“Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” – George Santayana

There is a subtype of atmospheric games that I have started to appreciate more and more as the years go by. That genre: the walking simulator. Titles like Firewatch, What Remains of Edith Finch, and Everybody’s Gone to Rapture place the player directly into a story to experience the world around them. Some merely have you progress from point to point. Others require a little more thought on the player’s end. One such title in this latter category is the upcoming WILL: Follow the Light.

WILL: Follow the Light is an upcoming indie adventure walking simulator from TomorrowHead Studio. It’s also going to be the initial launch from this US-based studio. We got our first glimpse of this new game at the 2025 Future Games Showcase. And I’ll be honest – I was immediately hooked with what I saw. It’s gloomy, it’s atmospheric, and it clearly has puzzles. In the words of Philip J. Fry “Shut up and take my money!”

Gamer Social Club was fortunate enough, however, to get an early access copy of WILL: Follow the Light – sparing the burden on my wallet. So, without further ado, let’s go lost in a world of sailing and puzzles. And fog. Lots and lots of fog.

The World & The Story

The World

WILL: Follow the Light takes place in the northern latitudes of Earth. While not based on “our” Earth, much of the region in which the game takes place is reminiscent of the far reaches of the Canadian shorelines, closer to the Arctic Circle.

The game also features the wildest gamut of accents when it comes to the NPC’s in the world. Irish, British, Canadian, Scottish, and plain old American. All of these various dialects are on display, but given the world in which WILL: Follow the Light takes place, this makes sense. Many of the individuals within the game have come to this region for work – very specific work. Lighthouse keeping. Seafaring. Fishing. Scientific research. All walks of life have found their way to this corner of the world.

Throughout Will’s (oh yeah, you’re playing as Will if that wasn’t clear from the title) journey, you’ll experience harbor towns, remote lighthouses, and frozen tundra. And in the Unreal Engine 5, it’s beautiful.

The Story

WILL: Follow the Light follows…Will. Will is a lighthouse keeper on a relatively remote island in the northern seas of the world. A mundane “shift” at your lighthouse and an incoming storm to the region toss Will’s world into disarray. A disaster has hit Will’s hometown and in the midst of the chaos, Will’s only son, Thomas, has gone missing.

What ensues in the game, without spoilers, is a journey to not only find Will’s son, but to come to terms with his past and everything that he has gone through in his life. I’m not going to be dipping too much into the story of this title, as with many walking simulator games, the story is the game. That being said though, and I can promise you, you will not be disappointed. Let the opening quote of this review be the guide that routes you through the story of WILL: Follow the Light.

The Gameplay

Walking Components

If you have ever played a walking simulator game, most of your time, as you know, is spent going from point to point within the game itself to drive the narrative. WILL:: Follow the Light is no exception to that rule. If you’re a more action-oriented gamer, then yes, this may not be the game for you. But that being said though, if story is a key part of gaming for you, then I recommend at least trying!

And as with any walking simulator game, there are a WIDE variety of objects to interact with that provide context to Will, the other characters within the world, as well as the history of the world itself we are in. From pictures and notes, to tape recordings from visitors long gone, you’ll find no absence of pieces of the world to explore in further detail.

Puzzles & Lantern Usage

That being said, though, the game does vary up your gameplay to allow for much more interaction than other walking simulators do. There are puzzles. BOY HOWDY – are there puzzles!

Some of the puzzles – a cake walk. Others, however, definitely left me scratching my head. But that being said, though, I never got stuck. And in my opinion – that’s a hallmark of a good puzzle game. Hard enough to trip you up, but not face first into a wall.

You’ll also have a special lantern at your disposal that can interact with “memories” of the world around you. It’s a cool little mechanic that showcases the world’s memories and who was there before you in certain locations.

Collectibles

So, there are actually quite a few collectibles within WILL: Follow the Light! That being said, unfortunately, I did not 100% all of them sadly. Well, there was one. Will, as you can tell by the accent, is from England. And understandably – he enjoys a good cuppa. That being said – there are various tea canisters that you can collect throughout the world!

There are two other collectibles within the game: model ships and model planets from the solar system. Now, the ships are easily apparent right away, given their size. The model planets, though, are very easy to miss and I’ll be honest – I didn’t even know that they existed until easily 1-2 hours into the game.

And that’s really all that I can cover without spoiling the story – trust though: it is worth it! Now, we went through the gameplay and story – let’s dig into what we liked and what we didn’t like about the game!

The Good

Beautiful Visuals & Scoring

WILL: Follow the Light is a beautiful game – no getting around that. Granted, I am also a sucker for the beauty of the arctic landscape. The quiet solitude of ice and the Northern Lights. It just works.

Combined with the gorgeous visuals of this game was a perfectly balanced scoring. In some moments, the only sounds that you will hear in game are the wind and Will’s solitary footsteps. Other instances, especially when on Molly (your ship), you’ll be greeted to somber music and the crashing of waves against your ship’s hull. It all…just worked to make you feel at one with the world around you.

The Story, The Story, The Story!

I will take a good story over bombastic, over-the-top gameplay any day. WILL: Follow the Light presented such a heartbreaking, yet impactful, story that definitely highlights some key traits of humanity. Coping with loss. Reconciling with our pasts. Confronting those who have cared for us…or not always cared for us.

And the amazing part of the game is that it does it in such a way that makes you question “Is this really happening? Or is this all in Will’s mind?” It even makes you question if…those you are speaking with are even alive. Or are they merely figments of Will’s cognitive processes as he tries to locate his son? You’re never told outright, and that’s what I loved about it – the mystery of whether it was all real or not.

Challenging & Non-Repetitive Puzzles

One thing that I have noticed when it comes to puzzles in video games is that the more of them you add, the more likely you’re going to see clones of prior puzzles. WILL: Follow the Light does not fall into this trap and every puzzle feels like its own unique (and non-duplicated) form that you won’t see again.

The Bad

I’ll be honest – I didn’t have too many nits to pick with this game. And the nits I’m going to pick are minor and don’t fully detract from my experiences that I had. That being said, what hiccups did we encounter?

Unfinished Voiceovers

Credit where credit is due – TomorrowHead was open that there are some missing components of dialogue and voiceover in the game that are slated for final updating prior to launch. And yes – they were there – quite often. However, the fortunate piece is that it was seemingly not key dialogue moments, but more voice-over when interacting with objects in the world at times.

So while not game-breaking, it was noticeable.

Moments of Misleading Direction

There was at least one moment in-game where the provided hint or next step in the game on-screen did not fully align with what I was actually supposed to be doing. The biggest culprit of this was a moment where I was working a gondola system through a snowy mountain-scape.

Despite the game repeatedly telling me that I needed to “Inpect the house” (yes, inpect – not inspect), that was not needed. I needed to actually interact with a frozen gear system that would release the gondola for further travel.

Frustrating? Yes. Game-breaking? No.

The Overall

WILL: Follow the Light, without the few negative hiccups I noted, is a 10 out of 10 game. But as it stands right now, the few nits that exist within the game pull away from that score slightly – but only slightly. That being said though, if these updates and needed fixes are made, I can easily see this being a can’t-miss game. The beautiful, yet heart-wrenching story, coupled with the intriguing puzzles and environment of the game itself make for an unforgettable digital experience.

WILL: Follow the Light launches on May 7th to PC (Steam), PlayStation, and Xbox Series X|S.

Gamer Social Club was provided an early access copy of this game for the purposes of this review. This review was played on PC (Steam).

WILL: Follow The Light launches May 7, 2026, for PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X/S.