I’ll finish the video, but this conversation just feels like a rehash or rediscovery of older conversations. We used to call every shooter “Doom clones” and we used to call every MOBA “Dota Clones” before we developed the names and nuances for the genre. I think people just forget that genres are forged by reinterpretations and remixes of what came before it. All genres have the prototype, the archetype, and then the stereotype, and that’s a sign of good health.
I think it's also worth mentioning that clone didn't used to be an insult. nowadays I'll see someone call something a stardew clone and people act like it was called a rip-off. clone was just an easy way to say what a game plays like.
@@salmence100 yeah that’s totally fair, and I think this video does do a good service for this community to advance the conversation beyond “this game copied that game therefore its lesser.” I was just reflecting on my own time on the internet and having flashbacks to the days of yore lmao
Rougelike, Rougelite, Metroidvania, Soulslike, they're all pretty arbitrary in terms of what conditions needs to be met to be "close enough" to be considered as part of a genre. Genre definers, genre originators, genre progenitors, and genre popularifiers(?), can all be separate instances. STV was, AFAIK, the one that made the Farming Game popular. But the aspects that define farming games is more of an innate thing that all farming games would have regardless. In terms of other traits of a game that can be similar to SDV, it can often cause them to fall under a "SDV, but ______" category. The sort of "why would I place this over SDV?" category. Because that "but _____" needs to be something added, or something removed, but something different. Which brings us to the snag SDV / farming games in particular: mods. SDV is, in many ways, very simple. So if you play SDV and think "but what if ______?", then there's probably a mod for that. Not to say that's all encompassing for the thought process behind these games.
Here is the thing. Yes you can said about Harvest moon is the inspiration for SDV But, no Harvest moon sold 30 Million copies. Even with all their series combine.
Not that having more sale is the point. I also started love playing farming sims because of HM and now I play SDV like an addiction. Gotta start humble.
@@ZenHorakti okay but sales arent what we're talking sbout here, its clear that FoM was made with love, you can see just how much they tried to polish everything and how neatly fit together everything feels so far even as an early access game. Stardew is a love letter to harvest moon and fields of mistria feels like a love letter to stardew valley. Stardew's still gonns be the image of farming sims, probably for years upong years
I feel that Fields of Mistria is more of a love letter to farming games such as Harvest Moon and Stardew Valley than a rip off. Its 80s anime aesthetic and different mechanics (such as bug hunting, archaeology and levelling up system), along with a really well designed dialogue system and NPC functions are so unique in its own way and really make the game feel special.
Good video, but I'd argue pixel art is a medium, not a style. Compare the original XCOM to Super Metroid, or those to modern games like Octopath Traveler, Celeste, or Carrion. These all have wildly different art styles, despite all being pixel art.
Yeah, as someone who does sprite art, its a medium. It shapes your style and how you view things the same way 3D does. 3D allows for more intricate designs while pixel allows for more intention in shape language
I feel like while there are some clear rip offs but things like Fields of Mystria and Moonstone Island each bring something new, adding to what stardew valley added to Harvest Moon/Story of Seasons. I consider ripoffs things that directly copy but don't add to the game they are trying to imitate.
Perhaps someone said this already, but Dreamland Village Life didn't take kickstarter money and run. They cancelled the project (during the funding period) and nobody got charged, there was no money lost.
My only point of contention is that there are so many fantastic Harvest Moon, and then, Story of Seasons games between the first game and Stardew! Animal Parade, Magical Melody, Trio of Towns (just to name a few great ones!). They're real gems that really improved upon the farming sim genre and are still worth playing today imo.
Yeah but they all belong to the same franchise, which I believe is the point here. There are pretty much no other games outside the Harvest Moon/Story of Seasons franchise in this genre before Stardew Valley came along, and that was one of the major points why the creator of SV made it in the first place - he wanted to play Harvest Moon on his PC but it didn't exist. Stardew Valley then went and breath new wind on the whole industry, making even HM/SoS come back with things inspired by SV in them. Of course HM/SoS is the original, that's impossible to deny, but SV is a genre-defining game and changed the gaming industry as a whole. It's very likely that none of the other farming sims we see today would exist without Stardew, just none did before of it regardless of Harvest Moon already existing. To me that's what makes Stardew Valley such an important game for the farming sim genre.
