There’s no combat in Animal Well, and you won’t encounter any bosses in the way you might expect, but there are animals and guardians who will stop you along your journey, like the Storks.
One of the first creatures you’ll encounter while playing Animal Well is a Stork. Well, it’s a pair of Storks, and they’re pecking away in some shallow water that you’ll soon need to cross. However, your tiny protagonist will drown if it falls in the water, and it looks like it would make for a tasty treat for these Storks.
How to get past the Storks in Animal Well
To get past the Storks in Animal Well, you need to have the Bubble Wand and a full set of hearts. You’ll find them pretty early on in a large cave just after you pick up the Bubble Wand, seen in the above map reference. The Storks won’t actively hunt your character. Instead, they patrol their arena and peck at the floor in semi-regular patterns. You can watch them get used to their timing for a while if that would help you while preparing for what you’ve got to do next. Jump across the lilypads beneath their feet.
That’s right. The only way to get past the Storks is to hop across the lilypads on the water in which they’re walking. A few of these are sparsely spaced on the left side and closer together on the right side of the room. The most difficult part of getting past these guys is jumping across those first two lilypads.
To do this, you’ve got to inch up to the very edge of the lilypad, create a bubble, and then jump onto it and off onto the next lilypad without losing momentum. This means you’ve got to hold right or left on the joystick or D-pad, depending on which direction you’re heading, and only stop when you’re above the lilypad you’re landing on.
When I was trying to move across the room to the right, it took me a good dozen attempts. I can’t tell if playing on Steam Deck made it easier or more challenging. Once you’re all the way across this area to the right, you’ll find a little room with a chest that has the Great Egg inside. This is one of the dozens of collectible Eggs in the game, so it’s worth persevering and picking it up.
Now, the only challenge you have is getting back across those lilypads. Mercifully, Animal Well doesn’t damage you when you fall into the water, so you can fail as much as you want. The only downside of falling into the water is that your position is reset to the last solid ground you stood on, which will be on the right-hand side of the arena.
There’s no other way out of this than to use the Bubble Wand to jump across and back to the left-hand side of the arena—the place you were standing before you decided to try to get past the Storks. If you wait and tackle this area later, you might be able to use the Disc to carry you across it, but that’s much more complicated than platforming with the Bubble Wand.
