When I was young, there was a field with some trees just outside of my childhood home that I used to pretend was a magical forest. It became my playground where I'd explore, watch the birds nesting there, and play out my own little imaginary escapades. As I got older, the magic of it fell away, and when I went to revisit it as an adult, I was taken back by how small the field actually is – it always felt so huge. While playing Out and About, I pined for this patch of greenery and its wonders.
The cozy foraging adventure from developer Yaldi Games instantly made me feel like I had stepped right back into that field to marvel at my natural surroundings. Only, in this virtual open-world, I get to learn so much more about the plants I so often saw growing in the woods as a kid. And better yet, I get to make dishes and useful salves out of them to help the residents of Out and About's central setting of Portobello town.
It's still in Early Access as of right now, and while there's plenty of goals to work towards, I've been happily spending a lot of my time discovering new plants and reading all about their properties. In fact, it's so satisfying to identify flora and check them off in my field guide that it's basically all I want to keep doing.
All plants great and small
At the beginning of Out and About, you get to customize your very own character. As someone who loves to spend a good amount of time in character creator suites, I'm happy to report there are a variety of sliders and styles to play around with, so you really can create whatever look you want for your forager. Once I've finally settled on my appearance, I'm introduced to the adventure by a storm that's hitting Portobello. After it unfortunately destroys the tent I'm staying in outside of town, a fellow camper called Claire hurts her hand as we venture through the nearby forest together, but thankfully a local called Barbara has a lot of herbalism know-how.
The first set of objectives tutorialize the ways of foraging as I set about searching for plants to make a dressing for Claire's wound. Thanks to her generosity, I have a camera to snap shots of plant patches so I can start searching for the right ones to fulfil my task. Looking through the camera's viewfinder, a reticule begins to flash when I'm near some flora that I haven't added to my field guide yet. Taking a picture catalogues it, with Barbara popping up to tell me a little more about my leafy discoveries. Then I can examine the plants to properly identify and harvest them.
I love that when it comes to collecting plants, there's a health bar to show you when you're taking too much away from a stem. It's one of the first ways I get a feel for the sustainable ethos of the adventure – not only should you not take too much away from nature, but anything you do take should be done so to make something useful (like a tea or salve), so nothing is wasted.
As I find more plants and catalogue them, my field guide becomes a veritable treasure trove of knowledge. I eagerly consume real-world facts about the Ribwort and Broadleaf Plantain I've just found so Barbara can make a curative for Claire's hand. Even when I've checked off the objective and I'm free to move on, I can't stop myself from taking photos of more patches so I can learn about the flora I grew up seeing – with everything from the dandelions I used to blow at to make its seed scatter into the air, to my archenemies, the stinging nettle. Despite the red angry bumps the latter would inflict on my skin during my careless adventures as a kid, I now know that they're actually packed full of vitamins (which makes sense given that folks boil them down to make stinging nettle tea).
I'm at once reminded of the museum in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, and the way the collections I worked to put together for it encouraged me to learn more about the insects, fossils, fish, and artwork within it (all of which exist in reality).
In fact, I became so obsessed with the many species of fish I'd spend hours reeling in on my island (particularly the unusual Barreleye), that I actively researched them in my free time for fun (I'm too cool, I know). And now that's translated over to plants and fungi thanks to Out and About.
Once I eventually pull myself away from learning about foliage, I set off into Portobello town to meet my granny. It becomes clear that the town has seen better days, and I'm soon tasked with using my foraging skills to gather resources to make recipes that I can sell at a market to earn currency to help fund community projects – such as clear away a tree that's blown down and blocks a path, or restoring an area.
Again, it feels like everything you can do in Out and About is all about caring for the world around you and learning more about it, and I'm curious to see how much effect I'll have on the town and its people as I progress further into the game.
So far, it's very a laidback adventure, and I'm loving how much it's teaching me about the natural world and the plants that once decorated my own "magical forest" as a kid. Plus, as a fan of collecting in games, it's tapping into that satisfying checklist feeling as I identify and tick off more plant variants for my trusty field guide. As I mentioned before, it's currently in Early Access, but I'm looking forward to seeing how it grows in the future.
Out and About is out now in Early Access on PC. For more recommendations, be sure to head on over to our Indie Spotlight series.
