Hidden Path don’t like to be predictable. They followed up their tower defense game Defense Grid with Counter-Strike: Global Offensive. Next they made Age of Empires II: HD. Three games different from one another in many respects. Their latest project is another great departure for the studio, a social sandbox game called Windborne.
It has dragons.
Every playing in Windborne has their own island. They can explore it, finding enemies and puzzles to kill and solve; construct buildings; and defend it from encroaching hordes. Your island will float about sometimes passing other players’. If you’ve trained a dragon you can fly over and trade/say hi/burn everything to the ground.
Details of the game are still sparse but, according to an interview with Destructoid, Micheal Austin, CTO of Hidden Path, said there’s “an evolving single-player mystery that players can choose to investigate at their own pace, and you can continue to invest time in your island or guide it towards a self-sustaining state in order to focus more on exploration, interaction, and collaboration with other players.”
If you want, you can “just completely ignore the quest lines and just build, and at any point you can take your single-player world online.”
Hidden Path’s page for the game has this feature list:
• Building – With a wide variety of building materials, furnishings, and artifacts, you can build whatever you can imagine
• Crafting – Everything can be made and improved, and everything you make has a purpose.
• Exploring – You will be part of your own story as you explore an interesting world that is full of wonder and surprise. Explore millions of ruins filled with puzzles and treasure.
• Guiding – Guide the Jin to civilization by defending them, building homes for them, and teaching them, and they will help you in return.
• Community – See other islands floating by, and visit them to trade with their owners. Join your friends and help them build their town.
• Dragons – Breed dragonlings to unlock special abilities, including the ability to fly!
• Combat – Defeat enemies that are encroaching on your island, or try assaulting a copy of your friend’s island to test its defenses.
• Quests – Pick and choose quests to give you optional challenges that net big rewards.
We’ll be hearing more about Windborne in the coming month.