Wanderstop comes with seemingly random achievements, and it’s honestly refreshing

If you’ve ever played The Stanley Parable, you’ll know that Davey Wreden has a certain knack for creating a narrative that makes you question things. He’s done it again as part of the development team Ivy Road, and the result is the wonderfully cozy Wanderstop.

Wanderstop is a tea-centric, narrative-driven game about time and its ability to change things in unexpected ways. You play as Alta, a previously unbeaten warrior who finds herself stuck in a tea shop in the middle of a fantastical forest. The premise is simple – grow plants, serve tea, and make the shop your own. 

However, as players learned with The Stanley Parable, things aren’t always what they seem in Davey Wreden’s projects. Wanderstop is bizarre and filled with moments that make you question what’s really going on underneath it all. Has Alta finally been defeated? Is this a commentary on burnout and the perils of pressuring yourself, and a reminder that it’s okay to slow down?

The questions aren’t just limited to the gameplay or narrative, but also somehow woven into the game’s 11 achievements. If you were to glance at the list on Steam, none of it makes any sense, especially to someone who has yet to play. Want to know a secret? They make no sense even if you have played and got them all, because unlocking them is almost random, and there is no sure-fire way to get a single one outside of just playing the game. 

And honestly? That’s refreshing. 

Even the coziest of games on Steam have long lists of achievements tied to completing certain tasks. In Stardew Valley, you must cook every recipe to unlock the “Gourmet Chef” achievement. Similarly, cooking 900 meals in Disney Dreamlight Valley will unlock the “Chef Cook” achievement. Not all of them are cooking-based, of course, but those are the two that spring to mind.

There are no such requirements tied to any of the achievements in Wanderstop. The only secret to them is simply playing the game, spending time in the world created by Ivy Road, and getting to know the people you meet. As with real life, there are no shortcuts to success in Wanderstop. There’s no rush to serve 100 cups of tea to get an achievement, and you don’t need to do anything special to hit those completionist goals. 

Instead, you’ll actually get to enjoy planting seeds on the hexagonal grid system, creating certain patterns to grow new and interesting ingredients for your tea-making endeavors without counting down to a certain number that unlocks an achievement. You can collect trinkets to decorate the tea shop, knowing that they’ll eventually disappear, and that doesn’t matter because you had fun decorating.

All of this reminds you to slow down and enjoy the ride, rather than rushing to the end with a certain goal in mind. You’ll either love it or hate it, depending on how much you desperately need a goal to play towards. Either way, Wanderstop is a beautiful experience and worth diving into if you want to slow down and appreciate things a little more. 

The descriptions of the achievements themselves back up the concepts at play throughout the story:

The achievements system works so well with the story’s narrative because it backs up the theme of removing the pressure to act, to be perfect. You don’t have to act like a performing monkey to get something, you’re rewarded for simply keeping going, and that’s a message we all need to hear every now and then. Life is hard, and it gets tiring, but taking another step is an achievement in and of itself.