Ori and the Will of the Wisps

Add it all together and Ori and the Will of the Wisps is a 3A-grade masterpiece wearing an indie's skin — a Metroidvania that pairs the most beautiful 2D art in the medium with one of its finest orchestral scores and an emotional story that earns its devastation. Moon Studios did not just make a great sequel; they made one of the defining games of their genre, a high-water mark that newer titles are still measured against.

A Defining Work of Its Genre

What makes Will of the Wisps remarkable is how completely its pieces reinforce one another. The hand-drawn art gives the world its beauty, the orchestral score gives that beauty its feeling, the fluid Bash-driven movement gives the feeling its momentum, and the wordless story gives all of it a reason to matter. None of these elements works in isolation; together they produce something far greater than their sum, an experience that engages the eye, the ear, the hands, and the heart at once. That total coherence of vision is exactly what separates a very good game from a landmark one.

The reception bears this out. A Steam "Overwhelmingly Positive" rating across more than seventy thousand reviews, BAFTA recognition for its music, and a player base over six million mark it as both a critical and commercial success — the rare prestige indie that reached a mass audience without compromising its artistry. It took the foundation its predecessor laid and surpassed it on nearly every axis: bigger world, deeper combat, richer systems, and an even more affecting story, while preserving the audiovisual identity that made the series special.

Who Should Buy It

This is for anyone who wants to be moved as much as entertained. If cinematic presentation, a gorgeous hand-drawn world, a world-class score, and a story that will genuinely make you cry sound like reasons to play rather than distractions from it, Will of the Wisps is close to essential. It is for fans of Metroidvanias and precision platformers who want the genre delivered with unmatched polish, and equally for players who do not usually touch the genre but are drawn in by the promise of an emotional, beautiful journey — the craft is welcoming enough to convert newcomers. It is the rare game broad enough to recommend almost universally — to the hardcore platformer hunting a new skill ceiling, to the story lover who has never finished a Metroidvania, and to the player who simply wants two beautiful evenings with something that treats them like an adult capable of being moved.

It is also, simply, one of the best showcases of what games can do as an art form, the kind of title you hand someone to prove the medium's capacity for beauty and feeling. For most players, the only real question is which platform to play it on, not whether to play it at all.

Who Should Skip It, and How to Start

The honest caveats are narrow but real. Players with no patience for high-precision platforming should know the chase sequences demand exactly that and will kill you repeatedly, so if tight execution under pressure sounds miserable rather than thrilling, this game will test you. Anyone seeking a purely relaxing, low-stakes experience should look elsewhere; Ori's gentleness is real, but it is laced with genuine challenge and genuine grief, and it asks something of you emotionally and mechanically alike.

For everyone else, the path is straightforward. The game runs best on PC and the most capable consoles, which are the first choices for the smoothest, most beautiful experience, while the Switch is a fine portable option as long as you accept minor performance trade-offs at the largest scenes. Newcomers can dive straight into Will of the Wisps without playing the first game, though the original Blind Forest is a worthy, cheaper companion for anyone who wants the full arc. Start it, give yourself over to it, and let one of the medium's great emotional crescendos do the rest — which is precisely the experience this final score is built to honor.