Woolcraft Review

Herding one real sheep, let alone a whole herd, can't be very easy. Herding the cutesy digital sheep in Woolcraft is no cake walk either. It takes some ingenuity and some persistence to get these sheep where they need to go. Besides being cute, these sheep are mindful and very obedient but the terrains and obstacles that they must overcome make herding them much more difficult.

Woolcraft is split up into hundreds of gridded puzzles where the goal is to get all of the sheep from their starting tile to the same tile as their loving shepherd girl. The puzzling part of the game comes from how the sheep move from one place to another as players attempt to reunite them with the girl. The sheep can be moved in one direction at a time, and sheep being sheep, if there is more than one sheep in the puzzle they will all move in the same direction at the same time. The sheep will also move as far as they can in that direction before they stop. The player controls the movement of the sheep by removing plots of grass which will make a sheep stop in the last square of grass before the bare spot. By controlling how far each sheep travels and in which direction, the player will be able to herd them back to their shepherd one at a time.

Herding the sheep becomes more difficult as obstacles like water are added to the equation. The sheep, apparently not too bright and unable to swim, will jump right off of grassy squares into squares of water where they will drown. The player must then try to keep the sheep out of the water as they guide them home. This task is made possible in some instances by finding special tools under removed squares of grass, like rocks to build bridges and bushes that will stop sheep from moving farther in a certain direction.

Woolcraft is cute, there's no other way around it. The sheep, the shepherd girl, and the tiles used to build the levels are all very cute. The visuals are cohesive and they bring a whimsy to the game that makes it a pleasure to play time after time. The puzzles are challenging, and players will be satisfied when they figure out the more difficult ones. For those looking for a charming puzzle game that doesn't blend in with the herd, this is a great game. The sheer number of puzzles included in the game means that it will keep players busy for quite a long time, and that isn't even counting the 1000+ user generated levels that have been created with the game's included level editor. This game isn't just fluff, there is tons of cute woolly content to enjoy.