All posts tagged in Stardew Valley
Apr 28, 2018
A few months ago for my Games and Digital writing module at university, I found myself sifting through hundreds of game art images to add to a Pinterest board which demonstrated the aesthetic of a hypothetical video game. As well as discovering lots of amazing concept art on Deviant Art, I stumbled across two games currently in development that I never knew existed. The first game was HK Project, a neat cyberpunk themed game where you explore a futuristic Hong Kong as a cat. The second was Eastward. I was captivated by the beautiful art style of Eastward, and really wanted to share my discovery with readers of My Potato Games. My only issue was that no matter how hard I searched, I couldn’t find a lot of information about the game. Aside from a website post by game developers Pixpil Games dating back to 2015, and a greenlight page for the game on Steam (which was last updated in 2016), the game remained rather elusive. I pondered over whether the project was even still active, and decided to put the game out of my mind.
I thought nothing more of the game. That is until I logged into Twitter two days ago. To my greatest surprise, Chucklefish had announced that they were partnering with Pixpil Games to complete Eastward! Since then, a lot more information regarding the game has become available. We have high hopes for Eastward, as Chucklefish are the masterminds behind popular farming sim Stardew Valley, as well as the highly anticipated magic school game, Witchbrook, which you can read more about here.
Chucklefish’s blog contains the following information about Eastward:
Eastward is an adventure game combining RPG elements, with a visual style inspired by 90s Japanese animation. The game was built around pixel artist Hong Moran’s original intricate post-apocalyptic pixel designs, and the team’s joint love of the Mother and The Legend of Zelda series, inspiring them to create a narrative-driven RPG with a soft sci-fi storyline.In the not-too-distant future, the world around is falling to ruin, as the human population shrinks to an all-time low. You play as a hardworking digger named John, who discovers a mysterious young girl in a secret facility underneath his digging site. After being exiled from his village, John must guide this girl through dangerous decaying cities, inhabited by hordes of monsters and a quirky cast of characters!
Eastward’s emotional story and beautifully rich and vibrant world has been brought to life using a combination of 3D lighting and retro-pixel style artwork, powered by a game engine of Pixpil’s own making. Development on the game started in 2015 with only 3 studio members, and since then has grown to match the game’s ambition, also bringing on board the talents of soundtrack composer Joel Corelitz (Hohokum, The Unfinished Swan & The Tomorrow Children, Gorogoa) and sound design from Irish studio, Hyperduck Soundworks.
Additionally, the game has a swanky new trailer!
Chucklefish have said that updates will be given on the game’s progress in due course. To stay updated, you can follow @Eastwardgame, @Pixpilgames, and @ChucklefishLTD and of course @myPotatoGames on Twitter.
For more games from Chucklefish, check out their upcoming magic school game, Spellbound aka Witchbrook here.
- Mar 2, 2018
The publishers of Stardew Valley, Chucklefish, have been developing a new game called Spellbound. Chucklefish CEO Finn Brice recently talked with Red Bull Games to discuss more about Spellbound and whether a release for Nintendo Switch can be expected.
Finn Brice stated that the team took inspiration from Harry Potter, but mentioned that the world in Spellbound is much different that Hogwarts. The game revolves around learning magic in the school classes you’re a part of. Building relationships with characters and dating is also a big part of Spellbound.
The game is planned to release for PC, but might be coming to other platforms as well. “We’re all massive fans of the Switch at Chucklefish, and would ideally see all of our major projects hitting the platform in the future,” Finn Brice said.
We’d love to see Spellbound come to the Nintendo Switch! Are you interested in Spellbound? To learn more about the game, go here. And for all you Animal Crossing Fans out there, have you seen the customizable Animal Crossing Sticker Pack? Check it out here.
- Dec 10, 2017
Gift ideas for casual gamers
Are you struggling to think of Christmas gift ideas for casual gamer friends? Looking to treat yourself with Christmas money?Look no further as we’ve compiled a list of the most cute and quirky Casual Gaming merchandise currently on the internet.
