Woolfe is one of these Kickstarter games that remind us how risky it is to fund early development of games (hey... that also applies to crypto startups!). The game was released in 2015, and reviewed quite badly... and also had poor sales. This led to the multi-chapter game being unfinished, and the development studio going bankrupt. This has happened in the past with other episodic games... with the first chapter of these games leaving a little taste of what might have been.

When I started Woolfe, I had no idea that it was a cancelled multi-episode game... I only knew that when I hit the end... but I have no idea why it flopped. Perhaps my tastes are not the same as the blockbuster mainstream gamer who craves a testosterone hit?

It is a platformer game... a genre of gaming that isn't really my preferred taste in games. However, what drew me in was the story hook!

The Setup

Woolfe is a retelling of the Red Riding Hood story... and that was what brought me into the game. I love the retelling of the fairy tales, with one of my favourite comics being the Fable series. In this version of the well known fairy tale, Red Riding Hood was removed from the big bad city as a child by her Grandmother when Woolfe came to power, around the same time her father went missing.

In the forest, she trained with her grandmother until she became a bad-arse assassin.... and now she returns to the city with vengeance in her heart, axe in hand, and a mission to find out what happened to her father.

The Game

The city is a delicious mix of old mansions and twisted alleys, covered in snow... and mixed in with clockwork automatons as your main foes. The usual staples of platforming are here... a touch of fighting as well. Nothing is really too challenging, except for the boss battles which can be a bit hit and miss with trying to figure out what is going on and how to defeat their weaknesses. That in itself isn't too much of a problem, except for those unskippable cutscenes which are absolutely spellbinding to watch and experience the first time... but get rapidly tedious when you are forced to watch them in full before moving to the boss fight for about the 50th time!

The world outside the city is a twisted nightmare... which does leave some questions about how it got to be like this, and how the city managed to survive in its grimy own way.

Little secret collectibles scatter the platforming sections... which unlock snippets of newspapers and story flavour tidbits. These are all done in a lovingly crafted way... from old newspaper clippings through to photos and little written notes. All of these add some absolutely touching colour to the world.... and it is rare that I'm actively hunting down these collectibles, but I found myself craving these little bits of information to flesh out the story world!

Little moments of reflection and memories are also unlocked through voice-overs or cutscenes when interacting with objects in the moments between platforming chapters. These sections are critical story moments, and they are not able to be bypassed. You do have to interact with these touchpoints to progress through the game... thankfully, they aren't difficult to locate and they are definitely worth the interaction.

Some other fairy tale characters make an appearance in various guises... your arch-enemy in the first chapter is the Pied-Piper. A dangerous foe...

... and the game is appropriately gory! As our beloved protaganist says... "this is no fairy tale".

Visuals, Sound and Performance

On the Steam Deck's smaller screen, Woolfe just looks and feels great. The art style is quite unique, and I love it... Red Riding Hood, is just completely bad-arse! The voice acting from her is also suitably no-nonsense. She is tough, she is focused, she is cold... she is vengeance in human form.

My Thoughts

There are very few games that give me that satisfying feeling of just wanting to sit and savour everything without rushing through. Woolfe hit that spot... from the story setting, to the absolutely captivating character of Red Riding Hood... I just couldn't tear myself away from this game. I really have an aversion to platformers, but this just suited the Steam Deck... I would have avoided it on the laptop or desktop. It was a good thing to learn, that platformers are definitely better suited to that particular form factor.

I can't understand why this bombed so terribly... sure, the gameplay wasn't crazily difficult, except for the boss sections... and those unskippable cuscenes were pretty annoying after you had already experienced them. But WOW... everything else around it just oozed character and sheer beautiful craft!

Grin Studios deserved better than what happened... and most disappointingly, I will never know how the story plays out. Just fond memories of another cult classic being unfinished... just like Firefly.

Review Specs

Steam Deck (1st Gen)

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