Nov 15, 2023Mobile Game
There’s no lack of farming sims, I know. Harvest Moon, Stardew Valley, Coral Island, Fae Farm, Paleo Pines, and so many more different iterations are out there for everyone to try. Farming has almost completely become synonymous with “cozy gaming” lately. What there is a lack of, is good phone game options for on-the-go gaming. Sprout Valley recently came out for both iOS and Android, and is a great paid option. It’s adorable and simple. However, if you’re looking for a free game to try, Harvest Valley might be right up your alley!
Harvest Valley is a simple farming sim where you can pick your own character from a few presets. You’re the new owner of a run-down farm, and it’s up to you to restore it and make it great! Clean up piles of debris to make room for farm plots and useful equipment. Plant watermelons, potatoes, and a variety of other crops to sell. Even travel to neighboring farms to help out NPCs with different farming tasks like planting, watering, and vegetable sorting.
You can find this cute farming sim on Android and iOS now!
Mar 15, 2023Mobile Game
Some of you might be familiar with mobile game developer Foxie Ventures. They’ve put out games such as Virtual Sim Story, Wolf Tales, Dino Tamers, and Horse Riding Tales (which is also available for free on Steam). A few months ago they put out incredibly cryptic ads to sign up for their new game, Star Equestrian. Now, Foxie Ventures has released this new mobile game, and of course I’ve been playing!
Star Equestrian is a beautiful open-world MMO adventure game that centers around, you guessed it, horses. You play as a character you create, with a name you choose, and experience a traumatic riding injury. Once recovered, you don’t allow that accident to keep you from horses, and re-establish yourself as an experienced equestrian.
Explore an open world where you can collect items like carrots and lettuce to feed your horses. Go in search of your lost horse, Snowdrop, and complete quests for the residents of Evervale to see if they have any information on him, too. Ride around practice arenas, sprint across cross country courses, and participate in show jumping to improve your horse’s skills. You’re not only chasing down your lost horse, but chasing your dream of becoming the best rider, the Star Equestrian.
You’ll also get to build your very own ranch, where you can customize the interior of your home and build stables to house your horses. And what I think helps set Star Equestrian apart from some other mobile horse games is the ability to interact with your horse. You can pet them to help raise the bond level, which unlocks certain skills. It makes the game feel a little more personal and cozy. I have high hopes for this game, as so far it ticks what I want out of a horse game (quests, competitions, story, and interaction).
Star Equestrian is currently available for iOS devices through the Apple App Store. There are plans for the game to be available on Android via the Google Play Store. Unfortunately, there’s no word on when the game will be released for Android, though. You can pre-register on the Play Store to have it automatically downloaded when it is available!
You can also checkout Horse Club Adventures and Horse Tales: Emerald Valley Ranch for more horsey fun!
Aug 15, 2022Mobile Game
If you love Animal Crossing, but are looking for a completely new game, then check out mobile game Cozy Islands – craft & build by Tetrox Limited. This game is a relaxing management sim with Studio Ghibli looks available on Android systems. You arrive alone on the beautiful, overgrown island of your childhood where you will work as the sole inhabitant to make this new space your home.
Complete daily tasks from the bulletin board, and finish recurring quests for the jolly traveling merchant who visits. Mine rocks, chop trees, clear bushes, and collect flowers for resources. Use your newly collected resources to rebuild the island for yourself and restore your childhood home to its former beauty.
Play Cozy Islands at your own pace and complete tasks in any order you wish. The super casual game-play is perfect for players looking to break away from forced story lines and game-play
While the game is still in early development and has no full release date, it is in open beta and available to play. Developer Tetrox Limited even has big plans outlined for the future. Those plans include access to unique auto generated mystery islands for players to travel to and explore.
Cozy Islands will also have other cultures based on real-world experiences for players to enjoy. Lovable villager characters to settle in on the island and make friends with will make an appearance too. And perhaps even more exciting is the plan to add cute animal companions for players to acquire. These companions will work to help players with their daily tasks.
If you enjoyed the terraforming of Animal Crossing, mixed with the other features, check out Pixelshire, where you get to build your own home, design the homes of neighbors, and arrange the town as you like.
May 5, 2022News
Disney Dreamlight Valley is an upcoming free-to-play multi-platform life-simulation adventure game. Although the words “free-to-play” may have given you pause, the Gameloft assures players that there will be no main-campaign “pay-walls”. However, players will have the option to buy expansions to enhance their gameplay. With that out of the way, what is Disney Dreamlight Valley all about?
Play as your own unique, customizable character in a place called Dreamlight Valley where Disney and Pixar characters lived in harmony, that is, until the Forgetting. Night Thorns have grown everywhere now, destroying wonderful magical memories and displacing its inhabitants. In every realm, there’s a Disney or Pixar character that needs your help to go back home. The realms all have their own challenges, puzzles to solve, and villains to encounter.
How is the game compared to Animal Crossing and The Sims? Well in Dreamlight Valley, you can build your own fully customizable neighbourhood with creative landscaping and thousands of decorative items (all Disney/Pixar-themed, of course). Once you bring new characters to town, have them settle down, become their friends, and restore the valley to its former glory. This means you can do things like garden with WALL-E, cook with Remy, and fish with Goofy. The game has a real-time day and night cycle, but the shops will remain open 24/7!
Disney Dreamlight Valley will launch as a free-to-play game in 2023 on all available platforms. This includes PC and Mac on Steam and the Epic Games Store, mobile (iOS and Android), PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X and S, and the Nintendo Switch.
