Cloudheim Is a Lot of Fun, and Not Just Because of the Kick

Cloudheim is out in Early Access now, delivering a physics-based combat system with plenty of chaos, some base-building, and all sorts of Norse flavour. You take control of a being called a Runari, which is basically Cooler Daniel from the meme. You know the one. Anyway, they're a lot like humans, but they're better at jumping, falling, fighting, and all that good stuff.

Basically, Ragnarök happened and it's been a bit of a rough time since. Your job is to try to get things going again, and doing that means fighting your way through all sorts of monsters, solving puzzles, getting loot, and building up a base. Combat is probably the thing that's going to keep most people here, and it's pretty satisfying. Some weapons can feel a bit weightless, though you do get access to a bunch of cool abilities, with the two biggest draws being the kick and the lasso.

These help you whip enemies around wildly, even making it possible to smash them into each other, off ledges into the void, into explosives, and more. It's a lot of fun, and it all feels a little bit Bulletstorm to me. That's a compliment as I wish more games felt a bit Bulletstorm, it'd fix so many of the world's woes. This makes a lot of fights feel very cinematic. Cloudheim's especially fun when you're playing with your friends, since you can just sort of tennis everyone around.

Outside of combat though, your main interactions will be with the base building stuff. You basically (pun intended) get a small space to put things on which is on the back of Odin Shell, which is a massive flying turtle. Here, you do all of your crafting, building, weapon upgrading, and so on. It's a fun way to spend your downtime, but it feels a little fiddly right now.

There's a real charm to the way it all looks as well. It's very evocative of Breath of the Wild, and that's always going to be a good thing in my books. It's a good-looking game, although I have encountered a few random glitches like enemies being temporarily invisible. Nothing game-breaking has happened, but it's one of those things you're often signing up for with Early Access.

I'm enjoying it a fair bit so far. I'm expecting to hop in and out of it as time goes on, and I'm very hopeful for whatever form it takes when all the dots are added. If you've got mates, bring them along, and enjoy the good old-fashioned chaos of it all.