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Grow crops, fix fences, and train dogs in this relaxing farming sim - Everdream Valley Quick Review

5K View2023-06-12

Everdream Valley

9.2

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PLAY IT OR SKIP IT?

Play it if you’re a fan of farming games. Everdream Valley has modern 3D graphics, but it feels like it could be a hidden prequel to Stardew Valley or Harvest Moon. Instead of running your own farm, you play as a kid spending their summer vacation with their grandparents. Your grandparents aren’t in the best of health, and their farm has definitely seen better days. If you’re up to the challenge, there are crops to water, animals to care for, and locations to explore. The game is cute and cozy, but it’s also filled with things to do, so if you’ve got the farming bug, it should keep you busy for quite a while.

TIME PLAYED

I spent around six hours playing Everdream Valley, which added up to twenty-five days of farming. Even though the game takes place during summer vacation, there isn’t any sort of time pressure, and I felt totally free to relax and play the game at my own pace. Progress is connected to story quests that can be completed at any time. I spent some days tackling as many quests as I could, but on other days, all I bothered to do was take care of my animals and explore. By now, I have big plans for my grandparent’s farm, so I’m sure there are plenty more hours of farming ahead of me!

WHAT’S AWESOME

• Lots of cute animals. Plenty of farming games have livestock, but Everdream Valley let me interact with all kinds of creatures. My grandpa decided I should have a pet of my own, so he gave me a dog that I named Tofu. After we spent some time training together, Tofu could herd sheep, hunt for treasure, or hang out with me and play fetch! When I wasn’t busy with my pup, I could let my cat chase after its cat toy, feed ducks at the pond, milk the cows, or play around with some adorable alpacas! The huge focus on animals helps Everdream Valley stand out from all the other farming sims out there.

• Laid-back gameplay. Time does pass in Everdream Valley, but I didn’t feel like I had to watch the clock very closely. There weren’t any strict deadlines that I had to meet, and it wasn’t a big deal if I forgot to water my crops or check on my chickens for a day or two. While my grandpa and grandma were happy to give me quests, they never expected me to complete them right away. Everdream Valley made me feel like a kid with no real responsibilities, which made for a pretty relaxing experience.

• Unique dream sequences. Everdream Valley is a slice-of-life farming game by day, but at night, it takes things in a different direction. After my character went to bed for the night, I had the chance to experience their dreams. During these dreams, I played minigames that put me in the shoes of different animals, including my dog, a wolf, and even a mouse.These sequences only happened when my character was sleeping, but I’d frequently wake up to find rewards that suggested my dreams were more real than they seemed.

• It’s packed with content. Once I got into the swing of things, Everdream Valley essentially became a sandbox game that let me work on all kinds of projects. Over the course of my playthrough, I built myself a treehouse, started a butterfly collection, searched for magpies, and listened to way too many of my grandpa’s puns. There were always story quests for me to tackle, so I had a sense of direction, but if I wanted to chill out and work on my own thing, I could do that for as long as I wanted.

WHAT SUCKS

• Cooking can be frustrating. Everdream Valley let me start cooking right away, but it didn’t give me any recipes. In some games, I can figure out how to make things through trial and error, but when I tried that here, I ended up making inedible sludge. I was able to find a recipe list online, but I would have preferred to figure things out on my own. Making meals in Everdream Valley is really fun, so it’s frustrating that most dishes will end in disaster if you don’t use a guide.

• Awkward controls. I didn’t have any major issues playing Everdream Valley, but there were times when the controls made tasks much harder than they needed to be. I could ride horses and pigs, which is awesome, but it was so much work to mount animals that I usually didn’t bother. Chores like milking cows and shearing sheep were easy enough, but I had to chase animals down before I could get started, which was a pain. The devs have already introduced some improvements, like a magical, animal-summoning flute, so I’m hopeful that most of these issues will be ironed out in the near future.

• It could use more tutorials. Everdream Valley let me do whatever I wanted to do from the start, which was awesome, but that freedom meant I didn’t always know what I was doing. I played for hours before I realized I could move items from my backpack to storage from my inventory screen, and I had to do quite a bit of experimenting before I figured out how to plant trees. I found additional tutorials when I poked around in the in-game menu, and there was never any point where I felt lost, but you might need to check a guide or two as you play.

💬 Will you be living the farm life in Everdream Valley, or are you a city slicker? Share your thoughts in the comments!