Yonder: The Cloud Catcher Chronicles

Yonder is the nicest, and yet most deeply transgressive game we’ve seen in our little section of the art world, for quite some time, if not forever.

Looks like Zelda, totally isn’t. What you’ve got here is a farming concern which deserves to be spoken in the same breath as Harvest Moon. [September 2017, p71]

Yonder: The Cloud Catcher Chronicles is undoubtedly one of the cutest and most welcoming games that I've played in a long while. Sure, the experience may be slightly marred by a handful of minor faults, but Yonder more than compensates for these issues with its beautifully realised world and its enjoyably lighthearted tone.

If you're tired of shooting guns and swinging swords Yonder offers laid back palate cleansing cuteness in this open-world adventure.

Yonder Chronicles brings to the industry a game focused more on exploring, developing, and interactions over violence and leveling, and the end product is refreshing. A few things hold it back, but the heart and soul of the entire package is not to be denied on its way to success.

Yonder lacks combats, but that it's not a problem when you have a world as beautifully crafted as this is. Match it with addictive (although simple) crafting mechanics, and you have a unique adventure, where joy is found behind every new landscape.

Yonder takes many of the things, such as fishing and farming, that usually take a backseat and brings them front and center with rewarding results.

Yonder is as calming as it is addictive. I had thought I was happy with the amount I had played, only to come back the next day and complete even more quests. At just shy of $40 it's a little more than I'd want to pay for a game based around exploration, despite how wonderful the world being explored was. That hasn't stopped me from showing the island of Gemea off to all my friends though. Like a kid with the latest set of Pokémon cards, they're not really interested, but I'm going to make sure they know all about Yonder: The Charming and Calming.

Despite a few minor hiccups, Yonder offers a beautiful world to explore at your pace. You won't be fighting legions of demons to save the island, but you do collect cats and the likes.

Yonder: The Cloud Catcher Chronicles delivers an imaginative and colourful atmosphere that's contained within its own unique fantasy land. It's great fun to explore, learn skills, complete quests, and befriend the residents and the local wildlife. I only wish there was a clearer sense of direction and the ability to traverse this wondrous land more efficiently.

Yonder: The Cloud Catcher Chronicles is a charming and visually pleasing experience that will remind you immediately of 3D Legend of Zelda titles, mainly The Wind Waker, in how the towns, island, and citizens are portrayed.

A perfect approach to introduce kids in RPGs and a good choice for those who wish to enjoy a friendly and peaceful game.

This beautiful adventure transports you to an amazing world filled with a wonderful soundtrack. As far as gameplay is concerned, Yonder never becomes complex, instead opting for a simple, but charming experience. Highly recommended.

Prideful Sloth has created a well balanced game with a great artistic style and an amazing OST. Great game for the players that enjoy exploration and adventure.

Despite these niggles, Yonder is obviously a fantastic game for adults to play with their children, and for slightly older children to be allowed to play unsupervised. Even for adults it's surprisingly beautiful, and a soothing breath of anxiety-calming non-violence. But the older you get, the less mileage you might receive from Gemea.

In some ways, Yonder reminds of Animal Crossing with a bit of Fantasy Life thrown in, if one squints and tilts their head sideways. All three offer pleasant busywork and pastel colors, and they’re all just the sort of thing if a person’s in the mood for it. However, I strongly suspect that the optimal audience is comprised of kids looking for a game that offers a lot of easily-accomplished Stuff To Do without fear of restarts or penalties. Yonder: The Cloud catcher Chronicles isn’t a great fit for me and I suspect most seasoned players will bow out in a hurry, but I’m going to let my eight-year-old son sit down with it tomorrow, and I imagine I’ll have to pry him off of it with a crowbar.

Much like the fauna that inhabits its world, Yonder: The Cloud Catcher Chronicles is a beautifully odd creature. The things it does well it does extremely well, which leaves me baffled at some of the obvious drawbacks that limit its scope and longevity. With that said, I am massively impressed by what such a small team was able to accomplish, and the attractive launch price certainly makes it all the more appealing.

Yonder: The Cloud Catcher Chronicles is a delightful little game that can appeal to players of all ages and skill levels. The island of Gemea – complete with its atmospheric weather and seasonal cycle – makes for the perfect destination if you're looking for a relaxing virtual vacation.

