as close to a happy medium in the genre.

Starting out you can enter the character customisation section and design how you want to appear in the game. With 15 hairstyles and 12 hair and skin colour variations all with hue, saturation, and brightness adjustments, you can make your character rather unique. If you want to dive straight in you can, because you can just hit play and the default character will load up. Speaking of which it should be noted that I found all the load times excessively long, but there were very few occasions when the game had to load.

Once in Wildmender, you will be in the third person and be greeted by a spirit asking for your help. Once you help the spirit it will become your guide to the world and how you can interact with it. The spirit perfectly sets tasks for you to complete so you learn the mechanics of the game without becoming overwhelmed with information. This lovely, paced tutorial also eases you into the world itself revealing its mysterious story for you to discover. Without revealing too much, you are to bring life back to the world by cultivating and protecting your oasis and garden from the corruption that has turned this world into the dying state it is.

It is due to this perfect tutorial that the story is a slow burn. So, if you are looking for a faster-paced story, unfortunately, you will not find that here. In fact, the game moves at a leisurely pace, so if you are wanting fast-paced action, you will not find that here either. Wildmender is a cozy survival game that you could easily lose yourself in for hours.

Take heed though because of the slow pace if you hit a roadblock (I.E; waiting for food to grow while you’re starving), you will be standing around for hours doing nothing other than dying and reviving over and over. In the options though a very diverse menu for difficulty can be found. Here you can adjust things like water consumption, damage dealt, and attack frequency just to name a few. With many adjustments, you can make Wildmender as difficult or as easy as you like.

Wildmender also offers co-op, allowing three others to join in on the same world. The co-op is exclusively for friends only, so you cannot randomly join a world to help or experience another player’s game without permission. I found this rather unfortunate as I believe playing with others would enhance Wildmender further rather than playing alone. The worlds are also procedurally generated so no two player’s worlds will look identical.

The controls are easy to learn but also come with the option of rebinding them. So, if a button press isn’t where you would like it, it’s an easy fix. Wildmender also comes with an incredible amount of crafting, building, cultivating, customisation, perks, and abilities. With over 50 tools and structures, dozens of plants to grow, and over 25 personal upgrades, you will have plenty of flexibility to make your garden your very own.

The low poly graphics are gorgeous to look at and are very fitting to the coziness of the game. Even with Wildmender based in the desert, the vibrancy achieved in the colour and lighting is outstanding. Never once did I find myself groaning at the bleakness of the environment. The environment being so devoid of flora punctuates your garden oasis more. I found it gave me a meaningful emotional accomplishment in my work.

The audio is just a fitting to the coziness of the game as well. The orchestral music is very soothing allowing long hours of easy listening without becoming a nuisance. Sound effects being nothing over the top are serviceable so as to not break the relaxing nature of the game.

As said at the beginning of the review survival games are not a genre I play often. But Wildmender offers a flexible system that is balanced allowing for a cozy survival game experience. If you are a survival game enthusiast, you will be very pleased with this offering. If you’ve been interested in the genre then Wildmender could be just what you’re looking for to ease you in. If you have a friend or friends that play survival games and they want you to play with them, then Wildmender may be just the chilled gameplay for veterans and beginners to enjoy together.

Written by: Ashley Barnett-Cosgrove