Fae Farmis a farm sim RPG set in the magical world of Azoria where players can team up in online co-op or play solo. With its release date just around the corner, many fans of the genre may be keen to know more about what they can expect fromFae Farm’s gameplay, including how it approaches and incorporates magic into well-known activities, such as farming, fishing, mining, and more.
As anew and upcoming farming sim, there are some obvious comparisons betweenFae Farmand popular titles likeStardew Valleyand theStory of Seasonsgames. However, Game Rant recently learned more about some of its potential stand-out features through a demo with Phoenix Labs Game Director Isaac Epp. Epp about talked about howFae Farm’s magic and spells work, its quality-of-life improvements for “next level” cozy game UX, and more.
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How Magic And Spells Work In Fae Farm
As a comforting farming game,Fae Farm’s magic works in several different ways, covering spells, potions, crafting food, and its coziness system. In the demo, Epp showed howFae Farm’s magic can help make activitieslike mining and farming more efficient through tool upgrades and spells. By infusing magic into tools as players progress, quality-of-life improvements for activities like mining occur. For instance, magic-infused tools can enable players to mine many rocks at once within a certain area.
Epp also spoke about how unlocking the staff early on in the game is linked to progressing inFae Farm, as players can then unlock more spells that have multiple uses and quality-of-life benefits at the cost of using mana. For instance, Epp introduced the Water Bloop spell that waters multiple crops and the Vortex spell that efficiently harvests multiple crops, helps during combat, and collects grass. As Epp put it,
The Vortex spell in particular is also useful in combat. It’s like a big AoE and knock back, so if you’re getting swarmed by enemies at a dungeon, you can just cast that and it’s pretty helpful. I think you could also use it to pick up grass and stuff in the world too. It’s a good utility spell
How Magic Adds Quality Of Life Improvements For ‘Next-Level’ Cozy Game UX
When asked whatFae Farmadds to the genre when compared with popularcozy farming games likeStardew Valley, Epp named quality-of-life improvements as a key feature in addition to co-op multiplayer and creating a highly explorable and “incredibly beautiful world.“Fae Farmmakes menus and actions less fiddley in a way where “you kind of wish it had always been done this way.” As Epp further explained,
For some things, we’ve done an inventory where there’s a storage shed and one thing you’re doing on the homestead will just automatically pull from the shed, so you don’t have to keep running back to throw in your backpack. There are just lots of things like that, that we think overall create a kind of next-level UX for this kind of cozy game.
It’s also evident the player experience is crucial when exploring the world of Azoria as well as interacting with it. Unlike other farm sims, players can freely explore areas usually off-limits, such as swimming in the water and parkouring across the world with their fairy wings. Where games likeStory of Seasonsmiss out on multiplayer,Fae Farm’s inclusion of co-op, focus on the player experience, and quality-of-life improvements look promising and may help it shape its identity in a crowded albeit beloved genre.
Fae Farmlaunches September 8 for PC and Switch.
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