Yonder: The Cloud Catcher Chronicles is an enjoyable enough adventure, but it’s missing a hook to get players invested. The game wants you to get lost in the economy and exploration it offers, but in just performing these menial tasks for their own sake it fails to create any moments where the entire experience is more than a series of distractions.

Quotation forthcoming.

Yonder: The Cloud Catcher Chronicles has an earnest heart and an anxious mind. Brilliant landscapes and gorgeous vistas create a waking daydream while economic riddles and perfunctory direction recall the drag of reality. Yonder's strides, despite an admirable form, don't seem to take it anywhere.

Yonder offers a beautiful world and a big heads-up to the bigger franchises of this planet. The fact that only three people developed it, make this game very special. It is too bad the search for Sprites is exhausting, cause otherwise this could have been a pretty awesome game.

Yonder: The Cloud Catcher Chronicles is a fun, friendly and visually stimulating sandbox with a world that invites you to relax and have fun. But the lack of variety in the chores to do, through simplistic and not very deep mechanics, ultimately affects the game in a negative way.

Yonder has some interesting aspects to it, and while they really tried to throw in everything and the kitchen sink into it minus combat, many of them fall flat or shallow. The exploration is the best part of the game by far, and while the other parts of the game may be to shallow for me, others may find enjoyment out of them. Even then, the pacing is well done and players will have a pretty view the entire time. I’d say wait for price drop, but when that happens check it out.

Yonder: The Cloud Catcher Chronicles is a lovely, sedate open world adventure game that inexplicably gates its crafting mechanic behind an obtuse, tiered system that renders it moot.

Yonder is beautiful and relaxing, but only up to a certain point. It's great for the first few hours, wandering around and discovering new sights, but the world ultimately leaves you wanting more depth and personality to explore.

In the end, Yonder is undeniably a fantastic game to sit back and chill with. If you're looking forward to some exploration, collection, and light building and farming elements, then Yonder is definitely right up your alley. However! There should be a heavy emphasis on "light" in the sentence up above! This is not the next Harvest Moon or Stardew Valley. No, this is a game with few puzzles, no combat, and filled to the brim with fetch quests and item collection. Yonder isn't without its charms, to be sure. But deep and engaging game play (and story) definitely isn't one of them.

Yonder: The Cloud Catcher Chronicles offers an amazing world to play in, but an underdeveloped story and menial side-quests offer little to keep players interested.

This is a title aimed at players who want a peaceful adventure, where exploring is the key. If you're a more experience player looking for something challenging or deep, you might have to look elsewhere.

Even with its flaws, Yonder: The Cloud Catcher Chronicles manages to create a beautifully peaceful experience.

Yonder: The Cloud Catcher Chronicles is a beautiful canvas that needs more detail to make it a masterpiece. Gemea is an enchanting location and the majority of systems in the game function well, but the magic hook is missing. The story isn’t engrossing and the quests just blend into each other for the most part, as do the characters that give them. Gemea is magical, the content not so much.

Simple quests, a lack of tutorials, and little-to-no backstory makes Yonder feel unpolished, in direct contrast to its whimsically charming setting. [Sept 2017, p.84]

Yonder offers a beautiful and cutesy world to explore, but there is so little to do, the exploring is over way too soon.

If gathering resources, exploring, and “go get this for this, or find an item or persons for this” kind of quests are your deal or if you just want a change of pace, Yonder: the Cloud Catcher Chronicles is just for you. More experienced players may find some of the shallowness of the story and game play to be a little off putting. However younger players and those that desire a passive bit of simple gaming away from the loads of violence driven games with no choice but violence in them will have a good time with Yonder: the Cloud Catcher Chronicles. Though I must give this warning… you may smile.

Yonder is a beautiful and cute game that sadly lacks almost every aspect of a good sandbox role-playing game. The quests are tedious, the farming is undercooked, and the constant gathering of resources - without a compelling combat system or a peaceful equivalent - makes for a title that is fun for about half an hour before it grinds itself into forgetfulness.

Without a way to fail, the game just soldiers on like its fishing minigame: a thing that’s tedious but not at all difficult, and which simply continues until players either succeed or become bored enough to give up.

It has admirable intentions, but this misguided role-player proves a quiet life is rarely an entertaining one when it comes to video games.