Thousand Threads
Review

Thousand Threads (2020) is an open-world game of consequences. You are free to interact with the world, animals and people however you like, give, take, save, kill, inform, hide, befriend, and betray. But how you do this will have ongoing and unavoidable implications.

You can gather plants, mushrooms, pelts, and more to craft and upgrade your tools, weapons, and ammo along the way. But as you start to interact with other characters things get more morally complex.

You take on jobs for people like finding an attacker's identity. You can retrieve stolen items or deliver a gift. Perhaps you will help look for a lost keepsake. Will you help these people and complete the tasks or will you betray them and keep the item or money? If you see someone being attacked, lend a helping (or hurting) hand.

As you play you can deliver the mail to different people. But if you open letters and read them instead you can discover more about the people you meet, those who are easy to find and those who are more reclusive. There are ruins to discover and artefacts to collect.

But in each of these choices, characters remember and react to the actions you and others take. You can attack, rob, or kill just about anyone. But you’re likely to make enemies. And they’re likely to tell their friends and family. And you’ll likely need to watch your back. But it’s almost never too late to turn old enemies into friends.

It's a game that raises all sorts of moral and ethical conundrums without assuming a correct or right answer.

Our examiner, Andy Robertson, first checked Thousand Threads 3 years ago. It was re-examined by Jo Robertson and updated 6 months ago.