The Most Cottagecore Possible

Wed, Mar 29, 2023 Year 2, Spring 13

Al and Kev talk about Wylde Flowers

Timings

00:00:00: Theme Tune
00:00:30: Intro
00:01:30: What Have We Been Up To
00:07:51: News
00:21:18: Wylde Flowers
01:15:00: Outro

Links

Tchia
Above Snakes Release Date
Terra Nil Mac/Linux Delay
Innchanted
Ankora: Lost Days PS/XB Release
Len’s Island Controllers and Currents Update

Contact

Al on Twitter: https://twitter.com/TheScotBot
Al on Mastodon: https://mastodon.scot/@TheScotBot
Email Us: https://harvestseason.club/contact/

Transcript

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[00:30.040 –> 00:35.040] Hello farmers and welcome to another episode of the harvest season.
[00:35.040 –> 00:41.040] My name is Al and I’m Kevin and we are here today to talk about cottagecore games.
[00:41.040 –> 00:47.040] Which I will say I think so we’re going to talk about wildflowers this episode.
[00:47.040 –> 00:52.040] I think this might be the most cottagecore game in a while.
[00:52.040 –> 01:02.040] Yeah so we’ll talk about that. I guess before everything else just to mention transcripts for the podcast are available in the show notes and on the website.
[01:02.040 –> 01:09.040] Just scroll down you’ll see them there. Yeah so we’re going to talk about wildflowers.
[01:09.040 –> 01:16.040] It has been out for quite a few months and I think it came out the end of last year or maybe it was like the middle of last year or something like that.
[01:16.040 –> 01:21.040] Probably should have checked that. Wildflowers came out in September.
[01:21.040 –> 01:30.040] So we’re going to talk about that and before that we’ve got a bunch of news.
[01:30.040 –> 01:33.040] But first of all Kevin what have you been up to?
[01:33.040 –> 01:40.040] Busy things. Work things. Furniture things. I’m restoring a table.
[01:40.040 –> 01:45.040] My mom restored a table. Repainted. That’s something. Interesting. What kind of table?
[01:45.040 –> 01:50.040] It’s just like a dining room table that she found at the place. It’s a nice table she just wants a different color.
[01:50.040 –> 01:56.040] But yeah so that’s going on. That’s fun getting all manual physical for once in my life.
[01:56.040 –> 02:04.040] Aside from that and those moments down in Breathe I have been playing Wildflowers and Wildflowers.
[02:05.040 –> 02:14.040] We planned this episode. I brought it up a while ago and then our schedule kind of shifted and it kind of jumped up.
[02:14.040 –> 02:22.040] And so I said wow I really need to play some more Wildflowers. So I shotgunned a lot of Wildflowers this week.
[02:23.040 –> 02:28.040] But spoilers I enjoyed it. Talk about that later.
[02:28.040 –> 02:38.040] But yeah aside from that I can’t think of anything meaningful. Ball guys and Pokemon masters. It’s great.
[02:38.040 –> 02:44.040] Oh yeah I think we mentioned that in the last episode but we were speculating about what his Pokemon would be.
[02:44.040 –> 02:50.040] And of course it’s a Moonguss. It is a Moonguss. I mean makes sense but neither of us suggested it.
[02:50.040 –> 02:53.040] Nope. We were all focused on Voltarb.
[02:53.040 –> 03:00.040] Yep. And he sounds great. He sounds like the goofy guy you imagine he would.
[03:00.040 –> 03:05.040] Oh is he out now? Oh yeah he’s out. It came out the day after we recorded it.
[03:05.040 –> 03:10.040] What accent does he have? It’s not British because a lot of the Galarian.
[03:10.040 –> 03:12.040] Yeah well that’s why I was asking.
[03:13.040 –> 03:18.040] No it’s just like goofy cartoony voice. Like here catch this. Something like that.
[03:21.040 –> 03:26.040] It fits his character. It’s a ball guy. I haven’t pulled him yet. Hoping.
[03:26.040 –> 03:29.040] But I will let everyone know.
[03:29.040 –> 03:38.040] But yeah so let’s see. Wildflowers, ball guy. I really can’t think of anything in particular. Nope. Nothing comes to mind.
[03:38.040 –> 03:40.040] What about you? What have you been up to?
[03:40.040 –> 03:45.040] Well obviously I’ve been playing some Wildflowers this week. I haven’t played as much as you.
[03:45.040 –> 03:52.040] Because I was, as Kevin mentioned, Kevin was like we should do an episode on Wildflowers.
[03:52.040 –> 03:56.040] And I was like ok yeah fine. I guess I will join you in that.
[03:56.040 –> 03:59.040] And then we agreed last week that we were going to do it this week.
[03:59.040 –> 04:01.040] And so I was like well I guess I need to play something.
[04:01.040 –> 04:04.040] So I haven’t played a few Moonguss ones.
[04:04.040 –> 04:08.040] You have to. But I’ve got enough to get a feel of the game.
[04:09.040 –> 04:13.040] I finished off Kirby Return to Dreamland Deluxe.
[04:13.040 –> 04:18.040] Well when I say finished. So I finished off the main story.
[04:18.040 –> 04:23.040] And then I think last week I had done that and I was just like I’m not sure exactly what I’m going to do after that.
[04:23.040 –> 04:25.040] And the answer is nothing.
[04:25.040 –> 04:31.040] So I started playing the epilogue which is where you’re playing as, oh what’s his name?
[04:31.040 –> 04:37.040] Magolor? I’m not a fan of the epilogue.
[04:37.040 –> 04:40.040] And the reason I’m not a fan is because I don’t like the controls.
[04:40.040 –> 04:45.040] So it’s not that it’s not Kirby. Because obviously I like lots of different platformers.
[04:45.040 –> 04:49.040] I enjoy platformers. It’s one of the things I really like to play.
[04:49.040 –> 04:54.040] But the way that Magolor plays just feels really frustrating.
[04:54.040 –> 05:01.040] So anytime you do an attack in the air you start falling down and then you cannot do anything else until you hit the ground.
[05:01.040 –> 05:03.040] And it just feels really frustrating.
[05:03.040 –> 05:10.040] I feel like that’s going to unlock later on because the way that they’re doing the epilogue is that you add more powers as you go on.
[05:10.040 –> 05:14.040] But it just made some of the levels in the middle just really frustrating.
[05:14.040 –> 05:16.040] Because it’s like I don’t have all my powers.
[05:16.040 –> 05:21.040] And I’ve got some really hard challenges which would be fun if I could do things.
[05:21.040 –> 05:28.040] There’s a point where you have to jump over, drop a bomb down and then somehow make it back onto the thing really quickly.
[05:28.040 –> 05:35.040] And I just cannot figure out how to do it. There’s just no, in my mind I just can’t feel any way to control that. It’s really frustrating.
[05:35.040 –> 05:39.040] That’s interesting because you know it’s a Kirby game.
[05:39.040 –> 05:44.040] Controls usually aren’t an issue. They’re usually pretty simple and enjoyable.
[05:44.040 –> 05:50.040] That is really interesting. I am curious. I’d hope to get that at some point and see for myself.
[05:50.040 –> 05:55.040] It’s a really nice game. I’ve not played obviously the original so I don’t know how well it is in terms of a remake.
[05:55.040 –> 05:59.040] But the game itself plays really well. I really enjoyed it.
[05:59.040 –> 06:05.040] I played for a brief amount. It was enjoyable. I imagine there weren’t that many significant changes.
[06:05.040 –> 06:11.040] It was already a pretty modern Kirby game so I’m sure it’s fairly close to the original in terms of its controls.
[06:11.040 –> 06:13.040] But yeah, okay.
[06:13.040 –> 06:15.040] So yeah, I’m done with that.
[06:15.040 –> 06:24.040] And I have started Coral Island. So I think in the last episode I had mentioned that my key was for Switch and of course Switch isn’t out yet.
[06:24.040 –> 06:29.040] Well I managed to contact them and they switched it to a Steam key so I’m now playing it on my Steam Deck.
[06:29.040 –> 06:35.040] So that will be fun. It may well be covered in an episode in the future.
[06:35.040 –> 06:41.040] And I’ve been obviously kind of going through the Bloom update still which is fun.
[06:41.040 –> 06:52.040] They finally, I think I said this on our original podcast episode about Bloom, but we finally found a game that I can just play for five minutes and then put down every day.
[06:52.040 –> 06:56.040] Because that’s how Animal Crossing is meant to be played and I couldn’t play it that way.
[06:56.040 –> 07:00.040] Just something in my mind just stopped me doing that. But I’m managing it for Bloom, which is interesting.
[07:00.040 –> 07:05.040] Oh my gosh, Animal Crossing never felt that way to me.
[07:05.040 –> 07:09.040] No, but it definitely feels like they want you to play it that way.
[07:09.040 –> 07:11.040] But I just never could.
[07:11.040 –> 07:22.040] Yeah, no, I think most people couldn’t. But cool, I’m glad that you found a game that you can play a little bit as a little de-stresser, whatever you want to call it, a little breather.
[07:22.040 –> 07:25.040] Without getting too in-depth, that sounds pretty nice.
[07:25.040 –> 07:32.040] I don’t know, see I play Unite like daily, but that’s for like half an hour.
[07:32.040 –> 07:34.040] The five minute thing is the kicker.
[07:35.040 –> 07:42.040] Yeah, no, I literally, I pick it up, I go and check my flowers. If there’s something to harvest, I harvest and then replant.
[07:42.040 –> 07:48.040] And then I get checked through any new messages, see what the new story is, and then I put it down and pick it up the next day.
[07:48.040 –> 07:49.040] That sounds pretty nice.
[07:49.040 –> 07:53.040] It is. It’s good fun. Cool, should we talk about some news?
[07:53.040 –> 07:54.040] I guess so.
[07:54.040 –> 08:00.040] So, first of all we have Chia. I think that’s how it’s meant to be said. Chia.
[08:00.040 –> 08:01.040] Chia.
[08:01.040 –> 08:10.040] This is the game based in New Caledonia, which Kevin now does believe is a real place, is that correct?
[08:10.040 –> 08:14.040] I do believe. I believe in New Caledonia.
[08:14.040 –> 08:17.040] You believe in it, you can do it in New Caledonia.
[08:17.040 –> 08:19.040] I’m no longer of the conspiracy crowd.
[08:20.040 –> 08:27.040] So it’s now out on PS4 and PS5 and on Epic Game Store.
[08:27.040 –> 08:34.040] So it’s interesting, this one seems to have really caught the wider games crowd as well.
[08:34.040 –> 08:38.040] Like occasionally you get a game that we cover that’s like, oh this is like a game.
[08:38.040 –> 08:45.040] But like I’ve seen all the kind of big game journalism places that I follow, like they’ve all been talking about this game, which is interesting.
[08:45.040 –> 08:53.040] That is interesting. I will say though, they dropped a radical trailer for it, so it makes sense, it would catch people’s attention.
[08:53.040 –> 08:58.040] Yeah, yeah, definitely. But it looks interesting.
[08:58.040 –> 09:06.040] I mean people are basically comparing it to Breath of the Wild, but more calm and obviously based on New Caledonia.
[09:06.040 –> 09:11.040] I didn’t expect that comparison, but okay sure that makes sense.
[09:11.040 –> 09:15.040] Yeah, well I’ve not played it, so I can’t confirm whether I would agree with that or not.
[09:15.040 –> 09:20.040] I will give especially one props though, near the end of the trailer.
[09:20.040 –> 09:30.040] They mention how it was inspired by the homeland of the founders of the development company, I don’t know how you pronounce it.
[09:30.040 –> 09:39.040] And they have like voice acting and musics from the local languages from New Caledonian talents, which is very cool.
[09:40.040 –> 09:47.040] And you can see that in the trailer, they clearly did the justice, so very cool to see that.
[09:47.040 –> 09:54.040] I always like seeing smaller cultures who haven’t gotten a lot of attention get a goal somewhere, so very good for them.
[09:54.040 –> 10:00.040] Yeah, definitely. Next we have our release date for Above Snakes.