I will admit to the "surely everyone knows by now that Harvest Moon came first?" kneejerk reaction, but usually vidoes like this make a point to clarify that early on
I tend to call the genre "new in town" games, because to me, more important than and other single mechanic is the fact that you're building up from nothing in terms of skills and relationships. I also think the genre relies very heavily on vibes. More than any other kind of game, I'm inclined to write off new in town titles on art style alone. The story and mechanics aren't likely to win me over if I don't fundamentally enjoy just being in the world.
I don’t count what animal crossing added to new horizons as something stardew valley inspired. I see the crops being added as an extension to the crafting system new to this series they implemented into this game. They wanted to get more things to craft but in new ways so it didn’t seem the same as other ways already in the game. And besides, the crops themselves are kind of an extension of how trees and flowers work in AC already, which have been there since the beginning decades ago.
@ryninja5788 Yeah I thought that take was a stretch lmao. Fans of AC had wanted food items to display for a long time, and the harvesting/cooking system just felt like a fun way to implement that with the already-existing crafting system.
i don't think it was stardew valley inspired at all, but there was a wave of "cozy farming" hype going on at the time, and it capitalized off of it. i love the cooking in acnh--the food models are well designed and it's really fun!! but still, you can't deny that it wasn't necessarily unexpected
But it definitely is a neighborvania. With New Horizons having a heavy focus on crafting and decorating, with the farming and cooking being a thing to support both crafting and decorating instead of being a main focus of the game.
I guess for me it doesn't matter. I just want to go and farm and romance people. I have noticed a lot of people say X is Stardew because they've Stardew'ed first. (which is me. I remember my best friend gushing about it and I said and i quote "Why would I want to waste my time doing that?" (enter covid, and a very long illness where all i could mentally handle is farming games and 1180 hours and counting.lll because i love it LOL). There are times where i say "I wish the farming was ala stardew" but there are a lot of times i say I wish stardew was like this game." there is no perfect game, (stardew included) and that's why there are so many versions. beacuse people want. something to scratch that itch. I am still surprised no one has made a farming sim where all the romancable people are 30++ because that's a HUGE chunk of the market.. that's a BIG backlash on games (like stardew, SoS and Rune Factory etc. the fact that they are older now and the marriagables are so young - or seem young are just immature). so. yeah I am happy for all the ripoffs for there is more land to till!
As someone who has loved cozy farming sims ever since I was a child, I love the fact that there are so many new ones coming out! Pardon my language but who gives a crap if not all of them are as „good“ as the ones hailed to be the best in the genre. As long as they are unique in some ways they can still be enjoyable. I dont like all this nitpicky comparing that the gaming community does to farming sims. Edit: I also firmly believe saying Stardew Valley is the blueprint is false. If not for the harvest moon series, stardew valley wouldnt exist as it was a huge inspiration. Game devs only picked up on it because of the huge hype it (deservedly) got at the time and how people seemed to be more open to the genre, but its not the number 1 just for that. That feels wrong imo.
You know, I'm going to admit that while I love the rest of the video, I absolutely disagree on harvestella being a stardew valley clone. I do think it was an attempt to ride the wave of farming games, but I don't think it was *just* that. As someone who finished all but the epilogue dungeon and the well dungeon, you can tell there was genuinely a lot of passion in this game. You can tell care and effort were put in! But you can also tell that no one on the team with any power had played a farming game since the original rune factory. Harvestella genuinely has its own identity and clear vision, but it also feels like they gave it to in-house devs who only knew how to do the RPG part of making games, but not the farming part. I can't say that for some of the genuinely awful or cash-grabby games I've played in the past. If there had been some special 20 dollar DLC content I'd be more likely to agree with you that this was more cash grab than not, but instead I think that it was Square Enix genuinely trying to dip its toes into the water of farming games to find out if it's worth their time to invest in something even bigger. Especially when you look at it compared to all the rest of the non-rpg (and even some of those) games coming out by them. That said? I love literally all of the rest of the video. And I am going to see if I can get neighbourvania to proliferate among my friends because "Cosy farming game" is less fun to say.
