While playing The Pathless, my mind kept going back to two particular games, Giant Squids last indie game Abzu and Journey from Thatgamecompany. Both encapsulate different features of what a walking sim could do, and both are ultimately much more engaging than the Pathless ever could be.

Significant disappointment with this one, especially with how much I loved Abzu for as short as an experience that one was. A pseudo open world with some of the dullest moment to moment exploration that desperately makes you want to care for the relationship of the hunter and eagle with really aggravating mini games, coupled with what might possibly be the worst stealth sections put into an indie game. The Pathless feels very conflicted with itself all the way through,with the only real bright spots being the excellent world traversal and solid boss fights (besides the second and third one these are all pretty good caps to the very boring areas). Also while price isn't something I usually go on about (because most of the time it does not matter), $40 USD for something this aggressively dull is legit maddening. For twice that you can get the much better Abzu, or if you were a new PS5 owner can get the MUCH superior Miles Morales for $10 more.

Overall I can not in good faith recommend The Pathless. Hoping Giant Squid learns in the future to scale things back because this is one of the worst indies I've played in the last decade

4/10