[10:00.040 –> 10:07.040] So this is the one that we were talking about a few weeks ago, we were talking about it with Nami.
[10:08.040 –> 10:16.040] So that is coming out on the 25th of May, that’s obviously only the Steam version.
[10:16.040 –> 10:22.040] But the console, I think it’s just Switch is coming later, they’ve not started working on that yet.
[10:22.040 –> 10:25.040] They’ll be working on that after release.
[10:25.040 –> 10:31.040] So yeah, there’s also a prologue, I mean it’s basically just a demo right?
[10:32.040 –> 10:40.040] You can download that on Steam just now and play that if you would like, I’ll put that in the show notes.
[10:40.040 –> 10:47.040] If you want to try it out and see how the gameplay, it says there’s about 2-3 hours worth of gameplay in the demo.
[10:48.040 –> 10:55.040] I’m looking at the trailer because I didn’t even remember what the gameplay looked like since our focus is on the culture stuff.
[10:56.040 –> 11:02.040] First of all, the game visually looks very nice, I’m giving props for that.
[11:02.040 –> 11:10.040] Secondly, so it’s an isometric game where you build and craft and so on and so forth.
[11:10.040 –> 11:19.040] But the crazy part is you zoom out on the global map or whatever and you can just drop chunks of land into an isometric grid.
[11:19.040 –> 11:24.040] And you just see the land is boom, land and ed.
[11:24.040 –> 11:28.040] It’s a very satisfying thwomp isn’t it?
[11:28.040 –> 11:37.040] Yeah it is. So yeah it looks good, aside from putting all the culture stuff, the game age.
[11:37.040 –> 11:45.040] So cool, good for them. May 25th, that’s going to be here sooner than I want it to be. Time’s going too fast.
[11:45.040 –> 11:52.040] Yeah I don’t know how quickly I’ll get to this game because of course we know what May is. May is Zelda month.
[11:52.040 –> 12:02.040] Oh is it? I didn’t remember. Oh no. I’m not ready. I have an extra month now. March 2.
[12:02.040 –> 12:10.040] Well if we were running on the international calendar system, that has 13 months.
[12:11.040 –> 12:19.040] I mean it doesn’t actually give you any more time. Still, not the point.
[12:19.040 –> 12:26.040] The best calendar system is actually from Wildflowers. I’ll discuss it when we get there.
[12:26.040 –> 12:31.040] Just keep this in mind folks, Wildflowers.
[12:31.040 –> 12:34.040] You know what else does it best?
[12:34.040 –> 12:39.040] Oh that’s a big assumption. We’ve not played it yet.
[12:39.040 –> 12:42.040] It needs to be good.
[12:42.040 –> 12:51.040] Well yeah, Taranel. It will be out on Windows by the time this podcast comes out.
[12:51.040 –> 13:00.040] I want to say that I was going through the show notes and I saw that and I was like it’s out now and then I read the parenthesis by the time the episode comes out.
[13:00.040 –> 13:05.040] I’m like no, it’s not now.
[13:06.040 –> 13:10.040] But the sad news is the Mac and Linux versions have been delayed.
[13:10.040 –> 13:14.040] Is it that sad? Ok Mac people, sure, but Linux!
[13:14.040 –> 13:18.040] Hey! Come on! Why are we being harsh on Linux here?
[13:18.040 –> 13:22.040] Linux is your Steam Deck. Your Steam Deck runs on Linux. Not your Steam Deck, you don’t have a Steam Deck.
[13:22.040 –> 13:25.040] This Steam Deck runs on Linux.
[13:27.040 –> 13:34.040] Although presumably the Steam Deck will just download the Windows version because it can play Windows games as well.
[13:35.040 –> 13:40.040] And the soundtrack is also out now, so if you want to go.
[13:40.040 –> 13:45.040] And that’s on, it’s just like a big YouTube, an hour and a half, an hour long YouTube video.
[13:45.040 –> 13:49.040] Wow, let me try saying that again. It’s an hour long YouTube video.
[13:49.040 –> 13:52.040] You said it right already, you just repeated it.
[13:52.040 –> 13:54.040] Very calm, relaxing music.
[13:54.040 –> 13:58.040] I haven’t listened to it, I kind of wanted to but eh, I’ll just wait.
[13:58.040 –> 14:02.040] You know what’s not calm and relaxing?
[14:02.040 –> 14:06.040] Enchanted definitely doesn’t look calm and relaxing.
[14:06.040 –> 14:09.040] Was this the game that we only had a name last week?
[14:09.040 –> 14:14.040] I think we talked about it last week, but we didn’t really look into it too much.
[14:14.040 –> 14:19.040] I don’t think I truly understood what this game was.
[14:19.040 –> 14:22.040] I definitely didn’t.
[14:22.040 –> 14:25.040] It basically looks like, what’s the game I’m thinking of?
[14:25.040 –> 14:27.040] Overcooked.
[14:28.040 –> 14:32.040] You’re running a magical hotel, Overcooked style.
[14:32.040 –> 14:37.040] And it looks as chaotic and frantic as Overcooked.
[14:37.040 –> 14:38.040] It does.
[14:38.040 –> 14:41.040] You can play with up to four people.
[14:41.040 –> 14:46.040] There’s upgrades and progress, so I don’t think it’s like Overcooked with just little levels.
[14:46.040 –> 14:50.040] But at the same time you’re cooking and doing objectives, so I don’t know.
[14:50.040 –> 14:57.040] I’m having trouble understanding how this game works just other than it’s Overcooked but hotel.
[14:57.040 –> 15:02.040] Yeah, it looks like they have different kind of levels.
[15:02.040 –> 15:10.040] So one of them is in, you’re just cooking one of them, there’s a river and you have to go and get the fish from it and then go cook them.
[15:10.040 –> 15:14.040] Stuff like that. I presume there’s a farming one, bits as well.
[15:14.040 –> 15:18.040] You can turn your body into a cake for some reason.
[15:18.040 –> 15:21.040] I mean it looks gorgeous.
[15:21.040 –> 15:26.040] I’m a little eh on the design, the style they went with.
[15:26.040 –> 15:28.040] I love it.
[15:28.040 –> 15:31.040] But for what it is going for it looks great.
[15:31.040 –> 15:35.040] Yeah, it’s definitely one of those, you can’t say it looks bad, you can say you don’t like it.
[15:35.040 –> 15:37.040] Yeah, I know for sure.
[15:37.040 –> 15:40.040] It’s not an actively bad looking game.
[15:41.040 –> 15:47.040] There’s a lot going on in that game because it’s got a lot of the cottage core things.
[15:47.040 –> 15:55.040] The cooking just looks straight up like Overcooked but they have crafting and feeding cows and furnitures and I don’t know.
[15:55.040 –> 15:57.040] There’s a lot going on there.
[15:57.040 –> 16:06.040] I’m really curious because I see single player, it looks like it could be better for single player than Overcooked so that would be interesting to see.
[16:07.040 –> 16:10.040] And you can have an echidna follow you around.
[16:10.040 –> 16:12.040] An echidna?
[16:12.040 –> 16:14.040] Yeah, it’s in the trailer.
[16:14.040 –> 16:16.040] I don’t know what to say.
[16:16.040 –> 16:19.040] And there’s also little onion guys they have to get rid of.
[16:19.040 –> 16:22.040] There’s a lot going on, people just watch this trailer.
[16:22.040 –> 16:28.040] Anyway, the point of this was that it’s coming out on Tuesday, the same day as Taranel.
[16:28.040 –> 16:32.040] So it will be out by the time this episode comes out on Steam.
[16:32.040 –> 16:35.040] The Switch version is coming soon, not out yet.
[16:36.040 –> 16:42.040] I’m interested in giving this game a shot, especially because I have people I can play locally with.
[16:42.040 –> 16:49.040] But I don’t know when I’ll be playing with it because Taranel drops the same day and I’ll be…
[16:49.040 –> 16:55.040] And Kora Lost Days feels like a while since we talked about this and you might be like, oh but it’s already out.
[16:55.040 –> 16:58.040] It’s not out yet on the PS4 and Xbox.
[16:58.040 –> 17:04.040] So they’re coming on the 30th of March, which I think is the day after this podcast comes out.
[17:05.040 –> 17:08.040] So if you’ve been waiting for those versions, there you go.
[17:08.040 –> 17:12.040] And hopefully it works a little better with some of those rough edges polished up a little bit.
[17:12.040 –> 17:15.040] Something tells me no, but who knows.
[17:15.040 –> 17:16.040] Try it.
[17:16.040 –> 17:17.040] Yeah, yeah.
[17:17.040 –> 17:19.040] It’s a fine game.
[17:19.040 –> 17:22.040] The physical editions still aren’t out yet, but they’re coming.
[17:22.040 –> 17:26.040] Oh yeah, I looked at the… there’s all sorts of physical stuff.
[17:26.040 –> 17:28.040] Look, I am over on Kora Lost Days.
[17:28.040 –> 17:33.040] I am all in on, what’s it called, the next one.
[17:33.040 –> 17:37.040] Mika and the Lost… no, Mika and the Witches… oh, there’s two.
[17:37.040 –> 17:42.040] There’s Mika and the Witches Mountain and there’s another one that’s like a platformer.
[17:42.040 –> 17:47.040] Wait, is Mika in the Ankora universe?
[17:47.040 –> 17:48.040] Yeah, yeah.
[17:48.040 –> 17:49.040] Wait, it is?
[17:49.040 –> 17:50.040] Yeah.
[17:50.040 –> 17:51.040] Oh, what?
[17:51.040 –> 17:53.040] I didn’t know this!
[17:53.040 –> 17:57.040] All of the Chibi games are in the same universe.
[17:57.040 –> 18:01.040] I don’t remember this, but Mika looks incredible!
[18:01.040 –> 18:05.040] Who cares about Ankora?
[18:05.040 –> 18:06.040] Oh no.
[18:06.040 –> 18:09.040] Kora and the Five Pirates of Mara, that’s the other one.
[18:09.040 –> 18:12.040] That’s the platformer at some point this year apparently.
[18:12.040 –> 18:13.040] I’m looking forward to that.
[18:13.040 –> 18:17.040] And yeah, Mika is obviously definitely a podcast game.
[18:17.040 –> 18:21.040] Mika’s just going to dominate it and be the best.
[18:21.040 –> 18:25.040] Ah, but the question is will I prefer it to Summer and Mara or not?
[18:25.040 –> 18:26.040] That’s the big…
[18:26.040 –> 18:27.040] Yes.
[18:27.040 –> 18:28.040] Yes.
[18:28.040 –> 18:29.040] I’m answering yes.
[18:29.040 –> 18:30.040] Well, we’ll see.
[18:30.040 –> 18:31.040] We’ll see.
[18:31.040 –> 18:34.040] It’s just objectively better, you can see.
[18:34.040 –> 18:38.040] I don’t think there’s anything objective about it.
[18:38.040 –> 18:40.040] We are the authority.
[18:40.040 –> 18:44.040] We are the influencers here.
[18:44.040 –> 18:45.040] Oh dear.
[18:45.040 –> 18:50.040] Lens Island have an update out.
[18:50.040 –> 18:54.040] The currents and controllers update, very catchy.
[18:54.040 –> 18:57.040] Can you guess what this has in the update?
[18:57.040 –> 19:00.040] It has controller support and currents.
[19:00.040 –> 19:05.040] Now the currents actually might throw you for a loop because I didn’t.
[19:05.040 –> 19:07.040] Is this what people want?
[19:07.040 –> 19:09.040] Procedurally generated ocean currents?
[19:09.040 –> 19:13.040] Well, I mean, the whole point is this is an exploration game, right?
[19:13.040 –> 19:18.040] So, you know, currents are accurate to real life.
[19:18.040 –> 19:19.040] I don’t know.
[19:19.040 –> 19:23.040] I mean, realistically, the reason I’m talking about this is the controller support, right?
[19:23.040 –> 19:27.040] It’s got basic controller support now, but there’s more coming later.
[19:27.040 –> 19:30.040] And also procedurally generated ocean currents.
[19:30.040 –> 19:32.040] So if that’s really what you were like,
[19:32.040 –> 19:37.040] Oh, I’ve been waiting for this game, but now I get the procedurally generated ocean currents.