Later this year (Summer 2022), fans who purchase the Founder’s Pack or have an Xbox Game Pass subscription will get Early Access to the game, along with exclusive rewards and limited-edition items that can be carried over to the full version (exclusive goodies such as in-game currency, cosmetic items, etc). For now, you can click on the links provided above to Wishlist the game on your platform of choice.
Apr 19, 2022Indie Highlight
PuffPals: Island Skies is indeed fluffy and puffy! This farming simulation game is all about living your best life on magical floating islands. Like Garden Paws, your neighbours are talking animals that you can’t help but get to know better. Interacting with them is definitely an option, but you’ll also be able do quests and play mini-games with them.
You can create and design your own farm and plant various flowers, trees, and crops. When some of your crops are ready to harvest, they come to life and follow you around like in Ooblets! Not only can you customize the exterior layout of your land, but you can also decorate inside your home. When customizing your own character, there are many choices of skin color, outfits, accessories, hair styles, and other traits that aren’t even human!
You’ll live in a main hub town but you’ll get the chance to do a lot of exploring and foraging at several unique connecting biomes. It will be every collector’s dream to discover new items and to even uncover artifacts.
Backers for PuffPals: Island Skies will have Alpha access to the game for PC fairly soon. There’s still time now to contribute to the Kickstarter Campaign here! Although they have already surpassed their main goals, there are stretch goals that include a Nintendo Switch version and even mobile! The developers behind the game, FluffNest, are also selling adorable plush toys of their characters here. *UPDATE: New trailer and info. Coming to PC, Switch, iOS, and Android in 2025*
Apr 15, 2022Mobile Game
Pocket Love is a mobile game where you can move into a tiny adorable home of your dreams! Start by creating your character and even your partner avatar, then choose to adopt either a kitten or a puppy. Once settled in, you’ll have thousands of customization options to choose from with regards to furnishing and decorating your home! Right now, you have the option to include Easter-themed items such as bunny plush toys, egg-plant trees, chocolates, and flowers!
Pocket Love is developed and published by HyperBeard and is available now! It’s still in the Beta version with a lot more to come but now is the perfect time to try it out with the Easter Event ending in 6 days. You can download the mobile game with Android here or for iOS here.
Check out other recent mobile games with Easter Events recurring again this year with our handy guide here: Easter Events in Games for 2019.
Apr 14, 2022Mobile Game
The developers behind Pokemon Go and Pikmin Bloom, Niantic, have recently announced their latest AR (augmented reality) game with uniquely original virtual pets, Tamagotchi-style like Melbits. Peridots are creatures that are near extinction and need our help to survive and thrive to adulthood!
This new adorable species comes in a variety of shapes, colors, and sizes, with the possibility of breeding them with other players around the world to create even more types! You can even have them resembling cheetahs, dragons, unicorns, or anything else you can imagine! To help your Peridots grow up, you can pet, play, feed, and teach them tricks. Furthermore, you can take walks and travel the real world with your pets and discover new places and items together. Also, to save these memories, take photos and videos!
Niantic plans to soft-launch the game for both iOS and Android sometime this April. You can pre-register now for Peridot on mobile here on Niantic’s official website!
Jul 4, 2020Mobile Game
Level-5 have recently announced that a HD version of Professor Layton and The Lost Future launches for mobile this month. Set to release on both iOS and Android devices on the 13th July, the game is an enhanced port of the Nintendo DS version, which released over a decade ago! As a HD port, the game will have significantly improved graphics and cutscenes in comparison to the 2008 original version.
Professor Layton and The Lost Future is the third game in the first Professor Layton game trilogy. However, the first trilogy chronologically takes place after the events of the three games in the second trilogy. A little confusing, but the puzzle games are enjoyable nonetheless.
Just like the chronology of the Professor Layton games series, the plots can also be slightly confusing initially, albeit very clever. However, the mystery of each game always becomes clear by the end of each game, owing to the sharp-witted Professor Layton.
In a nutshell, Professor Layton and the Lost Future starts with the professor receiving a letter from his apprentice, Luke. This may not seem strange, but the ‘Luke’ writing the letter claims to be from ten years in the future. He initially thinks that Luke is playing a trick on him, until he recalls the events of a week ago. At an unveiling ceremony of a supposedly fully-working time machine, a disaster occurs. The time machine explodes, and a number of people have disappeared, including the Prime Minister.
Deciding to follow the instructions of Future Luke, The Professor and Luke head to a clock shop on Midland Road. After a seemingly small earthquake-type experience whilst inside, the duo are dumbfounded upon exiting the shop. To their utter disbelief, their surroundings are entirely different, and they discover multiple things that suggest that they have travelled into the future.
Dubious as ever, the Professor is determined to uncover what exactly is going on. He’s certain that he is not in fact in a future version of London. However, he is not certain of who he can trust.
Whilst no price has yet been confirmed, the two previous games in the series to get HD mobile ports both cost £9.99 each.
In celebration of the HD remake of the game, Level-5 are hosting a competition. You can create a piece of artwork relating to Professor Layton and The Lost Future and then post it to Twitter with a short sentence on why you chose to create that specific piece of art. The winner will receive a diorama of Professor Layton’s office, alongside a pure gold Professor Layton art card. Five runners-up will also receive a pure gold art card. The competition closes on the 31st July. You can find out more about the art competition here.