Animal Crossing
Know a cheapskate or a workaholic? (Or just an Animal Crossing fan will do I guess..) Buy them a Tom Nook or Isabelle pin from Etsy, starting at just £7.73 each
Do you have friends who are like me and are forever losing their ID card for School/Work/Uni (amongst a variety of other things..)? Does their obsession with Animal Crossing: Pocket camp have you concerned for their welfare? Perfect. Buy them a Pocket camp lanyard from Etsy for only £6.95.
It’s-a me Mario
Buy them a Mario Rainbow GP t shirt to remind them how much they suck at Rainbow Road (or Mario Kart in general ?) and how much they hate that course. It can be bought from Theyetee.com for $20. Tip: Consider complimenting this purchase with a Rainbow Road pin and poster (conveniently sold by the same website) to really make them hate you.
Or purchase them an adorable Piranha Plant or Bowser hand puppet, giving them the ability to munch on random stranger’s hair and blame it on the puppet! (Tip: Don’t do that unless you want to look like a weirdo and risk get a slap). These mischievous puppets can be bought from Think Geek for $19.99 each.
Pixel Perfect
With these 8-bit soaps, you can hint to grimy gamer friends that showering in The Sims doesn’t count! The soap can be bought from Think Geek half price for just $12.99, a small price to pay to assist the most pungent of players.
Stardew Valley
Know a stylish Stardew Valley fan? Buy them a seasonal Stardew Valley Fair poster or a pretty Pelican Town poster (or both, if you’re feeling particularly generous) to brighten up their bedroom. The posters are available on fangamer.com (which has loads of cool gamer stuff) for a reasonable $15 each.
Ooblets
How about gifting some of the super cute Ooblets merch which is also available from theyetee.com? There are Ooblets pins, t shirts, stickers and an amazing poster up for grabs!
(Is it just me who thinks that Clickyclaws looks funny? ?)
- Nov 13, 2017
[dropcap]F[/dropcap]or those looking for some great casual games, both the well-known and the less talked about, plus some to look out for in the future, look no further. Here’s some of our favorites.
Night in the woods is an atmospheric adventure game with a great soundtrack, colourful graphics and an interesting and unusual storyline. The game is both brilliantly relatable and relevant yet intriguingly unfamiliar at the same time. ( Steam page – PC, Mac)
Rakuen is a beautiful fantasy adventure game which takes you on a journey with a hospitalised boy. Adventure into the breath-taking fairy-tale world of Rakuen with him and his mother and help assist various characters in need. ( Steam page – PC, Mac)
RiME is a mysterious adventure puzzle game with amazing graphics. Your find your character washed up all alone on an island and get to explore, collect items and unravel the island’s mysteries. This game is also available for purchase on Nintendo Switch as of tomorrow (14/11/17) which is super exciting! ( Steam page – PC
? Stardew Valley ?
Stardew Valley is a colourful indie,farming RPG. It has a characterful aesthetic and always offers plenty to do, meaning you’ll never get bored of it. Like Rime, this game has also made the transition to Nintendo Switch. ( Steam page – PC, Mac, Switch, PS4, Xbox One)
? Ooblets ?
Ooblets is an upcoming Harvest Moon, Animal Crossing and Pokémon inspired game. Your character, which looks similar to one that might have walked out of a Sims game, gets to fish, grow and train Ooblets, and befriend villagers, plus more, in this cute and colourful indie game. ( Steam page – PC, Xbox One)
? My Time at Portia ?
My Time at Portia is an upcoming simulation, open-world RPG. Your player inherits a workshop and builds things out of old relics and harvested materials in this post-apocalyptic setting, where humans are scarce. For a more realistic experience, characters go to school, work and partake in leisure activities. They also have stories that your player can unravel and there is the ability to have relationships. For more on my Time at Portia, and on how to play the free demo check out our previous article here. ( Steam – PC )
- Nov 12, 2017
Here are some games to tide over avid Animal Crossing fans until the release of Pocket Camp.