[19:37.040 –> 19:39.040] Now’s the time to play.
[19:39.040 –> 19:42.040] Obviously.
[19:42.040 –> 19:45.040] I don’t know what to say.
[19:45.040 –> 19:46.040] Oh yeah.
[19:46.040 –> 19:52.040] You can also build on tiny little islands as well now, which is more exciting.
[19:52.040 –> 19:53.040] I actually really like that.
[19:53.040 –> 19:59.040] There’s a dozen, over a dozen new sandbanks, coral reefs, and unique rock formations that can be found at sea.
[19:59.040 –> 20:01.040] Although don’t build on a coral reef.
[20:01.040 –> 20:03.040] Oh no, don’t do that.
[20:03.040 –> 20:08.040] Ocean houses can also be useful when building them next to ocean currents for easy traversal around the map.
[20:08.040 –> 20:11.040] So yeah, I think your boats move faster on the currents.
[20:11.040 –> 20:12.040] Okay.
[20:12.040 –> 20:16.040] See, that seems fun making a network of ocean homes with boats.
[20:16.040 –> 20:17.040] Yeah, that sounds cool.
[20:17.040 –> 20:24.040] Just, just don’t like go on one and then find yourself halfway across the world and you’re lost now.
[20:24.040 –> 20:25.040] So be careful.
[20:25.040 –> 20:28.040] What was that? The Australian…
[20:28.040 –> 20:31.040] From Finding Nemo, what was that?
[20:31.040 –> 20:34.040] Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I know what you mean.
[20:34.040 –> 20:35.040] I can’t remember.
[20:35.040 –> 20:37.040] EAC, I don’t remember.
[20:37.040 –> 20:42.040] EAC, the East Australian Current, yeah.
[20:42.040 –> 20:43.040] Classic.
[20:43.040 –> 20:46.040] Go get to meet Crush. Choo choo kachoo.
[20:46.040 –> 20:49.040] Wild flowers. Shall we talk about that again?
[20:49.040 –> 20:51.040] Fine, fine.
[20:51.040 –> 20:53.040] We’re not a Finding Nemo podcast.
[20:53.040 –> 20:55.040] Not yet.
[20:55.040 –> 20:58.040] Look, we’re getting there. We’re close.
[20:58.040 –> 21:01.040] Lens Island and Coral Island, we’re on our way.
[21:01.040 –> 21:04.040] We even have someone from New Zealand who’s occasionally on the podcast.
[21:04.040 –> 21:06.040] It’s not Australia, but it’s close.
[21:06.040 –> 21:08.040] We do.
[21:08.040 –> 21:11.040] We have an Australian fan, a friend on here.
[21:11.040 –> 21:19.040] Oh, no, Mark, if you ever listen to this, please join us and do Crush impression.
[21:19.040 –> 21:23.040] So we’re going to talk about wild flowers.
[21:23.040 –> 21:25.040] There are no Australians in that game.
[21:25.040 –> 21:29.040] A quick bit of background to this game.
[21:29.040 –> 21:35.040] So it’s on Switch and on Apple Arcade.
[21:35.040 –> 21:38.040] I believe it is at some point coming to PC.
[21:38.040 –> 21:40.040] I don’t know if that’s out yet, though.
[21:40.040 –> 21:43.040] I just assume everything on Earth comes out on PC first.
[21:43.040 –> 21:46.040] It is out on PC now. No, it didn’t come out first.
[21:46.040 –> 21:48.040] I think they got the…
[21:48.040 –> 21:52.040] Oh, it looks like the… So we said at the beginning it came out in September.
[21:52.040 –> 21:54.040] That was the PC version.
[21:54.040 –> 21:58.040] So I think the Switch and Apple Arcade one came earlier.
[21:58.040 –> 22:00.040] Huh. OK.
[22:00.040 –> 22:02.040] So that…
[22:02.040 –> 22:05.040] I think they must have got a deal from Apple to get it on Apple Arcade first.
[22:05.040 –> 22:09.040] And it came out on Switch at the same time, and then it came out on Steam.
[22:09.040 –> 22:12.040] So, yeah, I mean, I guess…
[22:12.040 –> 22:15.040] How would you describe this game, Kevin?
[22:15.040 –> 22:18.040] Other than what I said at the beginning, which was the ultimate cottagecore game.
[22:18.040 –> 22:24.040] I would describe this as the best Stardew clone.
[22:24.040 –> 22:27.040] I’m using that. I’m using… Yeah.
[22:27.040 –> 22:32.040] So, OK, I do need to give that a little more nuance because it’s a very clickbaity thought.
[22:32.040 –> 22:34.040] No, we don’t want nuance.
[22:35.040 –> 22:40.040] So I call it a Stardew clone, but it doesn’t feel like a clone.
[22:40.040 –> 22:44.040] I mean, it feels like there’s the same DNA because it’s a farming game.
[22:44.040 –> 22:48.040] People probably have played Stardew and learned lessons from that.
[22:48.040 –> 22:53.040] But everything is polished and innovated in a meaningful way, right?
[22:53.040 –> 22:59.040] Like, there’s some games you look at like, yeah, that’s that’s just Stardew plus X or whatever, right?
[22:59.040 –> 23:00.040] Yeah.
[23:00.040 –> 23:03.040] This game takes it up a notch on, like, every level.
[23:03.040 –> 23:10.040] Like, every mechanic feels like they tweaked or changed meaningfully the whole presentation.
[23:10.040 –> 23:15.040] This is a full 3D game with full voice acting. That’s nuts.
[23:15.040 –> 23:17.040] I didn’t expect full voice acting.
[23:17.040 –> 23:27.040] But, yeah, but it has a lot of, again, a lot of the same basic DNA of not having enough hours in the day to do the 20 million tasks you want to do.
[23:27.040 –> 23:31.040] And an energy system and farming and all that good stuff.
[23:31.040 –> 23:39.040] For the full disclosure, I am not done with summer in my first year yet.
[23:39.040 –> 23:43.040] Which, that said, that’s a significant amount of time, though.
[23:43.040 –> 23:46.040] I will explain a little how that works.
[23:46.040 –> 23:49.040] What about you, Al? What are your thoughts thus far?
[23:49.040 –> 23:53.040] Yeah, so I’m further behind than you because, as I mentioned, I only started.
[23:53.040 –> 23:57.040] But I think you don’t have to play a lot of this game to know how well it plays.
[23:57.040 –> 24:02.040] I mean, let’s put it this way, I don’t think I’m going to stop playing this game immediately.
[24:02.040 –> 24:03.040] Yeah.
[24:03.040 –> 24:11.040] The, yeah, it definitely, I think I agree and it feels inspired, it definitely feels inspired by Stardew.
[24:11.040 –> 24:16.040] But it definitely, it doesn’t seem to be doing things because Stardew does them.
[24:16.040 –> 24:18.040] Like, it does a lot of things differently.
[24:18.040 –> 24:19.040] Yes.
[24:19.040 –> 24:21.040] I think it’s doing what Stardew did.
[24:21.040 –> 24:25.040] It’s taking something and going, how would I like this to work instead?
[24:25.040 –> 24:27.040] Yes, exactly.
[24:27.040 –> 24:30.040] And that is good. That’s how we wanted it to happen.
[24:30.040 –> 24:35.040] Yeah, absolutely. I kind of wanted to make that point in my head earlier.
[24:35.040 –> 24:39.040] So, like, Stardew was like a jump from Harvest Moon, right?
[24:39.040 –> 24:42.040] Wildflowers feels like a jump from Stardew.
[24:42.040 –> 24:46.040] I think I would say, so I think that Stardew generally did everything better.
[24:46.040 –> 24:54.040] I will say that I think Wildflowers does everything different, but I think a lot of it could be up to how you like how it plays, right?
[24:54.040 –> 24:57.040] Like, I can absolutely see how someone would not like this game.
[24:57.040 –> 24:59.040] Yeah, no, I agree. I was about to say that, right?
[24:59.040 –> 25:05.040] Like, I don’t think it’s, because Stardew defined a genre, basically, like it was a game changer, right?
[25:05.040 –> 25:11.040] I don’t think Wildflowers is a game changer, but it’s a very solid game, a great game.
[25:12.040 –> 25:14.040] So, yeah, no, I agree with you there.
[25:14.040 –> 25:22.040] That’s why I was a little hesitant saying that, because it’s not the next Stardew, but it is, it’s a great game.
[25:22.040 –> 25:29.040] I will, oh, one thing I should add, so I didn’t expect to play Wildflowers.
[25:29.040 –> 25:37.040] I picked it up for reasons that, a few reasons that I will have to discuss at another time with you, Al.
[25:37.040 –> 25:40.040] That’s some behind the scenes stuff.
[25:40.040 –> 25:41.040] Intriguing.
[25:41.040 –> 25:49.040] But, what’s interesting is, at first I wasn’t that interested, because one of my big criticisms is the art style.
[25:49.040 –> 25:53.040] Like, I don’t like how the people, the design looks, I don’t know, just kind of on it.
[25:53.040 –> 25:58.040] I agree. The people’s design is, there’s something about it that creeps me out.
[25:58.040 –> 26:05.040] It’s the Bratz doll look kind of thing, something about their heads and their hands.
[26:05.040 –> 26:08.040] I don’t know, just, it’s eh.
[26:08.040 –> 26:13.040] I got used to it overplaying so much, but I’m still not a fan of it.
[26:13.040 –> 26:20.040] So at first I wasn’t that interested, and on paper it sounded like just another farming game.
[26:20.040 –> 26:27.040] But, once I looked at the reviews, they were all really good, and then I played it and I was like, oh, I’m not just playing this anymore for the podcast.
[26:27.040 –> 26:30.040] I’m really enjoying this now.
[26:30.040 –> 26:33.040] It consumed my week because I was enjoying it.
[26:34.040 –> 26:37.040] So yeah, it’s unexpectedly for me.
[26:37.040 –> 26:38.040] Yeah.
[26:38.040 –> 26:41.040] Okay, so let’s get into it.
[26:41.040 –> 26:45.040] Yeah, let’s talk about, so I think I’ve got a list of mechanics I want to talk about.
[26:45.040 –> 26:50.040] The first one is, for me, the first thing that kind of struck me was the movement.
[26:50.040 –> 26:56.040] So, I think, apart from the fact that you can just jump over fences, which, have you noticed that yet?
[26:56.040 –> 26:57.040] You can just jump over fences?
[26:57.040 –> 27:01.040] It blew my mind. It blew my mind. You can just run up to it and jump over it.
[27:01.040 –> 27:06.040] What is this? It’s bizarre. I was not expecting that to happen.
[27:06.040 –> 27:11.040] Terra is the character’s name, by the way. It’s not Stardew, your own farmer. You’re playing a character named Terra.
[27:11.040 –> 27:18.040] Yeah, oh, that’s a good point, actually. Maybe let’s talk about that, because there is basically no character customization because of that.
[27:18.040 –> 27:24.040] I added the boutique. It’s an update. I started that quest, but that was close.
[27:24.040 –> 27:30.040] This is not empty character self-insert. You are playing Terra Wild.
[27:30.040 –> 27:34.040] And I always feel a bit kind of like, I don’t think every game has to have character customization.
[27:34.040 –> 27:39.040] No. No, they do not. And this is a great example of why not.
[27:39.040 –> 27:46.040] Yeah. I think I would have no issues with that if there wasn’t romance in the game.
[27:46.040 –> 27:47.040] Ah?
[27:47.040 –> 27:53.040] But it feels weird to have romance in a game when I’m not playing as a character I’ve created.
[27:53.040 –> 28:00.040] Because then I’m like, well, what do I do here? Am I choosing for this character or am I choosing for me?
[28:00.040 –> 28:04.040] Who am I choosing for here? And I don’t know what to do in that situation.
[28:04.040 –> 28:13.040] Look, I play Fire Emblem. I matchmate. I know this. It’s not that odd to me, I guess.
[28:13.040 –> 28:22.040] But I see what you mean, right? It is weird that Terra is a fully defined character, except in romance you can kind of navigate that however you want.
