Here’s the thing about WILDFIRE: This game is fun. The art is excellent. The music is solidly okay. The charm and memorability is fleeting and lacks the kind of variety of gameplay experiences you might have playing other games. This game will force you to think outside of the box. However, I am unsure if most will want to complete the game twice to fully unlock everything. Playing on the Switch brings its own unique challenges, like the issues with lag and aiming with the Joy-Con joysticks. If you and your friend played this game separately, you most likely will have had the same type of experience.
I am not good at video games.
I sit before you a 29-year-old whose “peak” was either in 2010 when I was the 94th best Tekken 5: Dark Resurrection player (PSP) worldwide for a total of 3 weeks OR in June 2020 when I was ranked in the top 5% of all Team Fight Tactics players in North America for about a month. I mention this not as a way to humbly brag and tip my fedora, but instead to indicate that my “gamer credentials” are, at best, average. I don’t participate in the speed running circuit, nor do I immerse myself in eSports to the point of wanting to consistently compete playing the same game for a long period of time. Thus, when I was given the opportunity to review WILDFIRE for the Nintendo Switch, I imagined that I would be playing a casual game made for casual players. After spending some time playing it (around…5 hours) and completing 75% of the levels, I’m quite honestly not sure who this game is made for.
The last caveat before I continue is this: WILDFIRE was released on Steam in May 2020. This review is specifically about the Nintendo Switch version of WILDFIRE, which released on the Nintendo eShop (as well as other consoles’ electronic marketplaces) December 03, 2020, for $14.99 (USD). Thus, my experience may very well be different than Steam players. However, knowing that no two players (such as a console gamer and a PC gamer) are the same, it’s important for a review of a console version of a PC game to take place. You will NOT have an equivalent experience playing WILDFIRE on the Switch as you would on the PC, but you surely will have a great experience.
If I was to conceptualize this game into a single sentence, I would say that this game is a stealth game involving a character that functions like Aang from Avatar: The Last Airbender with side objectives featuring Lemmings elements, speedrunning (!!), and a limited amount of customization.
GAMEPLAY & OBJECTIVES
At first glance, WILDFIRE’s gameplay is straightforward and easy to understand. Each level has a main objective, a slightly unique optional objective, and several universal optional objectives involving speed running, single completion (completing a level without starting over), undetected, and deathless. For the most part, you need to be stealthy. There are several unique indicators that notify you when you’re being “loud,” such as a visual indicator of a circle, an echo that sounds like footsteps, and your JoyCon controller vibrates with each echo of the footstep. Thus, as you’re playing, and you break stealth near enemies, it’s hard for you to be angry at yourself for being “caught” when the game persistently and consistently reminds you when you’re failing to be sneaky.
Unique to this stealth game is the elemental mechanic, similar to being an Avatar from The Last Airbender. In order to clear levels, you need to use your environments to your advantage by setting things on fire, creating vines, and freezing enemies. You begin the game with a limited mastery of fire, meaning you can only draw fire from your surroundings, like a campfire, and use it to throw a fireball at enemies. As you progress through the game, you will unlock access to other elements, like water and earth, when an event happens in the story. You can also upgrade your current elements as you play using shrines. Upgrades range from double jumping when holding a fire ball and transforming your water ball into an ice cube. Each level has a single upgrade shrine that you can light exactly once. As you proceed through the story and unlock additional elements, you then are presented with a choice on which ability to upgrade as you proceed through each level. Since you can only light each shrine once, you might feel caught between deciding which of your elements to upgrade.
Luckily, I have yet to encounter a level where I have felt slighted by my choices in what to upgrade first. In other words, upgrading your abilities opens up opportunities for completing each level in less time. Even more, upgrading is far from a requirement for completion (although it would make levels easier if you did). The developers made a strategic decision to give you freedom of what to upgrade and when, which allows you to complete the game at your own pace. My only critique about this, however, is that it is impossible to completely upgrade all of your abilities in a single run through of the game. If you want to get everything upgraded and see a completely full skill chart, you’re going to have to complete a run of the game and start a New Game+.
For the most part, using elements as you play is seamless. Once you learn the button combinations, you’ll have no trouble getting used to drawing elements from your surroundings and using them in unique ways. However, the throwing mechanic requires an inconsistent level of precision that the JoyCon controllers cannot offer. To throw a fireball, for example, you need to use the right joystick to aim to where you want the fireball to land. Aiming with that joystick is far from a precise experience. Thus, if you’re looking for an experience that is pixel perfect, you’re better off using another controller or playing WILDFIRE on another platform altogether.
