Stardew Valley
A friend pointed out I should address the elephant-in-the-room topic next - how Tales of Autumn isn’t yet anther Stardew Valley clone. It’s a longer post, but I’ve a lot of points I want to include, and I think it important to talk specifics here, and then you can make your own call.
First up, as I’ve said elsewhere, Stardew nails this genre. It’s just brilliant, and Eric’s story is inspiring beyond all others. I bought it on release day and was immediately hooked. By chance Multiplayer came out roughly the time that my daughter wanted to look at a few games, and we started a 3 player family farm that will go down as one of my favourite memories. We’ve since turned it into a December tradition, starting a new save and playing it most evenings until Jan/Feb and then putting it aside until next winter, with a hope that yet another content boost arrives in the meantime!
Stardew’s success has certainly inspired hundreds of new projects, including mine. So how is Tales of Autumn different from Stardew Valley and those trying to repeat it?
In summary, I’m focussed on and going deeper into areas of the genre that, in my experience, I’ve always felt could have been explored more. I’m also shooting for a different pacing and feel - I think the mechanics I’m adding naturally present a different mindset for the players that want to partake. A design challenge I’m wrestling with is trying to keep the various paths independent and optional, with the intention that players can invest their time where they like (and effectively decide their own feel!), but interlink them enough to encourage them all!
Specifics!
My primary focus is the animals. Animal management plays a huge role in Tales of Autumn, mainly because other games have always left me wanting more. I’m keen for animals to be the central element of the game, not just a means to income. I think Rune Factory did some interesting stuff here, where the animals were only obtainable in the wild, but again that was an optional part that never really grabbed me - I’d grab a wolf asap to increase my speed, but that’s it.
Underpinning the animals, but also linked to the crops, the terrain editing is an important feature to me that I personally haven’t seen in a farming sim. Viva Piñata is my original inspiration here, and again, I enjoyed it and wanted to build on it.
Its on my list to do a feature-dive on nearer to release, but I’ve a feature of Karma. The lore of the town and many of the story arcs is community. As such, I’ve included a feature for it that effectively tracks it and rewards the player in various ways for activities that contribute to the town. If you pressured me, I’d say Stardew’s community centre is the closest possible link, but that really is quite a stretch.
I’m putting a lot more emphasis on quests. NPCs each have their own quest-lines that are linked in with their stories, and offer experience and distinct rewards (upgrades).
There’s a bunch more but I’ve removed them because actually, the most important comparisons are the primary mechanics. I can also offer that all of the above decisions have been made completely irrelevant of Stardew, Harvest Moon, or anything else that I’ve sunk hundreds of hours into.
That said, I do have specifics where I am overly cognisant of Stardew’s design…
Fishing. I am undecided on the fishing mechanic. Stardew’s is so simple and effective that its already inspired others - Graveyard Keeper spun it well with the range meter. Harvest Moon’s or Monster Hunter’s timing based versions have never engaged me, so I know that not an option either. So, fishing in Tales of Autumn will be different, but I think everyone will always be in Stardew’s shadow here.
‘RPG night’ is a side content idea I’ve again had on the list since day one. Again, a feature-dive is on the way, but in a nutshell if the player befriends a certain set of NPCs, they’ll be invited to a recurring RPG event. This will be an interactive, dice fuelled event that should be a lot of fun. I haven’t played it myself, but was watching an Aavak Stardew episode the other day and saw that Stardew now has an interactive RPG cutscene with Sam and Alex. I’ll admit I was gutted when I saw the thumbnail as this is a pretty unique addition for me. I watched it though, and I’m confident that actually its different enough that I’ll stay true and include it.
When kicking off the project, I was aware of how crowded this space is. But, it’s an idea I’m passionate about, and I’m not seeing what I want to see in the market right now. Are there similarities? Of course - if you were religious on not including features that are close to existing success stories, you’d release nothing.
Every decision made is what I think has been right for my vision, and the player experience I want to deliver.
Long one. Thank you for reading.