[28:22.040 –> 28:28.040] So that’s interesting. I don’t know. I feel like there’s a deep thought here, but I can’t think of it right now.
[28:28.040 –> 28:34.040] But, you know, I see what you mean. You would think as a full character she’d have her own preference.
[28:34.040 –> 28:41.040] Yeah. It’s just a small thing. And I suspect the way I’m going to deal with it is by just not doing the romance.
[28:41.040 –> 28:46.040] Because, as we’ve discussed, we don’t think every game needs to have romance.
[28:47.040 –> 28:52.040] I think if you’re not feeling it, don’t do it. That’s the beauty of these games, right?
[28:52.040 –> 29:03.040] Yup, yup. So in this one, despite people talking about it, because there’s several single people, and it’s a thing, the dialogue is well written and that’s brought up.
[29:03.040 –> 29:08.040] There still doesn’t feel like a lot of pressure that you have to get hitched or anything like that.
[29:08.040 –> 29:20.040] Even if your grandmother tells you to get hitched or whatever. It’s very nice that it’s pretty light, while still being a strong component. It’s a very nice balance.
[29:20.040 –> 29:24.040] And you say that, Al, but you haven’t met Wesley yet.
[29:24.040 –> 29:28.040] Fair enough.
[29:28.040 –> 29:35.040] But yeah, no. I’m probably going with Wesley, but I’ll talk about that later.
[29:35.040 –> 29:46.040] Okay, going back to what we opened with the movement. Yes, Tara just wore a dress and jumped over fences and it’s nuts. It blew my mind you can do that. You don’t have to walk to the doors. It’s great!
[29:46.040 –> 29:55.040] Yeah, so it’ll be interesting to see how you react to what I’m about to say, but I’m not a fan of the movement in the game in general.
[29:56.040 –> 30:05.040] And it might be, now you’ve kind of ruined my might be there, but I’m going to say what I was going to say anyway. It might be because I’m playing on the iPad. I’m not sure.
[30:05.040 –> 30:18.040] So the way that movement works on the iPad, there’s actually two different ways of doing it, but they start out by you basically dragging around on the screen vaguely where you want them to go.
[30:18.040 –> 30:30.040] So if they’re in the middle of the screen and you want them to go up, you have to press the screen above the character and they will go in that direction.
[30:30.040 –> 30:44.040] Which probably works fine on a phone, and I’m not even playing on a big iPad. I’m playing on the iPad mini. It’s basically just like a big phone, but it might be better on a phone if you can reach the whole screen.
[30:45.040 –> 30:56.040] But it’s really awkward. It’s really awkward because you’re like, I want to go across to this plant and you have to basically press in that general direction to get it.
[30:56.040 –> 31:05.040] It was really weird and awkward. There is a setting where you can change it to have a virtual joystick, which is what I did because I was going literally insane.
[31:05.040 –> 31:08.040] And that’s better.
[31:08.040 –> 31:12.040] Yeah, I don’t know why it’s the default. I really don’t know why it’s the default.
[31:12.040 –> 31:14.040] I don’t know. That’s odd.
[31:14.040 –> 31:18.040] Or why they don’t give you the option when you’re starting up. Which movement style would you like? That would be fine.
[31:18.040 –> 31:25.040] Because I get why some people might want that, especially if they’re playing on a phone, but that is an insane default and not even to tell you there’s another option.
[31:25.040 –> 31:32.040] I was already complaining about this and I was like, well, let me just check the settings. Oh yes, there is a setting to have a virtual joystick, so I have done that.
[31:32.040 –> 31:40.040] But other than that, the movement is fine, but there’s something about it that I’m not a huge fan of and I’m not sure what it is. What are your thoughts on that?
[31:40.040 –> 31:47.040] Well, I’m playing on Switch, so I’m using a non-virtual joystick. I’m playing on a controller.
[31:47.040 –> 31:49.040] A joystick you might call it.
[31:49.040 –> 31:56.040] Yes, a physical joystick. So I don’t have that whole issue, which just sounds nightmarish.
[31:56.040 –> 32:03.040] But the movement, I think it’s just too slow. I think that’s the biggest thing. Her walking is kind of slow.
[32:03.040 –> 32:13.040] But I think it’s intentional. It’s like Stardew. I think, if I recall correctly, don’t you speed up in Stardew? You get faster. I could be wrong.
[32:13.040 –> 32:16.040] I don’t think so. You can get the horse.
[32:16.040 –> 32:22.040] Yeah. Well, at the very least it does that. I think it’s intentional because you can get speedups later in the game.
[32:23.040 –> 32:32.040] So I think they slowed it down so you feel very incentivized to speed up. Which, as of right now, I’ve seen there is a spell you can cast on yourself.
[32:35.040 –> 32:41.040] Did we describe the hook of this game? I don’t think we did, did we? That you’re falling by day, witch by night?
[32:41.040 –> 32:43.040] Yeah, I guess we could talk about that.
[32:43.040 –> 32:48.040] I should just point out that’s a selling point, right? In Stardew, you’re also a witch by night.
[32:48.040 –> 32:58.040] So magic is a thing in this game. And one of the spells you can cast on yourself is a speedup spell. I’ve not used it yet, but that’s the biggest thing for me, I think.
[32:58.040 –> 33:09.040] It’s just the movement’s a little on the slow side, especially with all the things you want to do. The map isn’t as big as Stardew’s, I don’t think, to compensate for that.
[33:10.040 –> 33:21.040] Yeah, so that is one thing I wanted to talk about. It’s not a huge map, and I actually quite like that. So I mentioned I’ve been playing Coral Island, and that is a huge map.
[33:21.040 –> 33:32.040] And there can be advantages and disadvantages to it, but I actually quite like playing a game that has quite a small area, because I am not playing an exploration game.
[33:33.040 –> 33:45.040] I am not playing this game to explore. I am playing this game to farm, and to get married, or to mine, or do some boring, repetitive stuff.
[33:45.040 –> 33:57.040] And apparently in this case, magic. But I’m not looking for an exploration game. There are other games I might play to do that.
[33:57.040 –> 34:01.040] And so I quite like the fact that it’s quite a small map.
[34:01.040 –> 34:10.040] It’s very deliberate, right? Everything, how it’s placed. And because it’s small, there’s a lot to see and do on the island.
[34:10.040 –> 34:14.040] But you learn it quickly, and you know how to get to it.
[34:14.040 –> 34:22.040] You do learn it reasonably quickly. However, I will say, I am not a fan of the map they have in-game, because it tells you nothing.
[34:22.040 –> 34:24.040] Yeah, it’s not great. It does not.
[34:25.040 –> 34:26.040] It does not.
[34:26.040 –> 34:33.040] There’s like a quest very early on where you have to meet everyone in the village, and I’m like, okay, where are they?
[34:33.040 –> 34:40.040] There’s one person that I haven’t found. I don’t know who this person is. I don’t know where they are. Turns out they live like a hermit in the forest.
[34:40.040 –> 34:41.040] Yeah.
[34:41.040 –> 34:48.040] But I found them. But it’s just like, I don’t understand how they’re like, oh, go to this shop. How do I get to that shop?
[34:48.040 –> 34:55.040] I don’t know. Like, sure, it’s in the main town, but like, there are about 10 shops in the main town. Am I expected to go into each?
[34:55.040 –> 35:05.040] The map gives you no indication as to what is where at all, other than like, this is the town, this is the forest, this is the beach, that’s it.
[35:05.040 –> 35:08.040] There’s no other indication as to where anything is.
[35:08.040 –> 35:14.040] Yeah, no, I fully agree with that. The map’s garbage, not where they’ve been looking at.
[35:15.040 –> 35:22.040] But you do learn it pretty quickly because it is quite a spot, so that’s only a very early, like, I learned that really quickly on.
[35:22.040 –> 35:27.040] Like, I haven’t played the game a huge amount at all, and I know pretty much the whole map now.
[35:27.040 –> 35:38.040] Yeah, but no, that sort of thing, I don’t know why, really irks me in games in general. Like, that’s bad game design, right?
[35:38.040 –> 35:43.040] Game design, you want your things to be functional and useful, right? So yeah, that’s something that always bugged me.
[35:43.040 –> 35:55.040] I will say though, in terms of the actual map, like the island, there are two big area, I say big, quote unquote, there are two areas to expand.
[35:55.040 –> 36:04.040] One is the mountain area, you have to access by building a bridge, and the other one is, okay, I’m going to, well there’s another area in game.
[36:04.040 –> 36:13.040] You can see, I don’t want to say, it’s later in the game, it’s on, like, the website, so it’s not really spoilers, but I won’t mention it here.
[36:13.040 –> 36:21.040] But anyways, it expands, is the point I’m trying to say. And more characters move in, so there are more buildings and things to see later.
[36:21.040 –> 36:29.040] But in general though, the map is good, and I haven’t gotten a broom yet, but I hope once I get a broom, the movement feels great.
[36:30.040 –> 36:38.040] Yeah, yeah, I obviously don’t have the broom either, but I like the look of it.
[36:38.040 –> 36:49.040] It’s not like it’s horrific movement, it’s just a bit meh, and I literally do not understand why they made the decision on the default control scheme for the map.
[36:49.040 –> 36:51.040] Oh, that would ruin it for sure.
[36:51.040 –> 36:53.040] Insane for me.
[36:53.040 –> 36:54.040] Insane.
[36:54.040 –> 36:58.040] Alright, cool. Let’s talk about farming, an important topic for us to discuss.
[36:58.040 –> 37:00.040] We talk about that here?
[37:00.040 –> 37:05.040] We talk about farming. Still, even though we’re not a farming game podcast, we still talk about farming games.
[37:05.040 –> 37:11.040] We still talk about farming. Oh my word. Words. What are words?
[37:12.040 –> 37:23.040] So, I guess, it’s quite a simple farming. You have these beds that you use, so you don’t have a plot of land that you hold.
[37:23.040 –> 37:27.040] You just have these beds that you then plant a seed in.
[37:27.040 –> 37:31.040] It’s kind of like when, I’m trying to think, what was the, was it Doraemon Story of Seasons?
[37:31.040 –> 37:37.040] Where you plant one seed, or you buy a seed and you plant it and it’s like multiple seeds.
[37:37.040 –> 37:39.040] Maybe, I don’t remember.
[37:39.040 –> 37:46.040] You pay for potato seed and you get four potatoes out of it, right? So, that’s how it works.
[37:46.040 –> 37:48.040] And then you water that and stuff.
[37:48.040 –> 37:59.040] So, you can get a reasonable space of land. I think it starts out quite small, but you can expand across to the other bits of land.
[37:59.040 –> 38:06.040] So, I think it’s a pretty decent amount, but if you want to keep things really low-key, you still can.
[38:06.040 –> 38:11.040] I quite like the farming. It’s kind of simple, but I think it works quite well.
[38:11.040 –> 38:13.040] Yeah.
[38:13.040 –> 38:18.040] That reminds me, I do have a question for you. See when you’re going to water, how does it work on the Switch?
[38:18.040 –> 38:28.040] Because how it works on the iPad is you go to it and then a little icon appears above the bed where you plant the seeds.
[38:28.040 –> 38:35.040] And you have to press on the button to then select what you want to plant, and then you have to select the icon to then water.
[38:35.040 –> 38:42.040] Does it work kind of like that, or is it more like a traditional farming game where you just press a button?
[38:42.040 –> 38:47.040] Actually, let’s go back to the movement slash controls talk, because it’s just traditional.
[38:47.040 –> 38:53.040] You go up to it and push A to say select the pot and then you…
[38:53.040 –> 39:01.040] The icons are still there. I know the ones that are like little speech bubbles and you go between them using the joystick.
[39:01.040 –> 39:04.040] Okay, I’m going to water, I’m going to plant, whatever, right?
[39:04.040 –> 39:07.040] So the touch screen doesn’t work for pressing?
[39:07.040 –> 39:11.040] Oh, I’ve been playing primarily on the dock, to be honest. I don’t know, I haven’t checked on the touch screen.
[39:11.040 –> 39:17.040] I think I did use it briefly and I used it if the touch screen worked for something.