In theory, the more you play this game, the more elements and tools you will have at your disposal. However, as I have played, I seem to be using the same element (fire) more than others. While this could be an arguable side effect of fire being the first element you get access to, I wish that the levels encouraged you to use *all* of the elements rather than only the ones available to you. Seeing as the game cannot be completed in a single run, there needs to be more encouragement to begin a NewGame+ other than to fully max out your abilities.
Some of the smaller hiccups that impact gameplay involves the AI-of the controlled enemies. While hidden in the brush, you can call them over. The issue that most frequently occurred during my playthrough was that there was no visual indicator that informed me of how long the AI would spend “investigating” (read: standing over the bush where they heard your character whistle) the strange sound before they returned to their patrols. Sometimes I would spend up to 15 seconds waiting for the enemy to resume walking and moving away from me so I could resume sneaking outside of the brush.
The largest issue that interrupted (yes, interrupted) gameplay occurred when multiple elements on the screen were active. For example, in a level where I had to set much of the brush on fire, doing so would cause the game to lag and stutter to a near crawl. While I am unsure if this is a limitation of the Switch version or an issue with the game’s design, this kind of issue is one that I would expect from a resource intensive game, not a 2D-platformer.
I mentioned earlier that one of the optional objectives for each level is the speed run objective. I’m gonna be blunt here: You shouldn’t try to get the speed run objectives for any current level until you’ve leveled up some of your abilities, such as the fiery double jump. I have two issues with the speed running objectives tied to the gameplay: First, some of the times seem completely unreasonable at first glance. One of the levels I just cleared took me 20 minutes to clear for the first time. After finishing, I took a look at the speed run objective: 2 minutes. That discrepancy seems quite daunting at my level, and I really am unsure if I want to try to achieve that time given the AI’s inconsistencies. Second, there really is no way for you to showcase your speed running achievements on the Nintendo Switch version. While this is no fault of the developers, I would say that even adding a leaderboard in-game would have been a way to account for the lack of visible achievements from the Switch.
WORLDBUILDING
One of the weaker points of this game is its lack of worldbuilding and memorability. I’m over 5 hours in (and apparently 75% finished?!), and all I know about the main character I’m playing as is that I’m a witch (or a warlock? Or a witch is now gender neutral?) who’s chasing down a nefarious kingdom who set fire to the main character’s village. I haven’t said a word in-game, and my few interactions with who COULD be memorable characters occurred at the beginning of the game in the tutorial. Also, I played as a cat (the main character’s cat, maybe?!) in one level, yet I have had any opportunity to be the cat again. As much as the game is charming at first glance, it lacks the memorability that would keep me playing it to learn more about the lore.
ART & MUSIC
The art is beautiful for a game featuring non-isometric pixel art. The world map feels almost nostalgic to the NES/SNES era of an overworld that shows your progress throughout the game. The elements are animated in a visually appealing way that adds a bit of variation to each level. For example, when you set a brush on fire, that instance of fire is bright and contrasts with the rest of the level and produces a large amount of smoke that seems to have several layers to it to mimic depth.
The music, however, is solidly acceptable. While it is not catchy enough for you to hum along like some of the “earwormy” music that accompanied some of the 2D platformers of the early console era, it’s enough for you to immerse yourself within the gameplay. However, seeing as the game uses audio indicators to inform you of things like your own footsteps (thus breaking stealth!), I am not too keen on listening to the music while I’m trying to focus and remain undetected.
FINAL THOUGHTS
Here’s the thing about WILDFIRE: This game is fun. The art is excellent. The music is solidly okay. The charm and memorability is fleeting and lacks the kind of variety of gameplay experiences you might have playing other games. This game will force you to think outside of the box. However, I am unsure if most will want to complete the game twice to fully unlock everything. Playing on the Switch brings its own unique challenges, like the issues with lag and aiming with the Joy-Con joysticks. If you and your friend played this game separately, you most likely will have had the same type of experience.
I’ve tried returning to some of the levels I’ve already beaten, and I’m quite stumped on how you can complete them in 2 minutes or less. I might not be using my abilities correctly, or I might need to keep playing and unlock more upgrades. It also could very well be that I am not the best at video games. If you have a choice to get this game on other consoles, you should consider doing so. Otherwise, if you only own a Switch, you very well might like this game! Just be aware of some of the unique hiccups that plague this specific version.