Honestly while I do love both games, as a longtime Harvest moon/SOS fan who's had to deal with Stardew fans dismissing all new releases from the series as "ripoffs" (including the remake of AWL, a game which originally released in 2003), watching Stardew fans freak over people praising Fields of Mistria has been great schadenfreude. Like damn there's a group of fans of a new game who are unfairly dismissing an earlier series you really love? That sucks, I can't imagine what that's like.
Genuinely brings me joy to see them in dismay after how they've disrespected us. Too bad they can't even argue they actually have the better game tho lol
as an avid stardew fan (well over 4000 hours lol) i never understood the hate towards other farming games, especially harvest moon. like i get it if you just prefer stardew over other farming games but just because a game comes out with farming and npcs you can build relationships with doesn’t mean it’s a ripoff. i can’t imagine how devilishly good you feel with the unwarranted stardew hate lol
tbh I think modern copyright law has done terrible things to the way we perceive ideas and ownership of those ideas. Think of how we related to fairytales 200 years ago. No-one was going to call you a rip-off hack for telling your own version of a fairy story with your own embellishments to suit how you liked it. No-one claimed they told a fairytale first. In practice, that's not how ideas work. Originally, copyright laws were supposed to maintain that idea, while giving creators enough time to profit fairly from their work before it was released to the public domain. Now, ownership of an idea is ZEALOUS. Bodies fight tooth and nail to hold onto creative control of a work for decades, and though artists absolutely should profit fairly from their works, even in circumstances where neither money nor reknown are on the line, people are still just as possessive against potential copycats. It's a deeply unhealthy and anti-creative mentality, and the system itself does far more for large corporations than it does for smaller independent creators. We have got to find new ways to suitably compensate artists for their work, in order to facilitate a move away from the ownership of ideas.
I haven't watched the video yet, but I will say I think fields of mistria is an incredible game. It's just different enough from stardew to be enjoyable without straying too far from what I like about it
The nintendo direct thing is really funny to me. I think it definitely put the phenomenon on to people radars. On the other hand Considering that two of the titles were remakes of Story of Season/Harvest Moon games (Rune Factory is a spinoff of Story of Seasons, for those who don't know), and one was the next entry in the Atelier series. I don't know much about the other games that were announced, but it's very funny to me that this big thing that made people start talking more about Stardew Valley ripoffs contained 3 games that were so far from being that.
Lukewarm take, I'd still be playing SoS - Sunshine Isle if it got free updates making it better every so often. The best thing to ever happen to Stardew is that ConcernedApe never made a Stardew Valley 2.
Nice summary of the "problem", but I have to ask, what does Atelier Ryza have to do with it? That can hardly be likened with a neighbuorvania? And the Atelier series goes back as long as Harvest moon if I not misstaken.
@@salmence100 The problem is that you specifically mentioned it with the cash grabs without any followup disclaimer like you did for Fae Farm. It's another entry in the Atelier series. They're alchemy games. Of course there's going to be a gardening element to them. There were no changes or additions that would suggest an attempt to capitalize on Stardew's success. It just feels like a lack of due diligence, because your lack of clarification means that a viewer who is not familiar with the Atelier games is going to come away from this video with the impression that Atelier Ryza 3 falls into that cash grab territory. You could have very easily just not mentioned it in this video.
The term I've heard and used myself is "Farming Life Sim." These are kind of a loose fusion of both the Life Sim genre and being a farming simulator, but lighter on the overall mechanics that would put games like Stardew Valley actually into either category. This in turn makes these a more appealing alternative for those who find playing a full on Life Sim like, well, "The Sims" or an actual farming simulator incredibly tedious and boring.
If anything for single player games, what could kill it is another game that most people would think of first. If someone ask me for a relaxing farming game, I think Stardew first. If asked for another I've played a Harvest Moon (one on the Switch can't remember the name), or Sun Haven. I still recommend other games too, but Stardew is first to mind.