[39:17.040 –> 39:22.040] Oh, in fact, there’s at least one touch screen exclusive function.
[39:22.040 –> 39:27.040] There’s some menus where you can, when you’re buying stuff or selling stuff, how much you want to sell.
[39:27.040 –> 39:34.040] There’s like skip by a whole bunch. You have to tap those. I haven’t been able to figure out how to use them on the control.
[39:34.040 –> 39:35.040] Interesting.
[39:35.040 –> 39:40.040] Yeah. But anyways, I do have a big complaint about this. I forgot about that.
[39:40.040 –> 39:54.040] So it makes a lot of sense knowing that it feels like it was designed more for iPad, maybe, because the boxes are very loose and not always great.
[39:54.040 –> 40:00.040] So if you are near like three plots of land, sometimes it’s hard to pick the one you want to water.
[40:00.040 –> 40:07.040] Yeah, I can imagine that. Whereas on the iPad, it works really well. You just go up and if you’re right next to them, you just tap on the one you want.
[40:07.040 –> 40:16.040] It’s not my favorite way of controlling it, but it definitely feels like it was designed for that.
[40:16.040 –> 40:26.040] Yeah, it does. So yeah, that’s a little irritating, especially when you’re trying to talk to multiple people and you want to talk to one person, but you pick the wrong one and the other one starts walking away from you.
[40:26.040 –> 40:30.040] And then you have to say, now come back.
[40:30.040 –> 40:35.040] But yeah, I guess this is kind of related to the movement and farming.
[40:35.040 –> 40:42.040] One of the things is, I guess, like Stardew, the clock is really fast. Stuff happens really fast.
[40:42.040 –> 40:43.040] You can’t change that.
[40:43.040 –> 40:44.040] Oh, you can?
[40:44.040 –> 40:45.040] Yeah, it’s in the settings.
[40:45.040 –> 40:49.040] I need to look into that.
[40:49.040 –> 41:01.040] Because, oh man, like when you’re farming, right, like if you’re like me, somebody who likes to be super efficient, like I want to have this soil ready at this time.
[41:01.040 –> 41:06.040] And you click on the wrong thing and you lose 10 minutes. Like, no, now I’m behind. It’s very irritating.
[41:06.040 –> 41:12.040] Yeah, that’s an option. You can make it slower or faster.
[41:12.040 –> 41:17.040] Oh, looking into options. What a genius idea.
[41:17.040 –> 41:24.040] But going back to the farming, I agree pretty much with your sentiments.
[41:24.040 –> 41:30.040] At first, I think I was expecting maybe a little more because I like the farming and the area is very small.
[41:30.040 –> 41:37.040] I still haven’t been able to expand to the bigger area because I get sidetracked by a lot of stuff.
[41:37.040 –> 41:40.040] No.
[41:40.040 –> 41:47.040] There’s, right, because expanding the farm takes resources. You have to get wood and iron or money or whatever.
[41:47.040 –> 41:53.040] And the resource management in this game is it’s demanding. Like it takes a lot of work to get it.
[41:53.040 –> 41:58.040] And then there’s you can spend it in like five different ways. It’s a good balance, though.
[41:58.040 –> 42:05.040] It’s not to the point where it feels like I’m I just can’t get enough, but it’s you know, it just makes you work for it.
[42:05.040 –> 42:14.040] Not unjustly, which I guess kind of like Stardew, but just a little more resource heavy because this game focuses a little more on crafting and things like that.
[42:14.040 –> 42:20.040] Yeah. Yeah. I feel like we’re moving into the crafting conversation. I have severe issues with the crafting.
[42:20.040 –> 42:23.040] Oh, you just want to complain. That’s that’s all.
[42:24.040 –> 42:30.040] I do want to complain. Right. So this is not going to be as bad as this is not as bad as my Temer Portia.
[42:30.040 –> 42:33.040] This is not going to be a rant like that.
[42:33.040 –> 42:41.040] I will say that this game very definitely is one of the you craft a thing to craft a thing to craft a thing to craft a thing.
[42:41.040 –> 42:46.040] Right. And I’m never a huge fan of that. I like how Stardew did it where you’re like, yeah, sure.
[42:46.040 –> 42:51.040] There’s you have to have like things to like smell things and that’s fine. You have to have those change.
[42:51.040 –> 42:53.040] Right. I get that. That’s fine. I don’t have an issue with that.
[42:53.040 –> 42:59.040] The issue is when you’re crafting an item that then you use to craft another item or they’re like multiple ways to craft items.
[42:59.040 –> 43:03.040] That’s where it gets me really annoyed. So like Stardew was like, here’s your crafting menu.
[43:03.040 –> 43:06.040] Just choose what you want. And that really worked really well.
[43:06.040 –> 43:14.040] The problem here is you immediately when you start the game, there are two crafting tables, two different crafting tables.
[43:14.040 –> 43:16.040] There’s a lot of crafting tables.
[43:16.040 –> 43:21.040] That’s a really bad start. And that was when I was like, oh, no, here we go. Right.
[43:21.040 –> 43:25.040] Because it wasn’t even like there’s one and then you get another one later. It was no here are two.
[43:25.040 –> 43:30.040] Because I was like, oh, you need to go and you need to go and craft a compost bin to.
[43:30.040 –> 43:36.040] OK, fine, because you have to craft a compost bin and then you put some weeds in the compost bin and that gives you compost.
[43:36.040 –> 43:41.040] And then you use the compost to make a bed for seeds.
[43:41.040 –> 43:46.040] I’m like, OK, fine, whatever. Right. That’s not the worst thing, but it’s a bit annoying that you’re like these things.
[43:46.040 –> 43:52.040] So I was like, OK, well, let me go into the shed that I noticed the the the crafting table was in.
[43:52.040 –> 43:57.040] I’m like, there’s no thing for a compost bin in here. Am I missing something?
[43:57.040 –> 44:00.040] And so I went into the one thing I will say is the questing works really well.
[44:00.040 –> 44:06.040] The quests have like a little hint button that tell you the information so you don’t have to remember all really nice.
[44:07.040 –> 44:12.040] There’s a show hint button, but you can see like the whatever you need, you can click on it.
[44:12.040 –> 44:16.040] And I’ll tell you, OK, you need to get these ingredient location, et cetera, et cetera.
[44:16.040 –> 44:20.040] Yeah. Yes. It’s really nice. But it’s great. So I went and click the hint button on that one.
[44:20.040 –> 44:25.040] And it was like, oh, use the crafting table next to the farming area. And I’m like, what?
[44:25.040 –> 44:30.040] There’s another crafting table. So you have to then come out of the shed and go across to where you’re farming.
[44:30.040 –> 44:35.040] And then there’s another crafting table there. And why? Just why? Why would you do that?
[44:35.040 –> 44:38.040] Just give me one crafting menu for all these things. Right.
[44:38.040 –> 44:43.040] The crafting a compost bin to get compost to then also craft other things. That’s fine. Whatever.
[44:43.040 –> 44:48.040] I get that there’s chains like that. Right. That’s people just trying to add more of that stuff.
[44:48.040 –> 44:50.040] That’s fine. Whatever. I don’t have an issue with that. Right.
[44:50.040 –> 44:55.040] It can be a bit kind of like roll my eyes when it’s like, oh, yeah, I need to craft another thing to make more things.
[44:55.040 –> 45:00.040] Right. But whatever. But it’s when you have multiple ways to craft items that just drives me insane.
[45:00.040 –> 45:06.040] Just make it one crafting table. Oh, and it wasn’t even like you unlock the second crafting table later on.
[45:06.040 –> 45:12.040] There were both there from the beginning. No, you unlock the other three later.
[45:12.040 –> 45:18.040] I can’t. I just. Oh, my word. It’s dry. It’s not as bad as my temperature because it is just like going to press a button.
[45:18.040 –> 45:25.040] But I should not have to remember which crafting table to go to to craft certain items.
[45:25.040 –> 45:34.040] It’s just. Oh, my word. It’s defense. Most of the time.
[45:34.040 –> 45:40.040] It makes sense. You want to craft the compost bin. Well, guess it doesn’t go into your inventory.
[45:40.040 –> 45:44.040] It just when you craft it, it’s like poof here. OK, place the bin. Where do you want it?
[45:44.040 –> 45:50.040] So you can’t do that at the tool shed. No, no, no defense.
[45:50.040 –> 45:57.040] They could have. That’s that’s a bad decision, right? It’s a bad reason for a bad decision, for a bad gaming mechanic that they made.
[45:57.040 –> 46:05.040] I could have done it better. They chose not to. They chose to make it confusing so that there’s no way for me to remember which crafting table I need to go to.
[46:05.040 –> 46:11.040] Specifically for you. Yeah. Targeted. They heard the episode.
[46:11.040 –> 46:15.040] Whatever my time, Porsche, whatever they heard it, they heard it.
[46:15.040 –> 46:19.040] Nothing will ever be as bad as the crafting in my time in Porsche.
[46:19.040 –> 46:29.040] The having to figure out where to put items in 3D space to craft an item was the most insane thing I’ve ever experienced in a game.
[46:29.040 –> 46:33.040] Oh, that’s beautiful. All right, I’m done.
[46:33.040 –> 46:37.040] So, yeah, what were your thoughts on the crafting? OK.
[46:37.040 –> 46:43.040] That didn’t get to me, but like all joking aside, like I can I see your reasoning. I don’t think you’re being.
[46:43.040 –> 46:49.040] Thank you. Yeah, they could have designed that differently. But personally, it doesn’t bother me that much.
[46:49.040 –> 47:00.040] What I do want to comment on is like the system as a whole is, like I mentioned, the game uses it pretty significantly.
[47:00.040 –> 47:07.040] You can cook, you know, craft stuff with your stove to cook recipes. You need to craft potions and spells.
[47:07.040 –> 47:11.040] Also, there’s a lot of different things you can craft and you need to.
[47:11.040 –> 47:16.040] Some of them are kind of optional and really beneficial, like all of the spells.
[47:16.040 –> 47:21.040] All of them are very quest driven, as you said. Good questions in this game.
[47:21.040 –> 47:26.040] But it’s definitely more than Stardew. Like, you know, it’s more than.
[47:26.040 –> 47:36.040] Yeah, it’s definitely it is a game that has a lot of crafting and it’s kind of one of the few things that you can’t get away with doing in the game with not doing in the game.
[47:36.040 –> 47:40.040] But it also feels like they all have a purpose.
[47:40.040 –> 47:47.040] Yeah, absolutely. The two crafting tables aside, everything else, it feels like you’re doing it for a reason.
[47:47.040 –> 47:52.040] Right. Like I may roll my eyes at the fact that you have to do five things in a chain to just plant a seed.
[47:52.040 –> 47:58.040] Right. But at least it’s trying to do something and it’s not just going, oh, here’s a magic thing to do this.
[47:58.040 –> 48:06.040] Right. It’s trying to make it more realistic, but not not too realistic so that it’s like farming simulator.
[48:06.040 –> 48:12.040] Right. Like it’s not like that sort of level, but it’s trying to actually explain why are we doing these things.
[48:12.040 –> 48:15.040] There’s a reason for everything. Yeah, absolutely.
[48:15.040 –> 48:27.040] So all in all, I think the system is well done aside from, you know, those again, I doesn’t personally bother me, but I see your point in those gripes and, you know, it could always be improved for sure.
[48:27.040 –> 48:37.040] But like the biggest and this is, again, not so much a complaint, but because it’s so crafting heavy, it’s very resource heavy.
[48:37.040 –> 48:47.040] Like you’ve got to always be getting wood and mining or whatever, which is not the worst because, you know, you’re just playing the game, but it’s just a lot of pressure.
[48:47.040 –> 48:53.040] You know, it fits it. But I think the beauty is it’s only a lot of pressure if you’re trying to get through it as quickly as possible.
[48:53.040 –> 49:02.040] Right. If you’re playing these games like these games are designed to be played, they’re meant to become, you know, you play a couple of days here and there and you just go and do what you can do.
[49:02.040 –> 49:09.040] And if you can’t get that quest done today, well, we’ll do it tomorrow. Right. Like there’s very little like you must do this now.
