Like the movement, these sections also feel a lot like a rhythm game, with a greater emphasis on timing than back-and-forth combat. Spirits share several abilities, but each one has a few tricks that change the overall feel of the fight. The climactic spirit hunts are much more action-packed, always opening with a chase sequence but culminating in an arena-style duel. If you run into them before they're weakened – rather, if you get caught up in the crimson storm around them – you enter a light stealth section that plays like red light, green light. The zen of exploration ends there, though, because the tone and pace of the game flip dramatically when you actually confront the cursed spirits. The main story beats and spectacular finale can stand on their own, but an inquisitive eye will definitely improve your appreciation for what these spirits and their followers have gone through. There's precious little dialogue in The Pathless – though enough to give the main cast some real character – so your understanding of the world will reflect your willingness to poke through it. The prominent light versus dark motif gains welcome nuance as you uncover the gradual erosion of a people's faith and the accompanying swell of impassioned madness. Scraps of lore are scattered around, each one a window into the life of a late warrior, scribe, or perhaps a previous hunter. The largely hands-off storytelling is also enlivened through exploration. That tiny moment validated all the exploring I'd done to strengthen the eagle, and it confirmed once and for all that I could trust the game to reward my curiosity. Without even realizing it, I'd pulled off a bit of sequence breaking, and I was positively giddy afterward. Instead, I found a temple buried in a random craggy peak, and inside was a light stone for a spirit whose plateau I hadn't reached. I kept sprinting, gliding, and chaining talismans, waiting to hit an out-of-bounds marker. Unable to stop myself from exploring, I'd unlocked a few extra flaps by this point, so I was able to scale a mountain in search of high-altitude secrets. My greatest 'Wow!' moment came halfway through the second plateau. It also nails the excitement of seeing a landmark in the distance and knowing that you can actually go over to it. Nothing is marked for you on some map, so every discovery feels sweeter. This speaks to one of the best parts of The Pathless. It's well worth it for the visual splendor alone, nevermind the awesome bonus abilities. I won't spoil what, but please do yourself a favor and get all off the light stones. You only need a few to activate all three shrines, but if you find all of them, some Really Cool Stuff will happen. The same is true of the light stones found in each plateau. Suspiciously unlit torches, misaligned rings crying out for a well-placed arrow, corrupted wildlife, short time trials – puzzles overlap a bit much for my liking, but The Pathless is overflowing with things to find, and the promise of more flaps makes them well worth finding. The world is filled with unassuming secrets that grant crystals which increase how many flaps your eagle can perform, and you'll quickly learn that there's something around every corner. There are also plenty of good reasons to stop. Puzzles and purificationīut it's not just the movement that elevates The Pathless. Paired with another Austin Wintory score that's both somber and electrifying, The Pathless is equal parts calming and arresting. Trees bend in the wind, tall grass parts with your every stride, and rivers snake through the plateaus almost as fluidly as the huntress herself. Developer Giant Squid has taken the lush colors and clean lines of its previous game, Abzu, and somehow applied them to something much larger and more diverse without sacrificing any detail. Each plateau has a distinct aesthetic that evolves once you cleanse its guardian spirit, and every single one is breathtaking. This is partly thanks to the raw beauty of the environments you're running through. I have never wanted fast travel less in my life.

This is the video game version of runner's high, and in the eight or so hours it took me to clear the game, it never, ever got old. I stopped obsessing over the reticle and started focusing on what was ahead of me, comfortably landing power shots all the while. I was a bit shaky and overly careful at first, meticulously aiming and timing shots while watching the target reticle, but within an hour or two I was ripping over hills and blitzing through forests without a care in the world.

The pathless extended ending