Caravan Sandwitch

Caravan SandWitch was provided by Dear Villagers for review. Thank you!

This review was created using an LCD Steam Deck. OLED testing will be carried out at a later date.

The first time I saw Caravan Sandwitch, it reminded me of two things: how much it read like ‘Caravan Sandwich,’ which made me want a melted cheese toastie, and that it reminded me of Sable. Sable was one of my favorite exploration games in recent years, but its major technical issues kept it from being an all-time great.

Caravan SandWitch, developed by Studio Plane Toast, plays like a more enjoyable version of Sable without crippling technical issues. While the first impressions can be a little of a drag, don't let it fool you since this game is more than worth the sum of its parts.

There will be no spoilers for story ahead, but let's get right into it.

You play as Sauge, who has returned home to the planet of Cigalo after time away in space to track down her missing sister. Things on Cigalo are going downhill due to climate devastation, and while your community is doing all it can to staunch the wound, the world brims with growing uncertainty. While the narrative and goals of Caravan SandWitch center around navigating stress, the gameplay contradicts that. In other games, this might be a weakness, but I think this is the game's greatest strength.

There is no combat and no timers in-game, meaning you can explore at your own pace, drive the truck wherever you wish, and even fall from great heights without getting hurt. This led to hilarity when I spent hours driving around the map and hurling my van off cliffs! With the chill gameplay and sci-fi setting, Caravan SandWitch oozes charm and cozy vibes from every corner.

The gameplay itself is fairly simple. You explore the world looking for resources to upgrade your van, which increases your tracking capabilities to uncover the mystery surrounding your sister's disappearance. It is a great loop of collection and exploration mechanics that combines well. While you have a map function, you must dismantle the many transmitters across the map to access it and communicate with your friends.

Caravan SandWitch focuses more on the quality of its map rather than sheer size, which is a nice change from many other titles like this. However, finding new points of interest requires using the scanner on your van to track their location and usually solve platforming puzzles to reach them.

With no negative consequences, it is a relaxing experience. There are minor inconveniences as it is not designed with platforming in mind, and the camera tends to zoom into my colon in tight spaces. These are only small annoyances, and I ran into no crashes or significant gameplay bugs. The map is the right balance of size and depth to keep the exploration interesting, and it never feels bogged down. Despite the basic collecting mechanics, this bite-sized world feels natural.

I must applaud the attention to detail in the writing because Caravan SandWitch made me feel emotional for its characters and world. As a narrative designer and author, I find this a major challenge to effectively achieve. The characters feel realistic and diverse, and I love the talking frog people with their love for music, scavenging, and food. Despite the lack of voice acting, the dialogue is well-written for the most part, and it got me invested in the world. It’s only one part of the puzzle, but I enjoyed every moment with these characters. It made me care about their lives, and when I got irritated with them, it was for organic reasons.

While the game lacks a map fast travel option, it hardly requires it. At the push of a button, you can return to your van at any time, no matter the location, and you can return to the garage in the pause menu to save on travel time. However, I wish I could bring your van directly to me. I found myself exploring many areas on foot after parking the van, and while it is great to return to the truck afterward, I would love to call it to me.

Caravan SandWitch is the best blend of chill gameplay, exploration, and narrative that makes me happy. It is a bite-sized morsel of chocolate pudding that can be approached however you want, and it does not overstay its welcome. While the main story can be completed in a handful of hours, the open-ended exploration can last you much longer. Apart from the camera issues, there aren’t many things to note.

Caravan SandWitch - Steam Deck Performance

Caravan SandWitch is Verified on the Steam Deck. While some of Valve’s support badges might be slightly inaccurate at times, this is one of the better examples. I had a lot of fun playing this on the Steam Deck, although it ran a little worse than I expected. Max settings will push the Steam Deck extremely hard, so I found myself experimenting with FSR and some compromises in visuals to find the right balance. The game benefits from a decent number of graphical settings to tweak. Along with overall graphic settings, it boasts excellent FSR2 support with various modes.

I was surprised by how heavy Caravan Sandwich was on performance, and the maximum preset during stock Steam Deck settings pushed the Deck much harder than I expected. (60hz refresh rate, unlocked TDP, and 1280x800 resolution). Even uncapped, I was unable to hit 50FPS even in open terrain. With this in mind, I switched the refresh rate to 40hz to preserve the battery as much as I could. Since I could not hit an unlocked framerate, there is little point in keeping the frame limit at 60.

While the game looks its best in this mode, the power draw is exceptional. I found spikes up to 23 watts fairly common, with an average power draw of 20 watts. For the LCD Steam Deck, that gives it around 2 hours of battery life at full power.

Recommended Settings

Lowering the refresh rate to 40hz brought modest savings, although FSR and visuals saved the day. After much tinkering, I found a great balance of visual quality, performance, and battery life. With FSR set to performance mode and graphics set to medium, the power draw was reduced significantly and I kept to 40FPS in most cases. The graphics did not take much of a hit with these settings, and is well worth the extra hour of gameplay for me! I saw an average power draw of 13 watts in this mode, with spikes to 15 watts in some cases.

Balanced Setting

That brings us to TDP settings. Although the base settings were power-hungry, Caravan SandWitch can work fairly well at a lower TDP. The lowest I could get for a stable 30FPS was a TDP of 5, with graphical settings turned down to low and an FSR2 setting at Quality preset. While visuals take a hit with some textures being a little grainy, this should offer a solid compromise between battery life and performance. I averaged a power draw of 10 watts at this setting, though it frequently dropped below that. This provides an average battery life of 4 hours on the LCD Steam Deck.

Battery Life Is King Setting

If you want to save as much battery as possible (and are as crazy as me!) I tested what I call ‘Potato Mode’. With graphics on low and FSR set to Ultra Performance, I could play Caravan SandWitch at a 4-watt TDP. While it hovered around 30FPS in most cases, you will see many drops, especially when driving around in the van. The textures look like mud in the lowest settings, and there are artifacts in the distance, so it will not win any prizes for visual beauty. I got an average power draw of 8 watts, and although 5 hours of battery life in this setting is appealing, it is not worth the drop in performance and visual clarity. Even I cannot really recommend this setting, but if you want to experiment, the option is there.

My preferred setup has no TDP limit, a 40hz refresh rate, medium graphics, and an FSR set to performance. While it will use a lot more power than locking the TDP, the smoother performance during gameplay makes the experience more enjoyable.

Accessibility

Caravan SandWitch is available in English, French, German, Spanish, Simplified Chinese, Japanese, Portuguese (Brazil), and Korean.

This game has plenty of accessibility options available for the player. You can change the interface scaling, toggle motion sickness reduction, a more accessible way of activating the van’s radar, toggle camera vibration, adjust camera sensitivity, change the x and y camera axis, and turn on Vsync.

Reading all text by default with the Steam Deck is easy, and I had no issues understanding things. Overall, a great experience!

Conclusion

Caravan SandWitch is a delightful morsel of exploration and storytelling. While the gameplay’s simplicity might put people off if they need a challenge to their games, I appreciate how much love and care went into this. While its performance on the Steam Deck is more power dependent than I expected, I had enormous fun with it, and it is probably something that can be improved with patches. I will not be surprised if it makes my Top 10 list in December.

Our review is based on the PC version of this game.

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