[49:09.040 –> 49:16.040] Like I still have one of the quests from like my second day and I haven’t completed it just because I’ve just not got to that bit yet. That’s fine.
[49:16.040 –> 49:22.040] Right. But like on some other levels, I’m I’m really far past that. Right. Like it’s just that’s fine.
[49:22.040 –> 49:26.040] Like it doesn’t it works well for that sort of game. That is a very good point.
[49:26.040 –> 49:34.040] Right. I was rushing to it because I wanted to see some certain things and, you know, to have more to talk about for the podcast. But you have that’s a very excellent point.
[49:34.040 –> 49:40.040] Oh, sure. That’s that is our problem that we have created for ourselves.
[49:40.040 –> 49:48.040] And also, there’s there’s a little bit of, oh, like, oh, I have this quest. I want to get it done sort of thing. But that is just a personal thing.
[49:48.040 –> 49:58.040] Sure. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But I want to add one more thing to that. This is perhaps, I think, the greatest innovation in this entire genre since Stardew.
[49:58.040 –> 50:07.040] There’s yeah, you’ve just started. So here’s the thing. Right. So like in Stardew Valley, you have quests like let’s say you need strawberries or whatever.
[50:07.040 –> 50:15.040] Right. You have to you have days to do it, but it has to be done in that season to get to get that quest done or whatever.
[50:15.040 –> 50:23.040] You know what I mean? Yeah. In this game, in Wildflowers, seasons change when you want them to.
[50:23.040 –> 50:27.040] I had not because I’ve not done any. I don’t know.
[50:27.040 –> 50:34.040] It’s I know you don’t realize it until a certain point, but oh my word, essentially.
[50:34.040 –> 50:42.040] OK, well, I’m getting into the magic a little bit now, but the the witches on the island control the weather and this.
[50:42.040 –> 50:50.040] And so to move to summer, it’s a quest. OK, you want to move to summer? Here’s this potion. You can craft it, give it to us.
[50:50.040 –> 50:58.040] We’ll do the ritual and it’ll move into summer. And there is no timeline punishment or pressure to do that.
[50:58.040 –> 51:06.040] So you can take all the sweet time you want in spring to get all your spring resources, do your spring quests, whatever you want to do.
[51:06.040 –> 51:17.040] It’s incredible. Crazy. Yeah, yeah, it’s it’s it’s it’s a game changer.
[51:17.040 –> 51:20.040] And of course, they will give you the warning. OK, it’s about to turn to summer.
[51:20.040 –> 51:28.040] All your summer spring crops are going to drop. All your spring crops will die if they don’t grow in summer.
[51:28.040 –> 51:33.040] Which happened to me because I didn’t pay attention just to like some flowers. But anyways, it’s happened to all of us.
[51:33.040 –> 51:38.040] Yeah, but it’s great. They let you know and it’s all up to you.
[51:38.040 –> 51:42.040] So the again, going back to the whole crafting resource gathering, you’re right.
[51:42.040 –> 51:48.040] This is like the most relaxed chill you can be about it because you don’t even have that seasonal limit.
[51:48.040 –> 51:55.040] You can just take all your sweet time to do however many days you want. It’s fantastic.
[51:55.040 –> 52:01.040] I absolutely love it. So let’s talk a little more about those resources unless you have anything else to say about crafting.
[52:01.040 –> 52:06.040] No, no, no. I just I’ve done my rant. I’m all good.
[52:06.040 –> 52:16.040] OK, fishing, fishing is a pretty cool improvement in this one, too, because there’s a lot of fish in this game.
[52:16.040 –> 52:20.040] So there’s two things that they do, I think, that make fishing fun and interesting.
[52:20.040 –> 52:25.040] First of all, it’s Animal Crossing style, not Stardew Valley. You don’t have to do a weird minigame with the bobber.
[52:25.040 –> 52:29.040] You just push A when it bites. It’s crazy. It’s always great.
[52:29.040 –> 52:38.040] Yeah, I haven’t done a huge amount, so I don’t know whether there’s the thing with Animal Crossing where you have a different amount of time to press the button depending on the fish.
[52:38.040 –> 52:45.040] As I’ve experienced so far, no, I have not encountered that. And it’s very generous.
[52:45.040 –> 52:49.040] Yeah, well, yeah, exactly. So it’s leaning into the game.
[52:49.040 –> 52:58.040] This is, I think, a lot of it. Assuming that you play it the way it’s designed to play, it is generally a stress-free, calm game.
[52:58.040 –> 53:08.040] It is, as I said, the ultimate cottagecore game. It’s designed to just be you are living in this place and you’re just doing these things.
[53:08.040 –> 53:15.040] And if things don’t happen really quickly, that’s okay. If you don’t immediately press the button when the fish latches on, that’s okay.
[53:15.040 –> 53:20.040] You’ve got some time. Calm. Go for it whenever you want.
[53:20.040 –> 53:27.040] Yeah, that is beautifully said. And especially now that I learned I can change the time in the settings.
[53:28.040 –> 53:36.040] But yeah. Okay, so they do two cool things aside from the generous Animal Crossing style.
[53:36.040 –> 53:46.040] One, they give you bait. Different kinds of bait. You can use worms, a baitfish, and a cricket. Something like that. There might be other ones, but that’s all I’ve seen so far.
[53:46.040 –> 53:52.040] And the different kinds of bait will attract different fish. And the fish also depend on the location.
[53:52.040 –> 54:01.040] You know, there’s the beach, the river, the lake, yada yada yada. So that makes it very diverse and not repetitive, right?
[54:01.040 –> 54:08.040] Because in Animal Crossing, or a lot of other games with fishing, if you fish here at the river you’re going to expect to get a bass or whatever.
[54:08.040 –> 54:16.040] In Wildflowers, not only can you use different bait, but you can see different styles of shadows of fish.
[54:16.040 –> 54:22.040] Like you’ll see little fish, big fish, fish that looks like a lobster. It’s not one to one, but it gives you a category.
[54:22.040 –> 54:28.040] Like if you see a lobster shadow, it’s going to be something that’s not just a fish. It’s going to be a squid or an eel or something like that.
[54:28.040 –> 54:37.040] And perhaps the even cooler thing that they do. So if you go to a spot, you’ll see usually two to three fish there.
[54:37.040 –> 54:42.040] When you drop your rod in with the bait, you can essentially choose which fish you want.
[54:42.040 –> 54:47.040] Because if a little fish bites it and you don’t want it, you just can wait and the little fish will leave.
[54:47.040 –> 54:55.040] And then the big fish can come and bite it and then you can pull it up. And it doesn’t use any extra bait or anything. It’s awesome!
[54:55.040 –> 55:04.040] Yeah, I agree. It’s a pretty good fishing minigame. I mean, calling it a minigame is a bit over the top, right? It’s not even a minigame.
[55:04.040 –> 55:05.040] It’s a mechanic.
[55:05.040 –> 55:10.040] Yeah, there’s no minigame to it and that’s why we like it.
[55:10.040 –> 55:19.040] Yeah, no, no. I like either a fishing mechanic or a full on fishing game, but no weird stardew minigame.
[55:19.040 –> 55:28.040] Yeah, I mean, I keep flip flopping on these things, but I’m sure we’ll have this discussion in the fishing minigames episode that we haven’t mentioned before.
[55:29.040 –> 55:36.040] One thing I will also say about fishing. One of the best characters, his name is Bruno, is the fishing guy and I love him so much.
[55:36.040 –> 55:40.040] He’s the guy who teaches you how to fish and you sell all your fish to him.
[55:40.040 –> 55:51.040] Mining. Okay. Well, I mean, what’s there to say about mining? There’s no monsters. That’s the big one. There’s no combat in this game.
[55:51.040 –> 55:56.040] So it’s just going down there and hitting rocks.
[55:56.040 –> 55:59.040] This one I haven’t done, so it’s all you.
[55:59.040 –> 56:11.040] Okay. It’s pretty straightforward. Okay, so when you open the mine, which is a project you have to do, you have to get resources to fix up the entrance and get into the mine.
[56:11.040 –> 56:17.040] You’re given a pickaxe and just like stardew, you hit rocks and they open and drop the river, right?
[56:18.040 –> 56:32.040] To proceed on to the next level, because like most of these games, there’s levels on these mines, you have to basically hit rocks randomly until you find a key randomly inside one.
[56:32.040 –> 56:42.040] And as you go farther in or farther down, there’s more resources to find, the levels get bigger, but it’s pretty much the same process.
[56:42.040 –> 56:47.040] As you upgrade your pickaxe, you can break rocks faster and use less energy, etc.
[56:47.040 –> 56:58.040] It’s nothing significant. A lot of the quests use a lot of mine resources like stone and iron and whatnot, so you will spend some time in there.
[56:58.040 –> 57:04.040] But again, no pressure, no stress, no combat. Just go in there.
[57:04.040 –> 57:09.040] It’s pretty simple, but like most things in this game, pretty satisfying.
[57:10.040 –> 57:14.040] And yeah, I think that’s all I have to say on the mining aspect of it.
[57:14.040 –> 57:22.040] Let’s see, I’m trying to think. It’s pretty much like wood chopping, right? You go around, chop trees, it’s pretty much like they’re just in caves.
[57:22.040 –> 57:34.040] Yeah, I think a lot of the game is that, right? Like you go to a place, it shows you that you can interact with it, you press a button, either a physical button or you tap the button that’s the interactable thing and it does a thing.
[57:34.040 –> 57:39.040] So yeah, I haven’t done the mining just because I haven’t unlocked the mine yet.
[57:39.040 –> 57:43.040] Yeah, well, there’s nothing crazy, it’s nothing mind-blowing.
[57:43.040 –> 57:54.040] But let’s see, aside from that, I guess the only other big mechanic is the magic system, which I think you’ve just kind of grazed or touched, is that right, Al?
[57:54.040 –> 57:58.040] I have unlocked it but not done anything with it yet.
[57:58.040 –> 58:02.040] Like I literally unlocked it this morning.
[58:02.040 –> 58:14.040] Okay, so magic is kind of really just another crafting system. You craft potions and spells primarily, and various ingredients to craft the items and spells.
[58:14.040 –> 58:22.040] But they, because it’s magic, this is like the fun cheating, not your standard farm games.
[58:23.040 –> 58:27.040] Some of the spells are ridiculously powerful.
[58:27.040 –> 58:36.040] There is a freeze time spell, where if you use it, it will freeze time in the location you are, and you can take as long as you want.
[58:36.040 –> 58:40.040] It’ll just stop when you leave the area.
[58:40.040 –> 58:48.040] It’s pretty insane. There’s a lot I haven’t unlocked yet, but there’s a lot of other potion spells that do stuff on that level.
[58:48.040 –> 58:55.040] There’s potions that tell you what a person likes, or even improve their relationship with you, etc.
[58:55.040 –> 59:05.040] The big ones are the season-changing potions. I think there will be weather-changing spells, I haven’t encountered them yet.
[59:05.040 –> 59:09.040] There’s still a lot left for me to see into the magic stuff, but it’s pretty cool.
[59:09.040 –> 59:11.040] It’s basically just a cheat system.
[59:11.040 –> 59:12.040] Yes, it is.
[59:12.040 –> 59:15.040] It’s like a built-in cheat system that you unlock as you go through the game.
[59:16.040 –> 59:23.040] I guess that’s not that uncommon as well. When you get to a certain point in Stargi, you’re transporting things.
[59:23.040 –> 59:28.040] You can pay the wizard to do certain things, you can change the weather, that sort of stuff.
[59:28.040 –> 59:35.040] I guess it’s not unusual, it’s not a brand new thing, but the way that it’s done is different.
[59:35.040 –> 59:40.040] The presentation, it fits naturally. It’s great.
[59:40.040 –> 59:48.040] I presume the spells you’re making using the stuff that you grow, right? That’s where it’s kind of leading to.
[59:48.040 –> 59:56.040] Okay, so spells, what you have to do is you have to get paper, which you use a paper press to make it out of wood.
[59:56.040 –> 01:00:02.040] You use ink, which you can fish up from squid or charcoal later on in the mines.
