Northwind First Impressions - Interestingly Complex

Northwind has been on my radar for quite a while, and after playing it for a while, its interesting complexity has made it a game that I am looking forward to playing in full. Here are our first impressions of Northwind, a look at its gameplay, story, and more.

What is Northwind?

Before we dive into our first impressions of Northwind, let’s first talk a little about what the game is. Northwind is a rogue-lite deck builder game made by Barking Kitten Interactive, a small game studio from Thailand. The game has a planned release date of 2024 and will be in Early Access on launch. A demo for the game is available to download and play on PC via Steam. If you’ve played other rogue-lite deck builder games before, you’ll likely be familiar with Northwind’s mechanics.

As with other games in the genre, players will have a deck of cards, which they will update and upgrade throughout their run. Updates come in the form of new cards, which the player can get as rewards, or by forging them in the town. Upgrades, on the other hand, come in two forms. Players can either combine cards to make new cards, or add additional effects to cards, such as increasing their power, lowering their cost, and more.

Other than cards, players will also have access to various Relics and Skills, which will help them during their travels. Relics are items that give various effects to the player, such as additional Mana, Strength at the start of battle, and more. Skills, on the other hand, allow the player to do a variety of actions during a fight, like deal damage or gain Strength. These are usually one-time uses per battle, so players must use them at the right time.

Run progression is also similar to other games, in that players follow a path that leads to the level’s boss. Players will face a crossroads, where they will decide what path to take when moving forward. Each path can contain fights, mini-boss fights, treasure, rest spots, and more, so the player should think carefully about what path they want to go through.

Now that you have a general idea of what Northwind is, let’s dive into our first impressions of the gameplay.

Gameplay

One gameplay feature that I liked about Northwind is how its Mana system works. Like most rogue-lite deck-building games, Northwind also has an energy resource system, Mana, which will dictate what cards the player can play. However, Northwind does it a little differently. For most games, the player’s energy refreshes every turn, up to a certain point. For example, in Slay The Spire, players will always regenerate to their maximum Energy, whether they use all of it in a turn or not. In Northwind, however, the energy carries over to the next turn. Now, this is a feature that other games in the genre have. However, Northwind changes it up by randomizing how much energy the player regenerates each turn based on the amount of energy cards the player has in their deck.

Whenever the player draws a hand of cards, they can end up drawing one of their energy cards. Whenever they do, they gain one Mana. The more Mana cards a player draws, the more Mana they get, which means they can do more actions in a turn. Normally, this would be a good thing. However, in Northwind, this may hurt the player. Let’s say, for example, that the player’s hand contains only one non-Mana card. Yes, the player gained a lot of Mana that turn. However, that means they only have one non-Mana card, which can be an equipment card or an Action card. This severely limits the player’s damage output, and should this line up with the enemy’s big attack, the player will take damage. Sure, the player can also use the Mana cards to deal some damage, but it will likely not be enough to mitigate all of the damage.

The same goes for if the player draws mostly Action cards, but no Mana. Yes, you have a lot of options, but if you only have 1 or 2 Mana during your turn, then it’ll be useless. This is what I find interestingly complex about Northwind. Players have to balance the amount of Mana cards they have in their deck, with the amount of Action cards and Equipment cards. If you have too few Mana cards, you won’t be able to have enough Mana to carry out attacks. If, on the other hand, you have too many Mana cards, then you might end up with hands that have little to no non-Mana cards, which will lower your damage output.

This fine-tuning of the number of Mana cards adds a level of complexity to Northwind that I don’t think I have seen in other roguelite deck0building games. It makes you consider the balance of cards in your deck in two ways, both the composition of your deck and the ratio of Mana cards to non-Mana cards.

Other than the deck-building aspect of the game, the combat itself is pretty fun. The combat is purely a numbers game, with the player pitting their damage against the damage or shield of the enemy. For example, if the enemy is going to attack for 5 damage, the player must deal at least five damage to negate the attack, and more than that to deal damage to the enemy. The same goes for if the player is defending, except the enemy doesn’t attack the player if they don’t overpower them. This feature makes the player choose their targets properly: Should they spend all of their Mana trying to damage that enemy with 35 Shield? Or should they just spend some to counter the 6-damage attack and save Mana for the next turn? These small decisions during the battle make Northwind’s combat gameplay fun, with little to no dull moments.

Of course, other than our first impressions of Northwind’s gameplay, it’s also important to take a look at the game’s story.

Story

In Northwind, players take control of a mercenary, whose job is to hunt down monsters, gather resources from said monsters, and explore the area surrounding Northwind Town. The more you explore, the stronger you get, and the more you can upgrade the facilities available in Northwind Town.

At the moment, there isn’t much to talk about with Northwind’s story. However, there are already quite a few bits about it that have me intrigued. For example, why are these people living in a frozen land? Was the land frozen since the beginning, or did it freeze over? Who is the Duelist and the Pyrotech? Why are they helping the town out?

I don’t know if Northwind will ever have a story. However, if it does, I hope that it will be able to answer the questions that I have. Or maybe the demo already does have answers to my question, but I still haven’t reached that part of the game. Who knows?

Verdict – Is Northwind worth your time and money?

As it is right now, I believe that Northwind is worth trying out. Its gameplay loop has enough to keep you interested and coming back for more, however, you won’t find any story in it as of now. Despite not having much of a story, however, Northwind is still worth playing. With the demo available for free, players can easily spend hours upon hours just playing this game over and over again.

That’s all for our first impressions of Northwind, its gameplay, and story. Want more of the latest gaming news, updates, and video game releases? Subscribe now to the ClutchPoints Gaming Newsletter to receive your weekly dose of video game information.