Author: Rich Meister
Wolfstride oozes style. It’s clear from the opener where our main character, Shade, is getting the shit kicked out of him by a dog and a cat in a public restroom. It blends black and white manga-style art with a deep mecha JRPG and off-the-wall characters to create something engaging and unique. It tends to dive down in the muck relying on sometimes cringe toilet humor to lighten its strange mood and world, but the weird trashy 90s anime atmosphere works more often than not.
Wolfstride (PC)
Developer: Ota Imon Studios
Publisher: Raw Fury
Release Date: December 7, 2021
MSRP: $14.99
You technically play as a handful of characters throughout Wolfstride, but most of that time is spent as Shade, an ever-aloof ex-yakuza who looks like Spike from Cow Boy Bebop crossed with Gurren Lagan’s Kamina. When an old friend leaves Shade and some other old friends a junk heap of a mecha after passing away, they reluctantly form a mech battling team and join the Ultimat Golden God tournament. A worldwide ranking-based mecha fighting competition.
The main team consists of Shade, Duque, a grumbling old dog, team mechanic, and Knife Leopard, the team’s pilot. During mecha battles, you take control of Knife and occasionally control him outside of combat when Shade is otherwise occupied for narrative reasons.
That’s right; our main protagonist isn’t even the guy piloting the robot. Still, he does just about every other odd job the team needs working jobs from bicycle messenger to amateur exorcist, all to scrounge up money for repairs and new mech parts.
As the story progresses, people from Shade’s past resurface, and we learn about his time as a career criminal and the history he shares with Knife and Duque. Old debts come back to haunt just about every team member, and it tells a surprisingly impactful and emotional story. Even if the rate at which that story unfolds is paced very unevenly. Wolfstride structures itself on passing days by between big mech fights. Occasionally these days provide big and exciting story beats, but other times, you’ll find yourself grinding cash at odd jobs and just wishing the next big battle would come.
Particularly in the game's first few hours, things can feel a bit sluggish. The reluctance to overcomplicate combat and the slow rate that new ability slots for your mecha are given out doesn’t help that feeling.
The combat itself is a joy in action. Every fight is a simple turn-based battle on a track moving your mecha towards the enemies from left to right. You can change everything from movement allowed per turn to armor and health on individual mech components by upgrading multiple pieces of equipment from armor plating to mainframes and installing a minibar in your cockpit.
Each mecha is made up of four pieces with their own health and armor: a head, two arms, and the chest or cockpit area. You need to destroy an enemy's cockpit to win, but they won’t make that easy. Knife can only go in with two attacks at the start, but the overall number of skills you can equip and choose from changes drastically as you progress. Some moves require ammunition which you’ll have to use an action point to reload, and others can’t be used at all if a specific component of your mecha is destroyed. Going for the cockpit might be the fastest way to victory, but sometimes it's more worthwhile to rob your opponent of the ability to attack completely.
Outside of the story-based combat, an in-universe virtual app lets Knife train via virtual battles, and these extra fights are super fun and some of the more challenging ones in the game. On top of that, completing them will net you some excellent equipment for your mecha. If they could find some way to rebalance this combat into an online competitive form, I might just lose myself in it.
Wolfstride is one of the most visually striking games I’ve ever seen, and as a result, my computer is overflowing with screenshots from it. The team at Ota Imon Studios beautifully combines pixel art with hand-drawn manga-style character portraits to make something unforgettable.
The soundtrack also evokes that jazzy style so standard in 90s anime. It may be a nostalgia pull, but it works, and I’m always happy to see developers revisiting that well.
Verdict: I knew Wolfstride was exceptional from the moment I laid eyes on it, but its ultimately the amazing combat that kept me going through my thirty or so hours with it, even in the slower moments I could keep pressing on knowing I’d be punching some giant fucking robots before long.
Buy it
[This review is based on a retail build of the game purchased by the reviewer]