Werewolf: The Apocalypse – Heart of the Forest is a ‘dungeons and dragons’ type of text-based adventure designed and developed by Different Tales. It is loosely based on a true story of a protest that occurred in 2016 at the Bialowieza Forest to stop the logging that was taking place. The main character, Maia Boroditch comes to the town to search for her life’s destiny, along with discovering the truth about her family lineage. As the player reads this story and chooses what path to take, Maia’s character is constantly formed as she finds out her true calling as a werewolf.
The approximately five-hour story wraps around Maia as a college student, her classmate Anya and Bartek their tour guide in the small village of Bialowieza, where Maia’s grandparents are from. They proceed to go to the logging protest and unearth what has happened in the small town by day and by night. Maia has a struggle with her internal dreams and then eventually discovers her true self. As the player reads on the choices that are made will fill out Maia’s character sheet that can be accessed at any time. The journal takes record of what has happened just in case the player needs a refresher after a break or before a big choice. The importance of the character sheet, which for role-playing games is key to outcomes normally, could have been better used and explained at the start. Relationships with other characters did not feel as important as it should have for big decisions.
As choices are made, three elements are used in Rage, Willpower and Health based on the decisions taken.
- Rage – Maia need to make sure that this does not get too high otherwise Maia will lose the ability to control herself.
- Willpower – If Maia run out of this element and Maia becomes impaired and cannot make tough choices is forced into a different decision path.
- Health – If Maia runs out of health she is impaired and cannot make movement action decisions like running away from danger.
Choices are available to the player throughout to help recharge or lower these elements as needed. The story will shift based on how low or high your rage is at any given point.
Reading through each chapter of the story brings different hand drawn art to experience along with audio effects. Playing with sound is a must to get the full effect. The art is well done, and the audio has the right importance to the scene and draws the player in quite well.
This is a single player adventure novel and has the ability to pause during any portion of the book if a break is needed for parenting or other needs. The writing and some of the art is of an adult nature so do not play this with kids present.
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Rob for One More Game
6 – Above average – As stated, this game is above average. The game provides a solid experience while not delivering anything outstanding. It’s a game that fans of the series will definitely enjoy but one that others may want to wait for a sale.
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A review code was kindly provided by the publisher for the purpose of this review for the Nintendo Switch. Our thoughts are ours and ours alone.