Warden’s Will Review
Returnal is one of my favorite games this generation. Risk of Rain 2 is one of my favorite co-op experiences this generation. I would bet money that many others share this opinion. So a game with Returnal-like bullet hell and Risk of Rain procedural gameplay HAS to be great, right? Right? RIGHT?
Developed by ELYZIO, Warden’s Will is a roguelike, bullet-hell, movement shooter. You play as one of the titular wardens and you must break the multiverse out of a time loop. The story is unimportant as this game is all about the action. Prepare yourself though because as soon as the action starts, the chaos never lets up.
All runs begin the same way: pick a warden, pick a gun, and pick a rift. For the first few runs though, you just start as there is only one warden available, one gun available, and one rift. Once you load into the rift, the Risk of Rain similarities smack you right in the face. Instead of finding a single teleporter, you must find three transmitters to upload data. Once done, this will open up a breach leading to a boss fight. Someone with more time than me can figure out the map dimension comparisons but Warden’s Will maps are also more densely packed than Risk of Rain maps. Once you do find your first transmitter and turn it on, a ring surrounds the area. Killing enemies provides the data but you most likely will not have enough right away. Leaving the ring area does pause the upload so feel free to explore more and kill. A giant beam of light projects straight up from the transmitter if you lose it by straying too far. The more runs I did and the longer I played landed me on this strategy: find the first transmitter, kill the turrets defending it, activate it, and then go explore a bit, maybe even locate another transmitter (repeat the process there). Similar to Risk of Rain, enemy spawns seem to increase the longer you are playing so in later stages, it becomes easier to have the data right away to upload. Once a transmitter is finished uploading, two beams of light shoot out directing you to the general location of the other transmitters. There is no minimap in-game so activating transmitters for the giant beacon to shine will help when you inevitably get lost. When you are in combat within the ring, the similarities to Returnal’s bullet-hell rears its head. Not only is there lateral movement but also vertical movement. Learn to leave the ring otherwise, you will take way too much damage to go deep into runs. The game did not do a great job of explaining what exactly was uploading so I was spending all my time within the ring thinking my mere proximity was causing the increase. Once I realized that enemy kills, and not just within the ring during transmission, were moving the upload bar, things became significantly easier.
In addition to providing the data for the uploads, killing enemies also earns you Bits used for upgrades (there are also chests scattered around the map that contain Bits). You will need to find upgrade pylons that provide a choice from 1 of 3 upgrades. Note: the game does not pause when choosing but it does go into a brief slow motion period. It is a somewhat irritating feature when starting as you are still figuring out what synergizes well with other upgrades but later on you will be hitting that upgrade on the run, making a choice, and getting right back into the thick of things. Most upgrades are self-explanatory: On Hit Restores 1 Energy (energy governs your traversal ability), Persistent +10 Max HP, Timer 1,000 Damage Shockwave (you release a shockwave at regular intervals). Upgrades can be stacked meaning +10 Max HP becomes +20 and +30, and 1,000 Damage Shockwave can increase to 2,000 Damage.
Other upgrades deal with in-game systems that the game neglected to explain properly. Here’s your primer which may save you some time and aggravation (I suffered on your behalf): the gun you choose has a primary and secondary attack. When you use the primary attack, you build up heat (there is an indicator right on the screen surrounding your character making it easy to see). If you max out heat, you have to wait a few seconds for it to cool down. To avoid overheating, you can either stop shooting (probably not advisable) OR use your secondary attack. The RAD Rifle (the default weapon) is essentially an assault rifle with a shotgun discharge. As heat builds up, you can fire the shotgun and lower your heat levels. This brings us back to the upgrades such as increasing your heat capacity. More heat means more time to fire your primary before it reaches max. All wardens also have two special skills. For example, F.L-Y3r has Lock-On which can target several enemies and then fire homing missiles, and Seismic Mines, which releases mines behind you (I think the idea is when you take flight or are trying to escape from multiple enemies, you give yourself some extra room). The Seismic Mines are considered an “executable” (I only discovered this by looking under options and controller layout). There is an upgrade, one which I avoided for several hours, that can perform an action like restore health or provide a shield when using the “executable.” Last but not least is the Mark ability. When selecting this upgrade, shooting enemies “marks” them which places a diamond above their head that fills in. Repeatedly shooting fills it in faster but it will fill in automatically (helpful when marking multiple enemies). Some of the Mark upgrades include firing a rocket at marked targets or granting 100% damage to your next shot. I was avoiding several upgrade choices because I had no idea how they worked. Once I figured it out, progression moved from a snail’s pace to a normal, “I want to do another run” pace.
We talked about in-run upgrades but what about meta progression? Bits are used for upgrades but Bytes (-10 points for naming) are needed to unlock new wardens, and new weapons, and upgrade your base health, shield, and energy pools. Bytes can be found in chests (they are different colored chests than the ones containing Bits) and dropped from bosses but the primary source is Necrorifts.
Necrorifts are scattered around each level and require you to activate which will release several enemies. Side note: I had no idea this was a good source of Bytes and skipped quite a few in the early goings if I did not feel my build was capable of taking on a swarm or my Lock-On was on cooldown. Bytes remain after you die and can be used to purchase the three other wardens, and seven guns, and fill the health/shield/energy reservoirs. Bytes can also be used during a run if you happen upon a Reboot station (it is a free life) and can be used to purchase upgrades (same ones you see during the run) before your run (only available after beating the game once) at an increasing cost per upgrade.
Warden’s Will feels like an Early Access title. This is not really a dig at the game though as the developers have released multiple patches and launched playtests to test future content. Hell, an update released between when I beat the game a few days ago to today when I am releasing this review that fixes a complaint about an obnoxious enemy I had devoted an entire paragraph to air my grievances. Early Access would serve as somewhat of a warning. There are still issues though but hopefully, they are on the to-do list of future fixes. The game feels lacking in variety. Yes, the biomes look completely different but the enemy variety as you progress further in a run changes only slightly. Two of the bosses become regular enemies instead of just adding new models. I like the idea of the bosses being regular mobs but they need to either make less frequent appearances or tone down their health. By the fourth and fifth levels, you are dealing with wave after wave of enemies with little breaks, and having multiple boss enemies at once is super obnoxious. The other issue that makes this feel more Early Access than not is the lack of non-friend multiplayer. I only say this because when you start the game from Steam, you are prompted with the choice of playing online or playing offline. There is no difference though because if none of your Steam friends purchased the game, your list will be empty. Sure, there is the discussion forums on Steam and Discord to form groups but it should be right in-game if it is an option. Plus, if it can re-create the experience of Risk of Rain 2’s co-op, that would be a huge boost to the game. All in all, Warden’s Will is really not a bad game. Perhaps my review can serve to eliminate some of the early headaches I dealt with so that you are not inclined to quit playing. At the very least, wishlist the game and follow it so you can keep apprised of the updates and planned content.