I believe that Neighborvania can describe more than just farming games. There are a lot now games where main focus can be on any kind of stuff. Like alchemy, smithing, shop or restaurant ownership etc. And s lot of them can be united in the case that they are about doing it in some sort of society, being part of neighborhood so to say
Please lord, don't let the player base of Journey ever die! I've played a few too many of these by now to mention. Fae Farm was just OK to me, I think I liked Harvestella slightly more, but I didn't "finish" either of them. Wylde Flowers was the most pleasant surprise, but well crap, didn't finish that one either. Sun Haven has been the most tempting one that I haven't tried. As for Mistria, it's gonna be huge and I'm here for it. Not having to worry about when shops are open? Be still my beating heart.
I believe it's really the age of the community that insists on this being a "problem". Not the age of the player base but with the bulk of the games coming in after 2016 the community is still young and subsequently will claim everything is a rip-off for a long while yet. There were years and years of FFPS called Doom rip offs and MOBAs Dota rip offs. But you've also got to recognise that Souls-like is it's own genre now and every deck builder is a "rip off" of the boardgame Dominion. Stardew gets to take its seat in history with Harvest Moon and Story of Seasons as pioneers of this genre. New games can come out and you can compare them to your fav game but immediately shutting it down for being a rip off because it's the same genre is a childish take.
First isn't always best. There's a reason "X invented a thing Y perfected it" is a cliche. Stardew is the standard in the sense that it's the reference point people measure other games against.
@@evilgeniusha01 I guess it's just my nostalgia or boomer take. I grew up with Harvest Moon: Friends of Mineral Town and played that so much as a kid and other installments of the series (not the current crappy pay 2 win ones though. The Story of Seasons installments). Don't get me wrong, I love Stardew as well and Fields of Mistria is just as enjoyable.
the reason people compare it to Stardew is 'cause that's what most people know as the standard now. Stardew was inspired by HM but these new ones are inspired by Stardew, so it makes more sense to compare to that. like, I always see someone mention the originals but I never see people talking about the new Harvest Moon or Story of Seasons games.
@evilgeniusha01 Harvest Moon did it really well, Stardew Valley is just the most famous currently. Your argument is no different from saying that Undertale perfected the "Earthbound formula", which is a ridiculous and nonsensical oversimplification. The thing is that farming games as we know would exist without Stardew Valley, but not without Harvest Moon.
IIRC, the Harvest Moon vs Story of Seasons thing is due to Natsume, who localized the older HM games, holding onto the name rights after some kind of split. (I'm not invested enough to google it for a youtube comment, just remember something along those lines.) Since HMDS Cute was my intro to the genre, I refer to them as anime farm sims lol. I used to call them my guilty pleasure, but Stardew has been my main game for a while now so I think it's well beyond that level lol.
I think I prefer the term "Slice of life game" myself. Neighborvania just doesn't roll of the tounge as easily (maybe because I ain't a native English speaker?). There is always a discussion about if a game is a clone, inspired by or just generally in the same genre and I don't think we should use "clone" too often. Clone implies it is a cashgrab, trying to get a piece of the pie from a successful games and those games tend to be pretty soulless. Mistria is heavily inspired by SDV, that is clear but I think they put in a bit too much effort into it for it just being a clone. I am not so sure it can sell more then 30 million copies like Stardew though, but Stardew really had no competition at release and it came out at the perfect time so I have my doubts if any similar games actually can beat in in sales. Stardew also have another advantage: It is a game about escaping the stress of modern life to settle down in a small town and becoming a farmer. I think many people have fantasized about doing just that so it is a theme anyone can understand and see themselves in. A fantasy adventurer settling down in a small town is less general. On the other hand, Mistria do add more customization to your house which certainly have a lot of fans. Personally, I think it's biggest weakness is that all the NPC have anime styled portraits while the player only have the chibi character they walk around with. I hope they add that because the character portraits are rather good, they should have the character creation system focus on that instead and just simplify it for the walking sprite.
I feel like this video topic is important for this genre of games (Neighborvania) because it is so tiering to just hear "xyz is a clone/dupe/ripoff" when folks don't understand it is a GENRE. great job!
