The Ori Series:Terr-Ori-sing, but beautiful

Platfomers. The most “pedestrian” form of games. Basic, uncomplicated, linear. Super Mario World was a platformer. Everyone has played it. It moves from left to right, and we just run and jump. Platformers. Literally the pavement in the highway of real videogames. The difficult part is the hack and slash. Sometimes there are puzzles. But anyone can play them. Right? Ori is a beautiful platformer. It has a rich story. You know, lots of feelings and all that. Ori and the Blind Forest is the first game in the series. It is playable on the Xbox and the PC. The game starts with introducing the friendship of Ori and Naru. They were best friends.

Something sad happens, and Ori is suddenly forced to go on an adventure to revive the Forest, and bring back its former glory. The illusion of the easy, beautiful, comforting platformer ends with the prologue to the game. Ori is a cute little bunny cat, a delicate creature of the forest. You think Ori can do no bad. In a few hours, Ori does triple jumps, pirouettes across platforms, smashes evil forest creatures, and is relentlessly slashing through the map. Exploration happens as Ori develops specific skills, which are neatly taped to the storyline of the game.

As the map unfurls its hidden nooks, we watch Ori grow into a resilient, and independent monster. I say monster, because I have struggled. Over 1,400 moments of failure (Ori’s incompetence, not mine), until I finally finished the game. I constantly wondered: “How can something so beautiful be so nightmarishly complex?”. Skill progression does not make gameplay easier. The experience is constantly refreshed in the game, which makes sense, because the repetition happens as you keep failing sequences.

As an interlude between the main missions, is a sequence so difficult, that I can now use my newfound dexterity to embroider a whole bedsheet. And then I played Ori and Will of the Wisps, the second and latest game in the series. Confident in its winning format of torturing gamers, Will of the Wisps expands the universe with new features. In WotW, there is a new region, dialogue interactions, upgradable skills, purchaseable power-ups, and even side missions! The Xbox Game Pass lures you with its free access to Ori. I wouldn’t dissuade you from trying it, but I will warn you — it needs patience. I give the game a rating of 1400 deep breaths — that’s what it took for me to finish it, anyway.