As a badger cub, I wake up lying on some grass next to a gigantic tree and a bush that wobbles like super slow jelly (Jello). There’s a massive open space around me and tiny cartoon pictures of stars and planets dot the sky. Nothing is telling me what to do, so I start walking.
A forest of square brown trees beckons me. The texture of the grass is made up of intricate square patterns that give a dream-like quality. Shuffling my little badger legs past a large boulder that’s lodged into the earth, I notice that its surface is made up of similar shapes.
Suddenly a lynx appears and I ready for combat, but can’t find any way to attack. I click the mouse, but all I do is squeak. The symbols on the left of the screen appear above me when I click, but nothing seems to happen.
The lynx jumps over to me and meows. Then a picture—just like the symbols I can use—appears above its head. In the picture a happy cat smiles and waves. I click one of my pictures of a badger giving a sneaky little hello and the cat responds with an image of it laughing.
At that moment, I realize that it’s another player, another animal in this strange world and that this is our only form of communication. An arrow appears above the lynx’s head and then it starts to run away. I decide to follow it because what else am I supposed to be doing?
We run into the woods, under fallen trees, through small grassy canyons and up hills where flowers and shining puzzle pieces float, waiting for us to collect them. On the way, more animals join us: a frog, a goat, and another badger. Soon we are all gallivanting gaily through the starry night searching out flowers, floating rocks, and puzzle-pieces, which seems to be our only task in this dreamy sandbox world.
That was my first experience in Meadow (made by Might and Delight), which quickly led to more nights exploring its beautiful geographic secrets. I bought it for a measly £1.99 on Steam at the suggestion of a friend who had not yet played it but had heard good things.
For that price, there wasn’t much risk in feeling like I’d wasted my money if the game was terrible, so I didn’t even research it. That last decision only made the experience of the game more enthralling. When I first logged on, I had no idea what the aim of the game was or anything else about it.
When I hear that a game is an MMORPG (Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game, hence the acronym) an extremely, almost exhaustively familiar set of things comes to mind. I’m sure you know them too: level up, fight adjective-nouns (Stinking Rat, Raging Goblin, Angry Tomato, the list of unimaginative enemy names goes on), get better equipment, spend countless hours grinding, never leave your house again, the standard stuff.
Now there are plenty of good MMOs out there and when the formula is done well and you find enough people to play with then you can have a great time. However, there are thousands of carbon-copy MMOs out there which make the system feel very tired.
When I bought Meadow knowing that it was a new MMO, I thought I knew exactly what I was getting into. So, the moment I saw that lynx I figuratively pooped my Lil' badger pants. After I whipped around the controls trying to find the attack button, I started to panic. Then, the lynx just waves at me and smiles. An MMO with no fighting? Ok…
After a while of wandering I realized that it was true, there was no combat. On top of that, the only way to communicate is through a limited number of symbols in the left corner of your screen. It seemed like a massive constraint on the gameplay at first, but once I got into it I was amazed at the level of companion-ship possible without language as a method of communication.
It also adds to the feeling you get as a bunch of animals running around together. You feel like a herd of creatures and interact in imaginative, animal-like ways using a mixture of symbols and character movements. Beyond the interesting limitation of communication, there is more to be compelled by.
One of my favorite aspects of Meadow is the visuals. Whether you’re galloping (waddling, hopping, or bounding) through the cool night air by the Home Tree, or swimming through the river that has led you inside a crystal-filled cave, the beautifully simple polygon world will mesmerize you with its fascinating textures.
Once you closely inspect any surface of the world, you will find intricate 2D patterns layer everything. Purple-scale clouds blot out the cartoon planets and stars above and the sun roils beneath the map.
Gameplay has you exploring the highs, lows, ins and outs of Meadow collecting objects which give you new skins, emotes and animals. You must band together to destroy obelisks that are dotted throughout the map by shouting at them.
Obelisks requires you to be with a certain amount of other creatures, from two to six. They will usually require there to be specific types of animals in your party as well, so make sure you travel in a diverse group. Rarer puzzle pieces are dropped from these obelisks, which makes traveling in a group an essential part of the gameplay. And that’s one of the things I love about this game: there is no competition. It’s all co-operative.
I am unsure yet if I have managed to explore the entire map. There must be one or two more wondrous caves to wander through. The map is fairly big and with the speed the characters move at, crossing it is no speedy feat.
This means that the map can be covered and that you will start to visit the same caves and rivers eventually. However, with the changing sky and new groups to wander around with each time you play, it’s hard to get bored simply experiencing the beauty and simplicity of Meadow.
Have you played Meadow? Let me know what you thought of it below!