@@safetyboots come on, I acknowledge and appreciate Harvest moon for basically kickstarting an entire genre, but let's be honest, Stardew Valley has objectively surpassed Harvest Moon and is definitely the standard that other farming games are compared to. Like it's not even close
@leonidesbabanto1585 Stardew Valley being better doesn't mean it set the standard. Besides, Stardew Valley doesn't implement anything groundbreaking to the genre, it only improves on the foundations laid out by Harvest Moon. You could say that Stardew Valley is the new industry standard, but that's not what we're talking about. Every new game on this genre is following the steps of Harvest Moon.
Stardew didn't set the "standard." Stardew didn't implement anything that can't be found in the Harvest Moon games made before it besides maybe the combat system. Even then Rune Factory was still made way before Stardew Valley. Play Harvest Moon Friends of Mineral Town or DS and you can totally see where all of Stardew's roots (heh) came from.
The Stardew Valley discourse over the last near-decade has really completed my transformation into an old head. I love STV for expanding the genre beyond Marvelous' niche. But the monkey's paw curls because the fans that came along with STV's success are often extremely dismissive of the history of the genre. And if I were not an old head, I'd ignore it but it bugs me that STV is the standard for the genre the STV set of mechanics have become the standard set. And we never get more modern interpretations of like romantic rivals, robust family life, etc. I just think that's a bit sad.
This video would be better without the Harvest Moon/Story of Seasons disrespect. I understand that this isn't a "History of farming games" video, but that is a big oversimplification of HM's legacy, as if they only ever made one kind of game. Yes, they're all farming games/neighborvania, but if you erased the names and references I bet most people would think they're made by entirely different people. Because they are, they just happen to come from the same company and can be lumped together because of it and the "farming game" concept, yet at the same time they can all very extremely different.
All these farming games so far, have not yet beaten either Harvest Moon Hero of Leaf Valley, HM Back to Nature or Stardew Valley, for me yet. Also calling out Atelier games is owning to the fact you never played an Atelier game, they are magical.
I haven't watched the video yet, but I will say I think fields of mistria is an incredible game. It's just different enough from stardew to be enjoyable without straying too far from what I like about it
Neighborvania sounds horribly inaccurate. I want to fight Dracula with a shovel before I consider it as such. More seriously, I have a more important distinction: Which games let you ACTUALLY SAVE IN THE MIDDLE OF A DAY and not have to fully commit to that day to save. And yes, Stardew is included on the negative side here because you need a mod for that. Rune Factory lets me and that's one BIG reason it's my go-to for these games.
You can quit in the middle of the day and keep your progress in Sun Haven too! It loads you back to the farm of the area you were at. Little anecdote; I just started a new Stardew file and almost closed midday once cause I got used to doing it in my latest Sun Haven game lol
As a kid, I always wanted more games like my beloved Harvest Moons. Now that Stardew Valley has expanded the genre, I now have my pick of games that bring me joy. I do definitely think that some of them were or are money grabs, especially the "New" Harvest Moons, but I am seeing more effort being put into those so maybe there is hope. But it makes me happy that if I want to chill, I can pick up Fields of Mistria, if I want some fantasy, I default to Sun Haven, if I want some monster taming, I go to Re:Legend and when I want to actually have the opportunity to play as my farmer's child, Echoes of Plum Grove has me covered. And all four of these have turn into comfort games for me right alongside Stardew and my old Harvest Moons. These games bring me joy and I am so happy to see the genre thriving!
