I’m not saying it for the first time, and probably not for the last time either: finding good VR games is hard. Since the big hype of a few years ago, things have not gone completely silent in this genre, but most new games are more limited to casual gamers. “Wanderer” finally seems to be a welcome change – is it though?

The first thought that came to me when I got into this game was, “This looks like Alyx” – that was the last big story game we played in VR. Many elements seemed the same at first glance; the art style, the visual markers for objects we can interact with, and even the whole setting at times gave me déjà vu. The city we start in is in ruins, partly submerged and taken over by plants and vines. While it was mostly intact in Half-Life, the atmosphere is very reminiscent of that other masterpiece.

The controls are also quite similar, but that’s nothing special – in VR all games are controlled relatively the same, ironically you are severely limited in your enthusiasm for experimentation due to the great freedom of movement – it just wouldn’t make any sense if you coulnd’t pick up objects by hand or move by walking around. As already mentioned, the special similarity to Half-Life results from the visual markers and the ability to pull distant objects towards you – although this is possible here without the speicial hand movement.

But what is it all about now? Before I reveal that, I’d like to issue a spoiler warning – as always, I’ll try to reveal as little as possible about the story, but that’s hardly possible here. So stop here if you want to play the game yourself without any prior knowledge.

So, the story: we are Asher Neumann and at the beginning of the game we are looking for our grandfather’s apartment. He left us cryptic messages to lure us there – we already know a thing or two about our grandfather from the prologue, but I’ll leave that out here.

The way to the apartment serves the game as a kind of tutorial. We get to know the most important mechanics and control elements. All of this is wrapped up in a beautiful environment through which we can comfortably navigate in a boat. I was particularly excited about the fact that I didn’t even notice the tutorial element while playing, I only realized it afterwards. This is definitely one of the best integrations into a game I’ve seen so far!

Arrived at our destination, we also get to know a few simple puzzle mechanics, with which we finally gain access to the apartment. That’s where the game really starts.

The apartment serves us as a kind of headquarters. From here we travel to various historical events using a special device. It turns out that our world is not supposed to be the way it is; someone tampered with the major turning points in history and made a lot of things go differently – our job now is to fix that.

The whole procedure is relatively similar every time: we end up in one of the events and control one of the people involved. Now we need to find out where something has been tampered with and how to fix it. We always find special items that serve as a key to a new event to which we can travel to. In this way we gradually find all the turning points that need to be corrected.

Correcting the events is always reminiscent of a point & click adventure – there is no straight path. The solutions are always quite challenging puzzles that require various items; these objects can come from the corresponding timeline, from our grandfather’s apartment or from a completely different event. Thus, the events are not isolated levels, but there is a complex (albeit sometimes quite strange) connection. However, the puzzles are never so complicated that you can’t figure them out – when they are, you can also get tips.

As we travel through time, we also find more and more clues as to why these events were altered. We find notes and film recordings, often in the form of VHS cassettes, which we can play in the apartment, which give us more background information – but I won’t tell you anything about that at this point. Only the following: the game ends with a cliffhanger, so I don’t know everything yet.

Not to forget on the technical aspect of the game: it worked. We haven’t had any issues with bugs or crashes. There were the VR-typical but game-independent problems that the bandwidth was blocked by a well-considered update from Steam or Windows and it jerked, or the well-known motion sickness (not so bad for me, probably worse when watching). All in all, you can’t complain here.

But what is my conclusion about this game now? In short: I love it! It’s finally a good, extensive story game for VR again that tells an interesting, mystical story and challenges you with crisp but manageable puzzles. The characters you meet are very interesting and the historical events are also very well chosen. There’s even a plot twist or two that you can’t see coming, but which absolutely fascinated me!

There is only one thing I would wish for in a second part: more fooling around. VR definitely thrives on being able to touch and use everything, and “Half Life: Alyx” understood that very well back then – just wear a pot for a hat, throw things around or bang them onto eachother, use everything as a weapon what you can find. “Wanderer” also had such elements and good ideas, but I would definitely be happy to see more of them!

I’m really looking forward to the second part and hope it lives up to the first – the story told so far deserves a fitting, epic ending. I’m excited for new mysteries and new events for us to make happen – and for the villains messing with the past.

How did you like the game? Did you like it or do you still want to play it yourself? Do you like VR streams or can’t you watch the shaking well? Join the discussion on Discord!