[01:00:02.040 –> 01:00:08.040] Those are the two basic ingredients for every spell, and then after that it’s a variety of different things for spells.
[01:00:08.040 –> 01:00:13.040] Potions, that uses more of the stuff you can find and grow.
[01:00:13.040 –> 01:00:22.040] A lot of the foraging stuff like mushrooms and certain weeds and plants you pick up, you use those for various potions.
[01:00:22.040 –> 01:00:29.040] So it’s a mix of different things. Again, it’s a resource-heavy crafting system, but it feels good.
[01:00:29.040 –> 01:00:33.040] Nothing feels unreasonable or unnatural.
[01:00:34.040 –> 01:00:43.040] It’s in-depth, like I said, there’s still a lot I haven’t seen, but it all looks very promising.
[01:00:43.040 –> 01:00:48.040] I know you get the broom you can fly on at some point, I haven’t unlocked it, but I can’t wait to get it.
[01:00:48.040 –> 01:00:54.040] I can’t imagine using the broom with the default iPad control scheme.
[01:00:54.040 –> 01:00:59.040] Oh gosh, I can’t imagine playing anything.
[01:00:59.040 –> 01:01:05.040] Sorry, I was just reminded of that.
[01:01:05.040 –> 01:01:09.040] Alright cool, is that all mechanics stuff we want to talk about then?
[01:01:09.040 –> 01:01:13.040] Do you want to talk about relationship stuff? I’ve not touched any of it, I don’t really care about it.
[01:01:13.040 –> 01:01:17.040] It seems pretty standard, right?
[01:01:17.040 –> 01:01:21.040] Yeah, this is a segue into the characters, because it’s a farming game so characters are big.
[01:01:21.040 –> 01:01:27.040] The relationship stuff is standard, you can give people, you can just talk to them daily.
[01:01:28.040 –> 01:01:30.040] You don’t have to go to a separate menu.
[01:01:30.040 –> 01:01:35.040] They seem to have different numbers of hearts you can grow, rather than a standard, the same number for all of them.
[01:01:35.040 –> 01:01:42.040] Yeah, that is cool, that you can see the actual romanceable people have like ten hearts, something like that.
[01:01:42.040 –> 01:01:49.040] Then there’s people with like three hearts they can just be buddies with, and there’s like a cat with like one heart or something like that, I don’t remember.
[01:01:50.040 –> 01:01:55.040] But yeah, it’s pretty basic, nothing crazy.
[01:01:55.040 –> 01:02:00.040] There’s the gifting system, but I don’t give so many gifts because crafting resources are valuable.
[01:02:00.040 –> 01:02:07.040] But what is nice is the actual cast.
[01:02:07.040 –> 01:02:13.040] I don’t know how much you’ve met, or give me your general thoughts, what do you think of the cast?
[01:02:14.040 –> 01:02:20.040] Well, I’ve met everybody, I believe there are some characters that come later on.
[01:02:20.040 –> 01:02:23.040] I’ve met all of the beginning characters, yes.
[01:02:23.040 –> 01:02:29.040] I will say that I don’t like some of them, but I don’t like some people, so that feels quite accurate.
[01:02:29.040 –> 01:02:30.040] What?
[01:02:33.040 –> 01:02:36.040] No one in particular, I’m not calling anyone out here.
[01:02:36.040 –> 01:02:41.040] No, call them out now. Call them out, who’s the Cameron in your life, Al?
[01:02:44.040 –> 01:02:49.040] But it definitely feels like everybody has a personality.
[01:02:49.040 –> 01:02:58.040] I haven’t played it enough to make the comparison to Stardew.
[01:02:58.040 –> 01:03:03.040] I don’t want to say it’s better than Stardew, I don’t know whether it’s better or worse than Stardew.
[01:03:03.040 –> 01:03:09.040] But it feels better than average in terms of the characters, it feels like there’s a lot of thought put into them.
[01:03:09.040 –> 01:03:17.040] Most farming games that I play, there’s maybe two people that I can be bothered to get to know.
[01:03:17.040 –> 01:03:22.040] Stardew was the unique one in that everyone felt like they were a character, and felt unique,
[01:03:22.040 –> 01:03:28.040] and felt like it was interesting to get to know them, even the ones you didn’t like, and this feels like that as well.
[01:03:28.040 –> 01:03:33.040] But as I say, I’ve not gone through it enough to know, oh these are amazing.
[01:03:34.040 –> 01:03:40.040] Okay, so yeah, obviously I’ve spent a lot of time with these characters so I can speak to it a bit more.
[01:03:40.040 –> 01:03:49.040] Yeah, I think like Stardew, they are characters, fully fleshed out characters, etc.
[01:03:49.040 –> 01:03:58.040] I think it’s not maybe the characters, but the dialogue and writing in this game are really well done.
[01:03:58.040 –> 01:03:59.040] Right, okay.
[01:03:59.040 –> 01:04:01.040] And they’re all fully voice acted, so that helps.
[01:04:01.040 –> 01:04:05.040] So they feel a little more fleshed out than Stardew characters.
[01:04:05.040 –> 01:04:13.040] At times the Stardew characters maybe feel a little more one-note or caricature-like, you know what I mean?
[01:04:13.040 –> 01:04:19.040] Like Linus is the hermit guy, that’s kind of his whole thing, right?
[01:04:19.040 –> 01:04:26.040] And that’s still kind of the case here, everyone has a role in town, there’s the butcher and whatever,
[01:04:26.040 –> 01:04:32.040] but they get to comment on different things, you see a little more rounded personalities.
[01:04:32.040 –> 01:04:45.040] But in general, it’s a strong cast. I definitely have my favorites, like I mentioned Bruno as the fishing guy, he’s a really cool old dude.
[01:04:45.040 –> 01:04:50.040] Okay, do you have anyone that stands out for you so far, Al? Let’s say that.
[01:04:51.040 –> 01:05:01.040] Not particularly. I guess Violet has been the only one that’s kind of been vaguely interesting to me,
[01:05:01.040 –> 01:05:08.040] just because I wasn’t wanting to focus on that area of things, because I had such a limited amount of time.
[01:05:08.040 –> 01:05:13.040] So she’s the only one that without doing much, I’ve kind of seen something.
[01:05:13.040 –> 01:05:22.040] Especially, she runs the flower shop, puts bouquets together, and there’s like one question for her,
[01:05:22.040 –> 01:05:27.040] she’s like, oh, thanks for these. I don’t really care about flowers, but it’s a job.
[01:05:27.040 –> 01:05:34.040] I mean, all right, I see where you’re coming from. It’s just really funny.
[01:05:34.040 –> 01:05:40.040] So yeah, that’s the only kind of thing I vaguely see.
[01:05:40.040 –> 01:05:45.040] This game is pretty good at making me laugh. I will say that the writing is pretty strong, like I said.
[01:05:45.040 –> 01:05:50.040] One of my favorite quotes in the game is, you’re talking to one of the child characters and like,
[01:05:50.040 –> 01:06:01.040] man, when will summer get here? It feels like taking forever. And Terra responds, I’m working on it.
[01:06:01.040 –> 01:06:10.040] But yeah, no, I mean, yeah, I’m not going to in depth. But OK, what about the mayor? What about Otto?
[01:06:10.040 –> 01:06:15.040] There’s a mayor character and he’s the most politician character ever.
[01:06:15.040 –> 01:06:24.040] Oh, my word. He is like so like, I don’t know much about him, but he just feels so sleazy.
[01:06:24.040 –> 01:06:28.040] What you see is what you get. I haven’t seen anything. I’m sure maybe there is.
[01:06:28.040 –> 01:06:32.040] But so far, both for mayor Otto.
[01:06:32.040 –> 01:06:39.040] He’s so slick and plastic. He looks like he looks like a Ken doll, right?
[01:06:39.040 –> 01:06:43.040] He’s so ridiculous. It’s great. It’s great.
[01:06:43.040 –> 01:06:49.040] By the way, Bruno is his dad. And even like Bruno’s like, man, what the heck, son? What the heck?
[01:06:49.040 –> 01:06:56.040] But yeah, no. So, yeah, I enjoy the characters because you love to hate Otto.
[01:06:56.040 –> 01:07:02.040] He’s great. He’s such a politician, man. But yeah, I don’t want to get too in depth.
[01:07:02.040 –> 01:07:04.040] No, we don’t want to spoil things too much for people.
[01:07:04.040 –> 01:07:10.040] But yeah, I think I think it’s important to talk about the fact that the because this could obviously affect whether people want to play the game or not.
[01:07:10.040 –> 01:07:17.040] Like if you’re really into like characters and relationships and the storylines, I think it’s I think it’s good.
[01:07:17.040 –> 01:07:23.040] Oh, it’s you know. Yeah. There is one important point about in general, not about one specific character.
[01:07:23.040 –> 01:07:38.040] This game, it’s all it’s almost amusing to me, like they wrote down a checklist of every like ethnicity and orientation and everything, and they hit all those checkboxes.
[01:07:38.040 –> 01:07:44.040] You’ve got everyone in this little, little town, which, you know, hey, it’s great, right?
[01:07:44.040 –> 01:07:50.040] It’s good. It’s good as a representation in a gameplay thing, but it makes zero sense.
[01:07:50.040 –> 01:07:56.040] Like there is literally no place in the world. There is no place in the world that is this diverse.
[01:07:56.040 –> 01:07:59.040] Nope.
[01:07:59.040 –> 01:08:05.040] But that’s not it. It’s just funny when you think about it. Oh, yeah.
[01:08:05.040 –> 01:08:08.040] Especially a rural farming village.
[01:08:08.040 –> 01:08:18.040] Especially Otto, man. Like Otto should be saying something if he were in real life.
[01:08:18.040 –> 01:08:27.040] But no, great for, yeah, everyone’s going to see someone like, well, I mean, this is amazing things like there’s no kind of, as far as I can see, no disabled person.
[01:08:27.040 –> 01:08:29.040] Oh, yeah. Okay. Well, yeah.
[01:08:29.040 –> 01:08:31.040] Stuff like that. But you can’t you can’t have everything.
[01:08:31.040 –> 01:08:40.040] Yeah, no, like, yeah. But like, as far as games, especially in the gaming world, like they, they made the effort to have a little bit of everything.
[01:08:41.040 –> 01:08:48.040] Yeah, um, but yeah, um, I, yeah, so I think that’s all I really have to say on the characters in general.
[01:08:48.040 –> 01:08:50.040] Do you have anything else?
[01:08:50.040 –> 01:08:56.040] No, no, I was just saying, I was just going to segue. So I guess we want to talk a little bit about the story.
[01:08:56.040 –> 01:08:59.040] We’re not going to talk proper spoilers.
[01:08:59.040 –> 01:09:06.040] But I think it’s probably important to just point out that we’re going to talk about the story because this is going to be the last thing we’re going to talk about.
[01:09:06.040 –> 01:09:15.040] So if you are, if you’re, if you don’t want to hear anything that would spoil you and you’re like, I must play this game, you can pause now and go play the game and then come back.
[01:09:15.040 –> 01:09:20.040] We’re not going to be talking about anything that’s past the first, what, two hours of gameplay, probably?
[01:09:20.040 –> 01:09:27.040] No, nothing. Are we? I don’t know. I mean, I have things. I’ll talk about things in vague terms.
[01:09:28.040 –> 01:09:34.040] Yeah, we’re not going to talk about any actual story points past the, the first kind of big thing that you do.
[01:09:34.040 –> 01:09:39.040] Um, I think, uh, so that’s, that’s your point. We’re going to talk about that.
[01:09:39.040 –> 01:09:42.040] Spoilers. There’s a story in this game. What?
[01:09:42.040 –> 01:09:51.040] Well, I mean, that is an interesting thing, right? Because like quite often these games will hang on to the characters and that is their story, right?
[01:09:51.040 –> 01:10:01.040] Um, and, and that’s fine. And that works really well. And like Stardew does a wee bit more than that. And then it has the, the Joja stuff, but it’s really, really small, right?
[01:10:01.040 –> 01:10:08.040] It’s basically just corporation bad, which is fine. I like that as a storyline, but that’s all it is really.
