Garden Story Review | TheXboxHub

From the compulsion of Stardew Valley to the rhythms of Farming Simulator, there’s one thing that simply feels proper when farming meets video video games. Maybe it’s as a result of farming, like gaming, is a loop, as you domesticate after which harvest, domesticate and harvest, seemingly getting higher with every cycle. Or possibly it’s as a result of RPGs and farming each revolve round rising one thing, watching it enhance with each motion. It’s simply that in an RPG you are usually rising your self. 

We point out this as a result of Backyard Story isn’t truly a farming recreation. The title may make you’re feeling it’s, the press supplies maintain invoking Stardew Valley, and the opening has you managing a Kindergarden, your individual little backyard within the nook of Spring Hamlet. However Backyard Story swerves fairly early and turns into one thing extra like a handyman simulator. It’s a rugpull that shocked us, and may disorient a number of potential gamers. When you wished your subsequent farming sim, this isn’t fairly it.

Assume Animal Crossing, however diluted to a couple of quarter focus, and with a nomadic edge, as you progress between 4 little cities. Now tuck a Legend of Zelda-style dungeon on the finish of every city, and also you’ve just about nailed Backyard Story. Ta-da!: whether or not that proposal does something for you’ll decide whether or not you get a lot out of Backyard Story. 

You play Harmony who, as talked about, is the custodian of a tiny backyard. However they’re quickly seconded by a large plum referred to as, um, Plum, to turn into a ‘Guardian of the Grove’. It is a quite essential title within the Grove, because it successfully positions you as one of many 4 cities’ champions. Being a Guardian signifies that you can be fixing bridges, clearing out water provides and boshing the odd slime on the pinnacle with a hammer. 

The 4 cities have seen higher days. They’re in varied states of smash, and infrequently share animosity with one another. There’s a civic really feel to Backyard Story, as you be taught the advantages of serving to one another and dealing collectively to a typical aim. It’s a heat, cuddly message that does work, nevertheless it replaces any high-concept tales, plots and even notably attention-grabbing characters (solely a frog, Rana, actually registered with us). Whereas there’s an easy-going consolation to interactions in Backyard Story, they don’t actually seize the guts or thoughts. 

A sample begins to kind as you play by means of Backyard Story. A brand new city is made accessible to you, themed to one of many seasons. You should abandon all the different cities to go to this one (presumably to maintain your focus from straying), as you’re rapidly given a spot of residence and a few preliminary chores to finish. Get these finished and a brand new instrument will likely be tucked into your backpack: maybe a dowsing rod, which acts like a fishing rod in all however identify; or a scythe, for chopping down reeds. 

You then’re gathering the world’s distinctive assets to finish jobs from a bounty board. These fall into classes of fight, delivering assets, and fixing up the city, and finishing sufficient of the duties will degree the city up. Abruptly, new inventory arrives within the store, new places open and – finally – the city’s dungeon is revealed, which likes to crib from Legend of Zelda. They’re a sequence of rooms, break up roughly half-and-half between puzzles and fight. On the finish of them is a boss, which would require mastery of the city’s new instrument. As soon as they’re downed, the city will love you dearly, and you’ll shuffle over to the following one. 

It’s all quite good. It’s the abiding, non-committal phrase that retains buzzing in our head as we play Backyard Story. Good. It doesn’t stray into the adverse points of the phrase by changing into twee, and we will really feel the day’s worries wash off us as we play. 

You possibly can sense the ‘however’. Whereas Backyard Story is good, additionally it is completely comfortable to drag up a deckchair in the course of the highway. There may be nothing right here to be wowed by, and it doesn’t have the depth, story or compulsion of so lots of its forebears. It’s not as participating as Stardew, not as thrilling as Legend of Zelda, and doesn’t have the sweep of Animal Crossing. It’s in peril of being castaway between all of them. 

Take the fight. You possibly can shut your eyes and picture a Backyard Story with out fight, and it might seemingly have been a greater, extra accessible recreation for it. However fight is right here, and it’s a tad tiresome. Your assaults deplete a piece of stamina and, at first of the sport, you’ve got three chunks. So, you’re whacking a slime or acorn-beast, and then you definately’re ready a number of seconds on your stamina to replenish. Different points additionally use the stamina, like a defend and dodge, which solely cannibalises the small quantity it’s a must to play with. In consequence, fight turns into a stilted, unsatisfying expertise as you hit and run, wait a bit, then return to the fray. Not often do you’ve got the harm functionality to kill an enemy in a single go.

This improves, in fact, however the harm is completed within the early recreation. And even with Harmony stacked with lifepoints and stamina, fight nonetheless feels inflexible. Assaults really feel tick-based, forcing you to attend earlier than loading up the following assault. The defend – important for sure bosses and projectile-firing roots that make up numerous the sport’s fight duties – can be painful, taking a second or two to activate. It shares a button with a toolbox, too, and it’s frustratingly straightforward to search out that you simply’ve waded into battle with a rusty (however ineffective) spanner.

The handyman (handy-pea?) aspect of Backyard Story is sweet, if slightly restricted. You quickly be taught to assemble facilities within the village, however nearly all of them are for you (stashes, bounty boards, well being refills within the type of dew), and valuable few truly enhance the city. Townsfolk need assets, however you’ll be able to solely stockpile a small quantity in a given day – farming solely actually comes into Backyard Story within the closing hours of a prolonged marketing campaign – so you’re feeling fenced in, progressing solely as a lot because the designers need you to progress. Missions, too, rapidly get repetitive. There simply isn’t a sufficiently big library of them. 

Fight, farming, dungeon-delving, handywork, story and building are all current, however in half-pints. They by no means fairly attain their full potential, and we couldn’t level to a single one in every of them and say “yep, Backyard Story nails that one”. Backyard Story emphatically sits between stools.

So, why did we play it to completion, and why didn’t we remorse it? To start with, we come again to the niceness. There’s a softness to the pastel pixel-art that pulls you in, and the characters – whereas not oozing character – are all the time optimistic in the direction of you. Serving to them out provides you a form of Readybrek glow. 

And there’s a easy loop, finished effectively, right here. We quickly got here to memorise the layouts of every city, and located a minor satisfaction in tidying all of them up. Backyard Story incorporates the thrill of a spring clear, as you potter about, tidying issues away and getting issues finished. Development bars slide upwards and an increasing number of of the Grove turns into accessible. You by no means really feel like you’re min-maxing something, or moving into the intricacies of a crafting system, say, nevertheless it’s genial and frictionless.

Backyard Story introduces itself as one thing of a Stardew Valley or Animal Crossing, however can’t probably compete: its techniques are too shallow, and its plumped for some fight when it might need been higher with out. However in case you’re a fan of these video games, and the thought of a contained, completable marketing campaign with barely a bramble to snag your self on appeals, then Backyard Story will likely be an interesting companion for a dozen hours or so.

You should purchase Backyard Story from the Xbox Retailer