Blanc is a magical game where you follow the journey of a wolf and a deer in hopes of reuniting with their families. The game has a beautiful black and white art style that helps bring the environment to life as you help the animals cross different terrains.
While the game is enjoyable for both single and two players, there are still some areas where it could be improved or expanded on its current concept. These changes will take Blank from a game that you enjoy and move on from within a few sessions, to one that you’re more likely to come back to and get more out of.
7 More complex puzzles
There are several areas throughout Blank where wolves and deer must work together to make a way for themselves or other animals they encounter on their journey. Most of these “puzzles” are fairly simple, and if you’re playing with another person, you won’t feel the strain of having to interact with them too much.
But since Blanc is made for co-op, it would be great if only these puzzle sections were more difficult. This would force you to coordinate more with the second person and really work together, which would also play into the main theme of the game: wolves and deer learning to help each other and others in need. Even if you were playing alone, it would help emphasize the game and give you more engagement overall.
6 More interaction with animals
In Blank’s chapters you meet other animals — a family of geese, two baby goats, your wolf cub and deer brothers and sisters. While you help them along the way, you have pretty minimal interaction with them. Once you’ve helped them, you usually don’t see them again.
While the focus is clearly on the friendship between the wolf and the deer during their journey, it would have been great if there was more interaction with the other animals you meet, rather than just cutscenes at the beginning and end of the respective chapters.
5 Make Chapter 6 a sliding mini-game
In addition to walking and running, you can slide across the landscape when there is a slope. You spend the entirety of Chapter 6 sliding down a hill, but you don’t have to do anything except slide and avoid any obstacles.
It would made a great mini game if it was more difficult there were obstacles to go around, checkpoints to pass, points to earn and a timer to beat. While this may conflict with Blank’s slow, easy vibe, it matches the playful energy of the two animals you play as, and would make the chapter a lot more fun overall.
4 Better camera smoothness
When there are two playable characters but one screen, there are bound to be some camera issues, and unfortunately, Blanc does sometimes. If one of the animals is too far ahead, the camera adjusts, often blocking the angle for the other animal, making it difficult to follow.
This is especially annoying if you’re playing Blanc alone and need to control both animals, or if you’re playing with someone else and one of your animals is stuck. You may have to go back to get a better look at the area and allow another animal to advance, but this can all be solved if you have better control of the camera angle yourself.
3 Add collectibles
Blanc is a simple game: nothing detracts from a wolf and a deer trying to make a journey to reunite with their families. However, the game’s beautiful scenery and artwork keep you exploring and taking your time. The problem is that there is no reward for this.
If you could pick up any collectibles along the way, that would be the perfect reward for exploring the nooks and crannies you might pass by. It can be something natural like pine cones to match the natural and simple themes of the game. Additionally, wolves and deer may have separate collectibles that they need to collect.
2 The best animal AI
In the second half of the game, other animals will mimic your movements and help you progress, but this can often be finicky. In both parts with baby goats, wolf cubs, and deer, usually the animals that copy you get stuck somewhere and don’t follow you all the way.
When this happens, you have to go back and watch to make sure they are copying your movements correctly. This tends to break the flow of the game and means you have to go back to make sure the AI is working correctly. If the animals get stuck on your first try, it can also make you think you’re completing a puzzle section incorrectly and throw you off track when it comes to completing that section. If this was improved, these chapters would flow much more smoothly.
1 Make peace with the goats
Spoiler alert for the end of chapter 8.
In Chapters 7 and 8, you help a pair of baby goats cross a landscape. After spending two chapters with them, it’s very easy to get attached to the pair and their adorable bleating. At the end of Chapter 8, however natural disasters. As you pass through the shaky pipes, the pipe breaks and the black goat falls from a great height.
Fortunately, they seem to be okay, but the baby goats are hostile towards the wolf and deer after this, because their leadership caused the baby goat to fall. If you try to interact with them again, they will bark angrily, forcing you to move on without them. After that, no one sees the baby goats again, and everything becomes a bit tainted and sad. It would be good if at the end of the game the band would get together again, and the kid goats would forgive the wolf and the fawn for the accident.