[01:10:09.040 –> 01:10:16.040] Whereas this game has an actual storyline, right? So you’re like, you start off and you’re like, Oh, blah, blah, blah. That’s fine. We’re doing some things.
[01:10:16.040 –> 01:10:23.040] And then you’re like, Oh, go and, uh, go and get this flower from this forest at night. You know? Okay. Right. Weird. All right.
[01:10:23.040 –> 01:10:31.040] And then it’s like, Oh, here’s this creepy group of people coming through and doing this, this thing. And all like your grandma’s part of it.
[01:10:31.040 –> 01:10:38.040] And it’s like this kind of like really actual story type thing that kind of pulls you in pretty straight away.
[01:10:38.040 –> 01:10:45.040] Questions, answers. Um, well, are there answers? That’s my, I don’t know. I’ve not got to that bit yet.
[01:10:45.040 –> 01:10:53.040] Well, I have the questions and the mysteries at this point. Yeah. I mean, like, even, I don’t know what’s all the answers. Um, right.
[01:10:53.040 –> 01:11:01.040] Like I say that it’s not, it’s not like a whole narrative, but there’s definitely a rail here and story guiding. Um, right.
[01:11:01.040 –> 01:11:10.040] It’s about Tara learning. She’s a witch because she doesn’t know that when she gets to the island, um, and you know, learning about that world basically.
[01:11:10.040 –> 01:11:30.040] Right. Um, there is, this is maybe perhaps the only spoiler ish thing I’m able to say, but there’s an overarching thing of, uh, uh, Hazel, uh, Tara’s grandmother wanting to the witches to come out of the secret life that they live in and, and, you know, co-mingle with the community.
[01:11:30.040 –> 01:11:35.040] So, so that feels like really the overarching goal, the end goal, overarching story, whatever you want to call it.
[01:11:35.040 –> 01:11:49.040] Um, and as you progress, especially like spring, the end of spring is a big turning point. There’s a big event that happens and a lot of new characters move in, uh, or there’s some that move in.
[01:11:49.040 –> 01:12:03.040] There’s some that just, uh, you encounter and so on and so forth. Um, and you meet people on the island who are involved with magic, but then you meet even more people who are even more involved in magic, which is very fun.
[01:12:03.040 –> 01:12:15.040] Um, very cool. Um, but I mean, all in all, again, like the rest of the game, it all makes sense. It’s, it’s not heavy handed, but it all feels, it all feels right. It’s very well done.
[01:12:15.040 –> 01:12:18.040] Yeah. Um, yeah. I mean, obviously I’ve not gotten very far.
[01:12:18.040 –> 01:12:28.040] Yeah. Well, yeah. I mean, I, I, obviously I, there’s a lot for me too. I’m only not even done with a full year yet, but so far what I’ve seen, I like where it’s going.
[01:12:28.040 –> 01:12:37.040] The, if the world feels bigger, the whole magical witch aspect of it, they, once you pass spring, they really, you really start to feel it and it’s great.
[01:12:37.040 –> 01:12:53.040] Um, but, um, yeah, I think, you know, it’s again, it’s not like a Phoenix Wright game. That’s only story, right? It’s still, you’re still focused on the farming and the crafting, but the story’s there. It’s nice. And, and yeah.
[01:12:53.040 –> 01:13:04.040] And it’s definitely, it’s something that you get through as you do the quests, right? So you’ve got all these natural quests that you just, as you do them, you learn more and that, and it works really well.
[01:13:04.040 –> 01:13:17.040] So you can go through it really quickly if you want to, if you want to be as stressed as you, as you are, um, or you can just kind of go at your own pace and just do it. And, um, yeah, I’m intrigued to see where this goes.
[01:13:17.040 –> 01:13:28.040] Of course, I should also say that characters have their own little stories and arcs much like Stardew, right? Um, yeah. And some of them do genuinely intrigue me.
[01:13:28.040 –> 01:13:40.040] Um, uh, for instance, Cameron, like, okay, I’m going to talk about this one character in a little more detail because it’s an interesting one. Um, do you remember who Cameron is Al? Cause I don’t know how much you’ve ignored him.
[01:13:40.040 –> 01:13:48.040] Nope, I can’t. Okay. So there is this quote unquote church question mark worship center.
[01:13:49.040 –> 01:14:08.040] Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And so he’s called messenger Cameron. That’s like his title. He’s got glasses, got the pole shirt and the khakis. He’s very clearly an homage to certain faith groups and like, you know, he’s a, um, missionary, not exactly a missionary, but you know, that sort of role.
[01:14:08.040 –> 01:14:15.040] It seems like an amalgamation, an amalgamation of different, uh, different Christian based religions.
[01:14:15.040 –> 01:14:31.040] Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That’s probably the best way to put it. And it’s nothing, even in games, not like a specific fate. It’s not even like anything about a deity. They call it like there’s a book of the mind and it’s like the, yeah, but it’s, it’s just in terms of like what is based on in real life.
[01:14:31.040 –> 01:14:45.040] It definitely structure and amalgamation of yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, clearly. Right. So, um, so that’s who he is and you know, he fits that role and you know, some people that might turn them off or whatever.
[01:14:45.040 –> 01:14:58.040] But once I talked to Cameron, turns out he was originally from Hollywood and was an actor, um, and was a hard partier and stuff like that. And like, oh, okay. That’s, that’s kind of interesting. That’s, that’s kind of cool.
[01:14:58.040 –> 01:15:06.040] Um, and so, yeah, that’s just one example of, but yeah, there’s, you know, backstories to people and, and nuances to learn about them.
[01:15:06.040 –> 01:15:20.040] Um, especially some of the more involved characters, like involved with like your grandmother, for example, right. There’s plenty to talk about her or, uh, or the people who were more familiar with magic. They have plenty of stories to tell and whatnot.
[01:15:20.040 –> 01:15:33.040] Um, but yeah, so there’s lots of little areas to explore. And again, like everything else in this game, all at your own pace whenever you want to, if you want to, um, don’t sound so happy about it.
[01:15:33.040 –> 01:15:38.040] People can play their games slowly if they want, Kevin.
[01:15:38.040 –> 01:15:57.040] I needed to meet Wesley. Um, I wish I could talk about some of these characters. Like, I wish I could talk about, um, man, I wish you were a little farther ahead. I want to talk about Marty, the guy who likes the animal ranching. He’s a character.
[01:15:58.040 –> 01:16:09.040] He, um, um, it just, he may have a false name, question mark. I can’t wait to learn about that. Um, yeah.
[01:16:09.040 –> 01:16:23.040] It definitely feels like everybody has at least something vaguely interesting about them. Um, and I’m intrigued to see where it all goes together and how it ties out, how different people react because presumably different people are going to react different ways when the inevitable happens, right?
[01:16:23.040 –> 01:16:40.040] Like they’re not, they’ve not, they’ve not set this story up for everyone, for all the witches not to come out, right? Like that’s clearly what’s going to happen. We know that’s going to happen. I think the interesting thing is how it happens, how people react to that, these sorts of things. I’m really interested to see.
[01:16:40.040 –> 01:16:53.040] Um, so yeah. Oh, I said it was the last thing, but I guess we didn’t do the, um, the summary or, you know, I think it’s probably pretty clear, but would you recommend this game?
[01:16:53.040 –> 01:17:11.040] Yes, I would heartily. Like if you enjoy, look, this one’s pretty clear. Do you enjoy Stardew Valley? You will enjoy Wildflowers. It’s I think pretty one-to-one. It’s the same type of game. They do things differently, some better, maybe some not up to your preference. It’s well done.
[01:17:11.040 –> 01:17:23.040] Everything is, what they want to do, I think is well done. Um, you know, aside from the insane iPad thing, there’s, I don’t know if there’s any egregious errors or flaws.
[01:17:23.040 –> 01:17:30.040] Do not subscribe to Apple Arcade for this game. If you already have it, that’s fine. But if not, go buy it on Switch or Steam.
[01:17:30.040 –> 01:17:40.040] It runs fine on Switch. I will say that. Um, yeah. So yes, I give this a heartily surprising two thumbs up, um, for this game.
[01:17:40.040 –> 01:17:45.040] Um, I would agree. I need to decide whether I’m going to continue playing on my iPad or whether I’m going to buy it on Switch.
[01:17:45.040 –> 01:17:55.040] Uh, well, then you’re not that far in. So if you make that decision, make it now. Yeah, getting the cauldron is the perfect point to stop and do it again somewhere else.
[01:17:55.040 –> 01:18:03.040] Yeah. The thing is, I have three months on Apple Arcade, so I could get three months to play it on the iPad, which I don’t know. We’ll see.
[01:18:03.040 –> 01:18:12.040] Be done with it? Yeah, maybe. Maybe. We’ll see. Um, it’s not, it’s certainly the controls isn’t enough that I’m like, I hate it. I can’t, can’t keep playing it.
[01:18:12.040 –> 01:18:22.040] You know, um, so I guess we’ll just, we’ll just, we’ll see. We’ll see how it goes. Um, awesome. Well, Kevin, where can people find you on the internets?
[01:18:22.040 –> 01:18:34.040] @Koopaprez on tweeters or at Spritersquare where I have art. Sometimes I’m working on it. I’m working on it just like Tara. Um, where can people find you on the internet, Al?
[01:18:34.040 –> 01:18:41.040] Find me on Twitter @thescotbot. Um, or also I’m @thescotbot on mastodon.scot as well.
[01:18:41.040 –> 01:18:43.040] Is Mastodon still going?
[01:18:43.040 –> 01:18:46.040] Oh, yeah. Oh, absolutely. Yeah. Yeah.
[01:18:47.040 –> 01:18:57.040] Um, I’ve not quite, I’ve not completely abandoned Twitter, but I’m certainly, I’m probably about 50 50 mastodon on Twitter and mastodon is where I go to see the nice things.
[01:18:57.040 –> 01:19:05.040] And Twitter is generally where I go to deal with all to see all the corporate tweets that I need to see to keep up to date with.
[01:19:05.040 –> 01:19:12.040] Look, I’m a Sonic fan. I’m on Twitter. I, I can survive trash fires.
[01:19:13.040 –> 01:19:24.040] You can find the podcast on Twitter at THS pod. You can find feedbacks and links, uh, show notes, all that good stuff at our website, harvest season.club.
[01:19:24.040 –> 01:19:34.040] One of those links you can find is a link to our Patreon where you can subscribe to get access to our Slack, which is full of lots of interesting people.
[01:19:35.040 –> 01:19:43.040] And you can also subscribe and get access to our extra bonus episodes of the podcast, which I should really actually put one out.
[01:19:43.040 –> 01:19:51.040] Um, I have a bunch, I’ve got a bunch that just aren’t fully finished, so hopefully I will get one out very soon.
[01:19:51.040 –> 01:19:55.040] Yeah, including some Al might not know about.
[01:19:57.040 –> 01:19:59.040] Oh, I hope so. That’d be nice.
[01:20:00.040 –> 01:20:08.040] I mean, I’m well, yes, look, I’m, I’m, I haven’t even talked to Al about this. This is live on news to him.
[01:20:08.040 –> 01:20:12.040] I am trying to work on an episode, a very special greenhouse episode.
[01:20:12.040 –> 01:20:18.040] Um, but I, it’ll have, yeah, it’ll happen when it happens. So hopefully soon.
[01:20:18.040 –> 01:20:20.040] Until next time, have a good harvest.
[01:20:20.040 –> 01:20:22.040] Have a good harvest. I missed that one.
[01:20:22.040 –> 01:20:35.040] The harvest season is created by Al McKinley with support from our patrons, including our pro farmers, Kevin and Stuart.
[01:20:35.040 –> 01:20:41.040] Our art is done by Micah the Brave and our music is done by Nick Burgess.
[01:20:41.040 –> 01:20:49.040] Feel free to visit our website, harvestseason.club for show notes and links to things we discussed in this episode.
[01:20:52.040 –> 01:21:02.040] Where, where can people find you, Scott? Al, because you are the Scotbot.
[01:21:02.040 –> 01:21:05.040] Do you want to try that again?
[01:21:05.040 –> 01:21:10.040] No, no, that’s, that’s a keeper @theAlbot.