RUNE FACTORY MENTIONED 🎉🎉🎉 anyway, i think its just because this is a very small genre. imo it's best compared to something like soulslikes, all taking much of the structure from a few games and trying to turn it into something new. sekiro plays way different from elden ring plays way different from lies of p, and like the farming sims. a lot of importance is in the details too. learning the world... and there is quite some diversity within the niche here even.. i've played a 'farming sim' without any farming, even! (i can't remember the name, i'll have to tell later)
I don't think it's fair to lump Animal Crossing in with the thesis statement for this video, as it's largely its own thing. It is true that more recent additions to the mechanics of the Animal Crossing franchise, like crafting, cooking, and farming, were almost certainly a response to the booming popularity of Stardew Valley, but those mechanics hardly make up the core identity of the franchise. They're hardly even the elements that I think of first when I think of the series, and certainly aren't what I'm turning to the game for. Animal Crossing has a very unique charm to its social mechanics and town building that I don't quite think is replicable by Stardew or its kin, and that vibe has been consistent across the franchise since 2001. It is, in my opinion, what makes Animal Crossing special
Great video! I like the bit about that everyone will have their favorites and that's a good thing. I know Traveller's Rest has gotten a ton of accusations of being an imitation, but I love that game for such different reasons than I love SDV.
Any game that popularizes or revolutionizes a genre gets this kind of treatment. Any monster collection game is considered a Pokemon ripoff, leaving *actual* ripoffs like Palworld less scrutinized than something inherently different like Digimon. The Metroidvania name being what it is implies that all other games are clones of Metroid and Castlevania. Survivors-Style comes from Vampire Survivors (though sometimes it's also called bullet heaven). All bullet hells are Touhou. All farming games are Stardew Valley or Harvest Moon: Friends of Mineral Town. You have Soulslikes. You have Roguelikes. You have Magic or YGO clones, even. It's more a mark of a game's success when these comments start popping up than it is a mark of people chasing money, though there's plenty of that too.
Because before SDV, all Harvest Moon game so hard to get at least... 1 Million copy sold Then, SDV is 30 mil sold. People never ever think farming game can be that popular.
The whole thing with games that dont have heart and just chase the money is something thats really annoyed me for awhile, its gotten to the point where a vast majority of games i play are indie games cause most AAA games just dont have any heart anymore. Even if i dont like a game after playing it if i can tell the devs were passionate about it i have a very hard time hating it, but the games that are unapologetically bad and lack any passion just upset me.
The video makes a lot of good points but there's a lot of stuff just swept under the rug. To say harvest moon (and by extension story of seasons) should be left out of the conversation is like saying the original AC had no affect whatsoever on today's rise of "cozy" games. Along with that, the vegetables in AC was an extension of the fruit and flowers system that had been there since the beginning in 2001. They didn't sporadically update ACNH with crops either, it's been documented that crops has always been part of ACNH's code since release and during 2020 the game had already been doing monthly updates that added in content like swimming or the art part of the museum.
I think these comparisons/rip off claims also come because of people classifying all of these games as "cozy games" and then getting frustrated when a lot have similar mechanics as if they arent in the same genre. I agree as you said many of the mechanics are key pieces to the genre. I dont like the cozy gamification of sims as any game is a cozy game for someone. Ori and the Blind forest is a cozy game for me, so is Hades. (This is stemming from seeing people complain that all "cozy games" have is farming and fishing and then they only spoke about SD, FoM, and HM which is greatly reducing what these games have to offer like they didnt buy a farming sim)
I'm assuming your timeline is only showing the first entry of each series of games, but you showed it as if to say "harvest moon shouldn't be considered in the same realm as Stardew because it was released so long ago" but there have been at least 20 different Harvest Moon games and 2 Story of Seasons games (which are the same series as Harvest Moon, just with a different title) before Stardew was even released. And the third Story of Seasons was released just a few months after Stardew. Just wanted to put this here because the timeline you showed wasn't really an accurate depiction of how the farm sim genre evolved over time leading up to Stardew.
Pfft, I felt like Stardew is a ripoff of Harvest Moon when it first came out. In time i found that it has some original ideas and solutions, but the bare bones of it is the same as Harvest Moon.
i was skimming through the video and then i saw doki doki literature club?? i was so confused (what does ddlc have to do with stardew and farming games) til i got to that part of the video.
Because most people are completely ignorant of history and think the first thing they saw in a genre must have the orgin. Diesnt matter if Harvest moon and its derivitives are old as dirt. It doesn't matter if Concerned Ape flat outnsaid he was inspired by them a suprising number of people are just incapable of recognizing the world didnt start with there birth.
