When you first boot up Okomotive’s latest game, Herdling, it may seem like the mystical vistas you encounter are something out of fantasy. But that’s not the case. The development team drew inspiration from hikes they took while creating the game.
“We went on a few hikes in the Swiss mountains, before and while developing Herdling,” Herdling creative director Don Schmocker tells GameSpot via email. “From Medels to the Suretta Lakes, three picturesque mountain lakes located close to the Swiss and Italian border, or up one of the better-known Swiss mountains, Mount Rigi. They were always inspiring and got us away from our computers for a bit.”
Hikes along the Suretta Lakes and up Mount Rigi inspired Herdling, a magical adventure where players guide strange, mythical creatures across magical mountain landscapes. The team’s goal was to capture the feeling of wandering and exploring while herding–and to make it feel natural rather than mechanical.
“When we decided to develop Herdling, we were intrigued by the fantasy of guiding strange animals through the mountains,” Schmocker added. “But we knew that the first thing we had to figure out was the original herding gameplay. We built several prototypes to try out different approaches. Some were more direct but felt too mechanical, and some were too unintuitive. Another problem we needed to solve was making the animals feel natural and animal-like, without interfering with players’ intentions.”
Okomotive eventually found a gameplay style that felt fluid and intuitive. To keep movement smooth, the team looked to games like The Pathless, Journey, and even racing games like SSX–making sure herding never felt like an escort mission or a puzzle.
The game’s visuals also mix fantastical and real-world influences. The Calicorn creatures are inspired by Bulgarian Kukeri costumes, while films like Pan’s Labyrinth, Spirited Away, and The Last Guardian informed the magical tone of the world.
“In the FAR games we use environmental storytelling to tell big stories about the world and past events,” Schmocker said. “In Herdling we tell a more personal story that’s centered around protagonist Via and the herd.”
The game can be completed in a few afternoons–roughly three to five hours–but you might take a little more time exploring its mix of mountain-inspired landscapes. The journey within Herdling resonated with GameSpot’s Mark Delaney. He called it a game about finding one’s purpose.
“It’s a journey I’ll remember for a long time thanks to its depiction of animals as unique individuals who, very much like us, are chiefly seeking love and safety,” he wrote in his GameSpot review. “It was one of my favorite experiences in video games to help them find that safety and to feel that love.”
