Step softly into the mist and thunder of Herdling, where every hoofbeat echoes through a fallen world stitched with silence and snow. This in-depth exploration of Herdling plunges you into a wordless alpine odyssey, guiding a lovable herd of Calicorns through eerie forests, forgotten valleys, and stampede-fueled survival. With no dialogue to anchor you, trust and instinct become your compass as you ascend toward a summit shrouded in mystery. It’s not just a journey, it’s a bond, forged in frost and firelight.

Herdling Review Pros

• Beautiful graphics. 
• 2.66GB Download size. 
• Platinum trophy. 
• Accessibility options – vibration, sprint toggle, press sprint to auto run, display HUD, herding direction indicator, calicorn immortality (make your animals invincible), and button holds. 
• I always call them animals, but they are technically called Calicorn. There are many types, and they all act differently, and by that I mean they all act out differently, disregarding you. 
• Brightness slider. 
• Camera settings – Invert axis and sensitivity sliders, motion blur, screenshake, and lock camera during stampede. 
• Full photo mode integration, and you can pull it up whenever you want, and in the options, you can choose to lock the field of view or not.
• You can remap the controls for every action except confirm, cancel, pause, and photo mode. 
• Herding gameplay. 
• Tutorial pop-ups as you play along with a controls menu to reference. 
• The opening prologue introduces the mechanics and general flow of the game set within the worn-down remnants of a city. 
• A full 3D game world, and you have 360-degree camera control. 
• Third-person view. 
• Control your herd with controls for movement, stopping, and even stamped ING to get past obstacles. 
• The game does have a very handy set of icons that appear. One is a line that lets you know you are connected to the herd so they can hear you, and the other is a sigil that helps you aim where you are herding them. 
• Find food within the world and either feed animals directly or place it on the floor for them to approach and eat. 
• You can indeed pet your animals, and in fact, it’s encouraged. 
• Puzzles play a huge part as some of the many World obstacles and puzzles require you and your herd, or maybe you on your own. 
• A very calming game in its approach to travel and presentation. 
• Find creatures in the wild and calm, then bond with them and have them join your herd. 
• Every animal you add to the herd can be renamed manually, or you can use the randomise button. 
• The game is all about a journey, and you will take in many beautiful locations, each with its own dangers. 
• Animals in your herd will change colour somewhat to denote hunger; they need to be fed in order to stampede and trample. 
• You can break parts of the environment. 
• The game does its best to cater to you, like herding can be done by just holding the button down rather than tapping it constantly. 
• Your herd will go to points automatically or line themselves up, so like if you need them to help push a door, they will instinctively go to the door part for them. 
• It takes a bit of time, but controlling the herd does get easier and feels good. 
• Different weather and time of day creep in. 
• I found it to be a great game for chilling out with. There are enough puzzles to keep your brain engaged, but it’s not too stressful. 
• The music is just as impactful as the scenery and locations, and adds a lot to the encounters and sequences. 
• Find and build fires so you amd your herd can rest up and eat, and sleep to advance time. 
• It’s a game where you don’t always get told what has happened or what is going on; instead, it’s down to your own interpretation. 
• Fast loading times. 
• Pause the game, and you can select to look at your herd, showing each type of animal and also their names. 
• Herd commands let you refresh your memory on the actions you can do. 
• I found it to be one of those games I put in, and I just lose track of time; it’s almost meditative in its play. 
• A lot of bright colours penetrate the sometimes drab, decaying world, as you move your herd, colourful flowers will appear to show you their route. 
• The HUD helps let you know when an animal is in need of food by changing the colour of the animal’s small avatar icon. 
• I was very surprised by how well the game worked for so many moving parts. The herd generally works as one, and the controls give you a lot more control but also variety than I thought. 
• The game world is big enough that it gives you the sense and feeling of an open world; it’s not as open as you may perhaps like, but it’s enough to feel satisfied. 
• I love the idea that each chapter just keeps rolling into one, if it wasn’t for the trophies poppin,g saying i completed a chapter I would never know. 
• Any cutscenes or interactions are all in-game. 
• Cool little off-the-beaten-track trophies to earn, more fun when you stumble across them. 

Herdling Review Cons

• It does take some getting used to the movement, and you may well switch the inversion to help, regardless of your typical preference. 
• A lot of pop-in and slowdown in built-up places was a bit distracting, especially when it’s like a building just appears. 
• The game is about the journey, and with all journeys, the first part is slow going as it sets the scene and story. 
• At times I found the herd to just say nope and walk off, causing me to chase them down and get behind them to move them to where I want, and it can get a little frustrating. 
• Outside of the trophy pop, you never know when you have finished a chapter. 
• No hard save option in the pause menu is annoying, as life can get in the way, and you never know when it last autosave was, plus the auto save icon is so small you can easily miss it. 
• Very little replay value in the game aside from trophies. Once you’ve seen the story, there’s not a lot to drag you back in. 
• The controls can get frustrating, as some actions require double-tapping a button and just by accident, you can trigger that. 
• The game struggles more in the tighter spaces than out in the open. 

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Herdling

Official Website: 

Developer: Okomotive

Publisher: Panic

Store Link:

PlayStation