✨ Enchanted Folk and the School of Wizardry (Magician’s Quest: Mysterious Times in US) ✨
This game is a must-play for fans of Animal Crossing. Animal Crossing meets Hogwarts, this game has all the favourite attributes of animal crossing such as animal residents, cute graphics (which are visually similar to animal Crossing), having your own room to decorate, fishing, bug catching and a variety of shops to browse. However, in this game there are unique perks such as: Being able to attend classes at the Magic school, being able to play instruments, being able to perform spells (such as invisibility, which is useful for eavesdropping) and the ability to date the other residents (which is alarming if you think about it, considering you’re a human and they’re animals/aliens/fruit, etc).
? Harvest Moon: The Tale of Two Towns ?
This game is a great addition to the Harvest Moon series. The story is of two towns (Bluebell and Konohana) that used to have a connecting tunnel between the two towns and were friendly with one another. But as years went on, they fell out and become more and more isolated from one another, with the tunnel eventually becoming blocked, meaning a long trek is necessary to travel from one town to the other. You can choose which town you want to inhabit at the beginning of the game. Your character’s aim is to restore peace between the two towns. You can choose to fall in love with one of the residents from your own town, or from the other town. In addition to this, there are all the Harvest Moon perks that we all know and love, such as Animal farming (Bluebell) and Plant farming (Konohana), shopping, horse riding, gathering etc., as well as regular food festivals held by the goddess at the hill between the two towns. As your character participates in more competitions, the friendship between the two towns will increase.
Psst! There’s also rumours of a remake called Harvest Moon: Tale of Two Towns +
? Fantasy Life ?
Fantasy life is a game brought to us by Level 5, the company that created the infamous Professor Layton series. The beautiful unique graphics and music are a good indicator of this. In this game, after creating your character you get to choose a ‘life’ (basically what career you want). The 12 life classes to choose from are: Alchemist; Angler; Blacksmith; Carpenter; Cook; Hunter; Magician; Mercenary; Miner; Paladin; Tailor; and Woodcutter. After you have mastered one life, you can choose another. In each life, you learn a new skill and can make/obtain new items (dishes as a chef, clothes as a tailor, ore as a miner etc.), meaning once you’ve mastered all 12 lives, you are saving a lot of Dosh (the currency) and resources. Like in Animal Crossing, you can decorate your houses, engage with locals, as well as being able to take on quests, slay dragons, and complete the exciting storyline.
This game also has a sequel that will soon be released for mobile! You can check out a first Fantasy Online gameplay video right here.
? My Sims Kingdom ?
This was one of the first DS games I played and therefore sticks in my memory. I vividly remember retrieving it out of my stocking from Santa and spending Christmas day curled up on the sofa being even more anti-social than normal (if that’s possible?!). So good was this game that my mum decided to steal it (along with my DS console), create a save file of her own, and play it whilst I was in school. This game basically consists of following a storyline where the King gives your character the task of solving the mystery around who’s been stealing public works projects and houses from the Kingdom and causing chaos?! Alongside following the story, you get to decorate your houses (you get multiple), go shopping, play mini-games, complete mini quests (such as finding all the escaped zoo animals), create public works projects and place new houses.
? Stardew Valley ?
I haven’t actually played Stardew Valley in depth, but I’ve heard very good things and definitely want to put aside some time to play it properly. Stardew Valley is a Harvest Moon like, farming RPG game developed by ConcernedApe. Your character inherits a farm plot from your grandfather and your job is to create a successful farm and a thriving community. It has been well received and has been given a 10/10 rating by Steam! Nintendo have also released a version of it for Switch. 🙂
?️ The Sims 3 ?️
The Sims 3 is great fun. Don’t get me wrong, I like The Sims 4, but there is very little space for development in your town, EA received a lot of backlash for not including pools and toddlers (amongst other things) in their initial release of the game, which forced them to include them in updates, and it has more of a mobile Sims game feel than the PC Sims games I’ve grown up with.
