Gaucho and the Grasslandis a colorful cowboy adventure steeped in Latin American culture. As the titular gaucho, you travel the overworld restoring harmony to nature and civilization by helping people and defeating evil spirits feeding off their misfortune. Though the game occasionally shows its indie roots—and not necessarily in good ways—it’s steeped in passion and care, creating an utterly unique game that also serves as a great representation for an underrepresented culture in the video game world.
This game starts remarkably quickly, opening with our protagonist (after a brief customizing pre-menu) sobbing over their father’s grave. They don’t have much time to mourn, however, before their father returns from the dead and, surprisingly jovial, informs them there’s no time for tears; we must pick up the hat, hop in the saddle, and help the world.
The tutorial sets a bad first impression. It’s incredibly railroaded, pushing you through objectives uncomfortably fast, then stalling the pacing with mandatory ghost-dad interactions. These feel awkward in the English localization.
Gaucho and the Grasslanddoesn’t have amazing localization, with English text prone to semi-frequent grammatical errors. While worth noting, it doesn’t overly detract from the experience; worst case, you might feel a bit lost before checking your mission journal. This feels most intrusive during the tutorial.
Here, the game feels cramped, its mechanics reminiscent ofAnimal Crossingto a fault, worrying it might be just another genre clone. However, once your ghost dad gives you the keys to other regions, things start to clear up.
InGaucho and the Grassland, your role is not simply as a farmer or builder tending to a little plot of land and trading with local villagers; you are a brave hero, restoring order to the countryside through your selfless actions and the sweat of your brow. Mechanically, this is portrayed as a semi-open-world adventure where you ride around and help the people of the land with their problems. Doing so allows you to build up a heroic power to drive away cursed creatures of Latin folklore.
That isn’t to say that farming, ranching, and general cowboy behavior are missing fromGaucho and the Grassland; many of the tasks you must do to help the locals are the kind of work you’d give to a sun-baked cowboy. Repairing fences, lassoing escaped cattle, and tending to crops coincide with bigger, more heroic tasks like putting out a raging wildfire. Along the way, you’ll build permanent structures and engage with ranching, farming, and home-tending as you see fit, too; after all, not everything you do has to be in the service of someone else, and occasionally you just want to raise some chickens of your own.
Gaucho and the Grasslandtakes place over several biomes, with one available to you at the start and the others unlocking as you restore harmony to the land before it. The one I chose to start with definitely felt the most like the Southwest I call home in real life: hot, dry, and grassy with a persistent drought, which I was more than happy to help the locals solve.
The game certainly surprised me. Once I got past the sub-par first impression of the tutorial, I was pleasantly surprised by just how openGaucho and the Grasslandbecomes, and just how much there is to do. Comparing to other titles in the genre becomes harder when you account for the directionGaucho and the Grasslandtakes, and its incredibly unique theme, representing a culture and mythology you don’t see much of in the genre—or in games in general.
That being said, there are certainly areas in which the game’s indie development hiccups can really show. Most noticeably, I think the game’s UI could really use some work. Awkward choices for hotkeys can make you open the game’s main menu when you try to exit the building screen or other HUD elements, and the game’s many traders and stores do their business through dialogue options rather than having an interactive shop menu or showing images of what you’re buying. You have to keep track of what you’re buying, how much you’re buying, and what you’re spending for it through dialogue options alone.
The world can also feel kind of empty, which I chalk up in large part for the style the game is going for; it constantly feels like the horizon is just ahead of you, but the game doesn’t do a great job of reading like that was intentional, instead feeling sort of like everything just fails to render until you’re very close.
Gaucho and the Grasslandis a heartfelt cowboy adventure that stands out not just for its vibrant art and open-ended gameplay, but for its celebration of Latin American culture and folklore—a theme too rarely explored in games. While its rough edges in UI design, localization, and tutorial pacing hold it back from greatness, its charm, ambition, and variety more than make up for it.
The Final Word
A refreshing, culturally rich twist on the life sim adventure, marred only by some technical roughness,Gaucho and the Grasslandis a game that grows into itself over time and rewards those willing to overlook its clumsy start.
Try Hard Guides was provided a Steam code for this PC review ofGaucho and the Grassland. Find more detailed looks at popular and upcoming titles on ourGame Reviewspage!Gaucho and the Grasslandis available onSteam.
