Revision 9

Windrose mixes procedural island generation with hand-crafted points of interest. The live Steam store description says the Early Access launch build contains over 90 hand-crafted points of interest, while the About This Game section rounds that broader exploration pitch up to over 100 hand-crafted dungeons and points of interest. The key idea is the same in both descriptions: the world layout changes, but the important sites are authored spaces rather than random noise.

What Counts as a POI

Known Launch-Build Examples

How POIs Work Inside a Procedural World

• Island layouts and travel routes vary between worlds.

• The major sites themselves are designed by hand, so their encounter logic and purpose stay recognizable even when world geography shifts around them.

• This is why discovery still matters: the map is not just empty filler between fixed towns. Your world asks you to go find the authored spaces.

Why POIs Matter More Than Simple Loot Runs

• They drive quest progression and boss routes.

• They are where many named treasure notes, plans, and unique or semi-unique rewards enter the game.

• They teach the difference between surface survival and Windrose's deeper exploration game, especially once you move beyond the starter coastline.

How POIs Scale by Biome

The same POI families appear across every region, but their difficulty and loot tier climb as you move outward from the starter coast. Early sites cluster on the Coastal Jungle islands where the Starting Island sits, mid-game ruins and caves fill the Foothills, and the toughest curated spaces, gated bosses, and rarest caches wait in the Cursed Swamps and the Ashlands. A ruin you can clear in the Foothills will be a far deadlier encounter once the same template spawns in a late-game biome.

What to Bring

• Food buffs and healing

• Oil Lamp or another reliable light plan for darker interiors

• Fast Travel Bell or a tent plan if you expect multiple runs

• Enough inventory space that one good chest does not force an immediate retreat

See Also

• Dungeons - the deeper breakdown of dungeon-scale spaces

• Coastal Jungle - where many players first learn Windrose's POI rhythm

• Foothills - where POIs begin to feel more like mid-game content than tutorial landmarks

• Bosses - how major encounters fit into the world's curated spaces

All POI Categories

POI Discovery Tips

• Procedurally generated islands scatter POIs per save; exact coordinates vary.

• Drop a Fast Travel Bell at every high-value POI to shortcut return trips. See Fast Travel Bell.

• Green-striped waters indicate Smugglers-adjacent islands; a concealed cave usually follows.