Werewolf: The Apocalypse – Heart of the Forest is a brand new game from Different Tales and Walkabout and is slated for release in Q4 2020. The game is inspired by the legendary tabletop roleplaying game Werewolf: The Apocalypse and is loosely based on the same concept in a digital form and presents itself in a very unique hand-drawn art style. Different Tales is the developer of last year’s brilliant Wanderlust: Travel Stories so we can say that the developer is not new when it comes to text-based titles. This is our early access preview of Werewolf: The Apocalypse – Heart of the Forest in which we try to catch a glimpse of a brilliant yet mysterious forest and its secrets.
Werewolf: The Apocalypse – Heart of the Forest is not your traditional RPG where you create your own character and jump in a forest and start tearing up monsters. Nor it is an action game where it puts you in the shoes of a protagonist who runs and guns monsters. Instead, Werewolf: The Apocalypse – Heart of the Forest is a text-based narrative-focused game where the choices you make develop your character and affects everything around you. The game is set in Białowieża Forest which is an ancient forest and holds mysteries and secrets that are long forgotten.
You play the game as Maia who is a young woman and she has arrived in the Białowieża Forest to uncover the secret of her family’s history. She is accompanied by her friend Anya. As they arrive in the Białowieża Forest, they hire a local guide which turns out to be a shady character called Daniel. Daniel knows much about the forest and the secrets it holds. It turns out that both Daniel’s and Maia’s families have also known each other in the past and somehow their past is related however the demo did not feature the full story of the game yet. The demo was rather short and a speedy playthrough took me around an hour and twenty minutes to complete it.
However, it was really engaging and I absolutely loved the visual art style of the game. To make choices in the game, you have to manage three of the main mechanics of the game. These are Rage, Willpower, and Health. Certain actions drain these mechanics while some of them allow you to gain them back. Depending on how much Rage or Willpower you have, you will be allowed to make certain choices otherwise they will be locked for you. In addition, the game also develops Maia’s character based on how you play the game which is yet another really neat mechanic of the game.
As the narrative unfolds itself in the form of text, you will notice that depending on your condition and stats, the narrative will be different as well. If you are happy and content, your tone of dialogue will be normal and the picture behind will be calm as well. Certain events in the game will be easy as well. But if you are angry and people around you are angry as well, the game turns into a nightmare and basic tasks become harder for you. For example, during my first playthrough of the demo, I chose the options that were in favor of the forest and the forest developed a bond with me. Afterward, when I was moving through the forest, the dialogue showed me that the forest was allowing Maia to move around freely and all hurdles such as bushes, thorns etc were removed from her path.
There were a few glitches here and there such as the icons on the map were not loading for me for some reason and a few spelling mistakes were visible here and there but the game is still under development and I am sure that all of this will be fixed in the full release of the title. There were no game-breaking bugs in the game. Overall, I really liked playing Werewolf: The Apocalypse – Heart of the Forest, and when the demo complete screen popped up, I was left wanting for more. Everything ranging from the visual art style, the dialogue, narrative delivery, and the sound of the game is shaping up to the great and I am sure that they will be even better in the full release version of the game.
Werewolf: The Apocalypse – Heart of the Forest presents its atmosphere in a very unique way. It may be a text-based adventure but the presentation of the game is really gloomy and dark and I cannot wait for the full game to arrive. The demo that I played was pretty small and allowed me to play only a small chunk of the full story of the game however I played it multiple times to check out how different choices affect the gameplay. The story remains the same however how it unfolds in front of you changes every time you make a different decision which gives you a chance to replay the story once you are done with it and experience every scene in a different way. At this point, a confirmed release date is not known of the game however we are certainly looking forward to it in the Q4 2020. You can wishlist the game on Steam.
