Game: Wind Story
Genre: Simulation, Adventure, RPG
System: Nintendo Switch
Developer | Publisher: BluSped Studio
Age Rating: EU 3+ | US Everyone
Price: US $14.99 | UK £14.55 | EU € 14,99
Release date: April 10th, 2025
A review code was used with thanks to BlueSped Studio
Looking for Fun Like in Stardew Valley
Stardew Valley coming to the market and being a big success has caused an influx of games based on the same principle. Farming sims that combine farming and raising animals with battling monsters and getting into the social scene. Some might say there’s only room for the real deal, but others want to have more options. Looking at the description of Wind Story, this might just be the game for the fans.
Wind Story is a game that is based on the same gameplay but based on the game’s info, with a difference. In Wind Story, you’ll get to build up your own ranch business bit by bit, adding everything from cosy accommodations to food and drink spots. As you grow crops and care for a range of animals, your goal is to attract more visitors and boost your income over time. And the fact that the game description promises you can eventually add amusement facilities to your ranch sounds really cool, earning you even more money.
Let’s see if the game delivers on what it promises.
Fly to Fengling Village
After some customization of your pixelated character, you arrive in Fengling Village in style, arriving by air balloon. You’re greeted by the Elder, who gives you a starting gift of 10 campanula seeds and a Boka. You can choose which pet Boka you want out of three; one is strong in plants, the other is strong in logging, and the third is in feeding. It’s a blob-like creature that follows you around from that moment on and will eventually help you in the area where it’s strong.
The instructions on various buttons are minimal. The L shoulder brings up an information screen with a task list, so I’m guessing that’s my cue to get going. From the start, though, I found the buttons and descriptions confusing. The English translations aren’t very good in places, and the buttons don’t always work like they should. You’re pretty much left on your own, aside from having that task list.
The first job should be to sow the campanula seeds you got, after which you are free to explore. Found some very odd-looking apple trees, a pond that I could easily traverse on foot and a lovely, colourful landscape. What was a bit of a disappointment was that, although the weeds and plants were of various shapes and colours, they all boiled down to “picking grass”.
Socializing and Threats
I soon found the store to buy more seeds and livestock, but I also found that the simple job of buying things worked in such a strange way. Walking up to the counter, I pressed Y, and there were two commands in the same window. With A, I could do Gift, but I could also Buy. I didn’t want to give my hard-worked-for crops to the store clerk. I wanted to buy new things! Eventually, I worked out that standing in the middle of the store and then pressing Y gave the desired selection of goods.
You can ask other characters to join you in your activities, but it was very hard to get rid of them afterwards. Outside in the field, I met tourists showing a smiley above them, and chatting with them usually netted me one generic line.
Pretty soon, it wasn’t only friendly faces, though: Pirates arrived, threatening my crops and the chicken that was running around. Can’t have that, of course, so I attacked them with a short knife. It felt a bit weird that a tourist passed me by while I was losing the fight but didn’t acknowledge any of it…their smiley remained unchanged.
Another threat was, “Wild boars can damage crops, and their location can be seen through a small window.” Really, I have no idea where I can find them. What small window?
Needs a Lot More Time in the Oven
If you’ve read my review so far, you’ll not be surprised Wind Story really needs more time in the oven. The idea is there, combining the farming sim RPG with amusement facilities sounds great. The graphics are a nice variance from the usual pixelated adventure sims. But I can’t really find any more positive points.
Wind Story should never have come to the Nintendo Switch in this state. The road to go would have been early access on Steam, with loads of updates and tweaks after that. And then, when it was as good as the vision sounded, bring it to the Switch.
There are so many bugs; it crashes, too, and it’s really hard to work out how to do basic actions. The background music is weird; at times, it’s just like two soundtracks running over each other. It’s quite jarring.
Conclusion for Wind Story
Wind Story has a great description, but sadly, it doesn’t live up to that in any way. This should have gone into Early Access for a much lower price. As it is now, I have no other option but to give a negative verdict.
Final Verdict: I Don’t Like It
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