The demo for Windrose is a rollicking pirate adventure—once you've chopped down enough trees, that is.



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One completely unexpected side-effect of the pandemic: I got really sick of sea shanties. When everyone was stuck at home clinging to TikTok for their sanity, it seemed like at least one out of five people recorded some sort of shanty-related content, and it didn't take long before the idea of hearing yet another spirited aquatic anthem made me want to throw myself off a boat.

Luckily, I deleted TikTok a couple years ago and I'm fervently pro-shanty once again, which makes for perfect timing because the Next Fest demo for pirate survival game Windrose is out on Steam—and it's great. You can fix up a ship, hit the high seas, and listen to your crew of NPC pirates sing a whole bunch of awesome sea shanties. Just listen (and watch) the new Windrose trailer below and try not to get completely keyed up for a grand pirate adventure:

Of course, this is a survival game, so the grand adventure doesn't happen right away. You begin the demo on a tiny island after an encounter with Blackbeard has left you shipwrecked and stranded with not so much as a single tricorn hat to call your own.

You know the drill: pick up rocks, gather branches, craft a cruddy axe and a crude pick and start grinding for resources. There's not a whole lot going on, survival-wise, that we haven't seen in a million survival games already, but at least you're a pirate covered head to toe in tattoos—which somehow makes a couple hours of chopping down trees and smashing boulders feel more like an adventure.

Besides, you've got an important goal to work towards: acquiring a boat to get off this island and visit the others you can see on the horizon. After defeating some surprisingly fierce Dodo birds (don't believe the history books, they're no pushovers), digging up some buried treasure (it's a pirate game, after all), and fighting some Drowned (that's what they call zombie pirates), I had a decent little base and a tiny, two-person boat I could use to start exploring the world. That led to finding a shipwreck I could repair (after a whole lot more tree-chopping and copper mining), and locating members of my crew that had been captured by Blackbeard's men.



After a bunch of battles with enemy pirates using my saber and an occasional carefully aimed flintlock pistol shot, I freed seven of my crewmates. I crafted new cannons for my ship and even located a new tricorn hat. Time to put to sea for some proper pirate adventures, and a few glorious sea shanties. (SOUND ON for the cl...Read more: Full article on www.pcgamer.com

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