The Sims 3 has better graphics than The Sims 2 whilst also having super cool expansion packs such as The Sims 3: Supernatural (you can create and meet fairies, plant people, vampires etc.) and The Sims 3: Island Paradise where you can create and run your own resorts. In addition to this, The Sims 3: University Life offers a more realistic University life for your Sims (perhaps too realistic for some, the stress of getting them through university is unreal).
- Jun 16, 2017
[dropcap]H[/dropcap]arvest Moon is celebrating it’s 20th anniversary this year. For the 20th anniversary, Natsume is doing two things: They are bringing the series to PC for the first time and bringing the series to consoles which has not been done in a few years. The new Harvest Moon game is known as Light of Hope.
Light of Hope’s graphics are top down and players view the cast of Light of Hope with more realistic proportions. Light of Hope does away with the full 3-D perspective which harken back to its most recent predecessors, which were the first Harvest Moon games developed by Natsume after their split with Marvelous Entertainment (It begs repeating: The series known in the West as Harvest Moon now is different from Bokujo Monogatari, the original farming sim franchise that now goes by Story of Seasons stateside).
Producer Taka Maekawa informed Polygon that this 2.5D style is meant to evoke the very first Harvest Moon game. Although the 16-bit Super Nintendo sprites have been replaced with 3D-rendered models, the flat perspective and grid-based, limited range of motion are all straight from Harvest Moon on SNES.
This art style might remind people of the popular farming sim Stardew Valley. However, Natsume is adamant that Light of Hope is not taking anything from Stardew Valley but rather they are going in their own direction. The switch version will have full touch controls and the pc version can be played with just a mouse.
The game is expected to launch in early 2018.
Source: Link
- Jun 11, 2017
[dropcap]R[/dropcap]eggie already teased that Nintendo would have a huge E3 this year. Today the president of Nintendo NA appeared on the official YouTube coverage show to give an introduction to ARMS. In a short interview after the tournament Reggie talked about the three major activities for this weeks E3. Splatoon 2, ARMS and Pokken DX on Nintendo Switch will all feature extensive tournaments throughout the week.
Furthermore Reggie said that the Nintendo 3DS will get a lot of love as well. He also said that Nintendo has some surprise announcements on Tuesday. A lot of Nintendo fans are hoping for news on the next Animal Crossing. Animal Crossing New Leaf has first been announced at the E3 2010. Most installments in the franchise are released with a 3-4 year gap, making a new Animal Crossing long overdue. Nintendo will hold the full presentation on Tuesday, 9am PT / 12pm ET.
Reggie also pointed out that the short 25 minutes E3 presentation will only be the start of a huge week for Nintendo at the games convention. The Nintendo Treehouse show followed right after the kick off show will have more news on unannounced upcoming games.
Beyond first party Nintendo news, fans will also likely get more Stardew Valley and Story of Seasons Switch details. Natsume also promised to reveal more gameplay footage for Harvest Moon on Nintendo Switch
Check out our Animal Crossing wishlist, and our Nintendo E3 Predictions.
- Jun 1, 2017
[dropcap]S[/dropcap]tardew Valley is coming to the Nintendo Switch in the near future. When it does come to the Switch, it is possible that there could be a physical collector edition. CDON, a Swedish retailer, is currently listing the Stardew Valley Collector’s Edition for the Switch.
505 Games published the Stardew Valley Collector Edition on other platforms earlier this year. It features the physical disc of the game, the soundtrack with 33 hand picked tracks, a fold out map of Stardew Valley, and a mini Guidebook created by the artist and author of the full guidebook, Kari Fry.
The Switch version of Stardew Valley will be the first platform to have multiplayer. Check out our article on Stardew Valley Multiplayer here.
Source: Link
