Windrose: Yo ho ho, it’s the pirate life for me

Windrose came out a week ago; I’ve sunk 25 hours into the game so far, I share the server with four other pirates (so far) and we’ve defeated the first boss. I think that places us about a third of the way through the Early Access content. It’s a good time to step back and talk about the game a little.

Windrose is a PvE survival crafting game. Like all such games, you start in the middle of nowhere with nothing and must immediately find a place to live, food to eat and clothes to wear lest you die when night falls and the monsters roam. Valheim was far from the first of these games, but its influence was strong, with games such as Nightingale, Enshrouded, Palworld and now Windrose iterating on Valheim‘s template in their own ways.

It is the Age of Sail and the Age of Piracy. Pirates roam the Caribbean, taking what they can and sinking the rest. Blackbeard rules the archipelago with an iron fist, via his strange artifact that has given him command of the Dead. With it, he has driven the good people of Tortuga into the jungle while the various factions try to live their lives around the edges.

Enter you. A simple merchanter captain who perhaps took on the wrong passenger, a passenger who carried a second artifact, twin to Blackbeard’s. That made you and your ship a target. You were boarded by one of Blackbeard’s lieutenants, and you and your entire crew were killed. Your confusion as you wake up on the shore, miraculously healed but covered stem to stern with tattoos that glow dimly in the dark soon have you questioning your very existence. Perhaps you cannot die because you are already dead.

You start the game in the first of the three available Early Access biomes, the Coastal Islands. Giant crabs and drowned undead patrol the beaches; boars and murder birds dodos prowl through the jungle, pirates scour through ancient ruins in search of treasure. All of these want to kill you. Pirate ships lurk about closely offshore. They are just waiting for you to unwisely meet them in a ship so that they can kill you in a different way.

By building up your base, you unlock workbenches and other crafting machines for making and upgrading weapons, armor, ship parts and, most importantly, food. You won’t die of hunger if you don’t get something to eat, but you won’t get the benefits of having a full tummy, either. Like more health. And stamina. And strength. So turn the tables on those crazy feathered freaks dodos and get their meat and their eggs and have yourself a traditional Mauritian breakfast. (Also: in Windrose, dodos are migratory?)

Now, a true pirate, such as yourself, naturally starts off their adventure with their trusty broken saber and useful rusty musket, as well as the colorful rags that are the iconic pirate uniform. Well, actually… being shipwrecked and, you know, killed, hasn’t done you any sartorial favors, and so once you have a bonfire to call home, you’ll be repairing the weapons you have and repairing your clothes and then… you’ll be ready for your main mission. Hunting down and killing the scallywag what killed you. But first, you’ll have to find him, and to do that, you’ll need a ship.

Unfortunately, the ship you came in is scattered across the beach, in pieces. Useful pieces, but pieces nonetheless. No, you’re going to need to find a vessel a little more intact. But you’re in luck; your ship’s doctor, the one that came aboard with a mysterious parcel he refused to talk about, was captured, along with the rest of the survivors, and managed to escape in a lateen-rigged dinghy that is now yours to use. Prowling the nearby islands, you’ll find a beached ship that the real estate lady calls a “charming fixer-upper that just needs a little love”. A little love, and a crew. Once you have rescued them and rechristened your new ride, it’s on to the high seas and the game play that sets Windrose apart from the competition: the ship battles.

Yes, I know Skull & Bones exists. That’s all ship battles; Windrose places just as much emphasis on the land exploration and base building.

Blackbeard himself is a legendary presence that you’ll never want to meet, but he rules the Caribbean archipelago through his fleets of ships, crewed by both the living and the dead. Their one purpose is to bring him the artifact that was stolen from him, and he has given orders to board and sink any unfriendly ship his crews come across.

Most of the time, you’ll be avoiding getting in cannon-shot range of these ships as you go about your own business. But sometimes, you’ll find a weak ship sailing alone, and now it’s hammer time. Hammering it with your cannonballs.

Naval combat is arcade-like, in that actual sailing tactics like sailing upwind and stealing the wind from your enemy isn’t something you can do here, and there’s no wind direction or tacking or gibing to worry about. The wind is always where you need it to be. Your starter ship has two cannons fore and (I think) three cannons each to port and starboard. Firing is simple and identical to firing your musket. You can use regular cannonballs to damage the enemy hull, and chain shot to rip their sails apart. Once you have them dead in the water, you can coup de grace them with a broadside to their waterline, or pull up for boarding, where you and your crew can jump over to the enemy ship and show Blackbeard’s minions the sharp side of your blade. Unfortunately, you can’t take their ship as a prize.

Eventually, you will meet the scallywag what shot you in the fight that caps off the Coastal Islands chapter. I won’t spoil the fight for you here. But it is challenging. Apparently you’re supposed to be able to take him on alone at level four?

The verdict: Valheim with less Odin and more Yohoho. It’s a lot of fun and there’s a good amount of content even though the game is still in Early Access. The first boss fight seems unreasonably difficult, although we did figure out an easy strategy for killing him. But that will just have to remain our secret for now.

Armor and weapon variety is good and allows for a bunch of different playstyles; same goes for the ship selection. There is no grouping, but people in the area working on the same quest will all get quest updates, and chest loot is available to everyone.