Great analysis! I like the neighbourvania term to discuss the genre. I feel like a lot of the criticism on these games is also influenced by a light side of misogyny: “oh another farming game that’s not for REAL gamers but just for little girls”. As if your seventh first person shooter game is massively different from the first six 😂
I’m not sure why some people fuss over the fact that a lot more people are making farming life sims these days … If you don’t want to play it, then don’t. I love the genre and there can’t ever be enough of them because I will eventually play them all as long as they good! I was so tired of waiting back in the day for a new harvest moon game to come out because that was the only of its kind back then. And I agree, sometimes new games can try to be too different and end up making a worse game for it.
Octopath travelers reference my Sals a gamer, but might I recommend the 8 playable character GRAND DADDY Romancing SaGa Minstrel Song. The original came out on the nes as sprites, got a remaster on the PS2 in full 3D that was banned in the US for reasons, and true to their word Square said they would take excess money made from FF14 and remaster their lesser successful titles and they delivered there is a full PC remaster of this game on steam $25 USD.
i mean, if most of them didn't have the exact same artstyle and gameplay, it wouldn't be as much of an issue. There's a lot of room to change things around, even when doing pixel art. They don't all have to be dating sims either.
In Indonesia, Harvest Moon: Back to Nature was so popular until this day, due to its became the first game that got localized to Indonesia. So, when Stardew Valley was start to get attention in 2016-2017. A lot of people's call it Harvest Moon copycat, but they were shock when they saw the combat mechanic
If it wasn't for crash issues, I might have moved on from Stardew to Coral Island. Of all the follow-ups, it seems to have kept the stuff that works and expanded the stuff that CA probably couldn't have made on its own. It feels both bigger and broader, a natural evolution of a classic. But...the crashes.
I agree! It's all about intention. If someone says "I want to make a farming game" and takes inspiration from Stardew Valley, then that's fine. If someone says "I want to make Stardew Valley", then it's a ripoff.
I really enjoyed Travellers’ Rest, there’s the Stardew element of growing ingredients, cooking/brewing with your ingredients and serving the townspeople. The pub also gets an adorable cat.
Critter Cove showed up in the video for, like, a second, so I'm here to tell all furries (and honestly anyone who wants to mess with a good character creator) PLEASE check out the demo. So good
People who are saying shit like "Harvest Moon walked so Stardew Valley could run and become the standard" has obviously not played enough Harvest Moon/Story of Seasons games. Stardew Valley has clear direct inspirations coming from Friends of Mineral Town and DS. (And the entire series, but I mostly see it in those games.)
These are not rip offs these are just more of the same ingredients mixed into new meals that i can eat again and again I get more of what i love in a new package
less than a minute ago im guessing there's a lot of stardew valley games because they are relaxing and people enjoy turning off their brain while gaming and also developers want a slice of the stardew pie and they view making farming games as easy i hope i am correct in this prediction edit; okay my prediction was COMPLETELY wrong!! this video was not what i thought it'd be and i am embarrassed for commenting this now with how the video actually was but this has changed my outlook on what i view as a "generic farming game" / "omg such cool not generic farming game". neighborvania is such a cool word aswell?? like my god i want this word to become widely used,, that ending tie in to pokemon was also an amazing parallel omg
The sooner we can get rid of the "Stardew Valley ripoff" garbage the better. And no, I will still call Stardew a "Story of Seasons ripoff" if we're using the word ripoff. The good things in Stardew are the Story of Seasons parts. And no, ACNH did not copy because ACNH actually has focus and plays what it does very well. Story of Seasons a New Beginning has crafting, arranging buildings, different ways to farm, some online multiple functionality, etc. that was way before Stardew. Idk how A New Beginning is considered "empty", I think its more focused. Rune Factory (also by Marvelous) implemented a lot of cool things to go with the farming and combat, the first game has farming monsters and camping in dungeons. I didn't really care for Rune Factory and kinda wrote it off since the NDS but it apparently got really good with soil mechanics and stuff, so I'm buying Rune Factory games on Switch. Stardew's dungeons don't really feel like I should care about, its very separated from farming. I'm not going to look forward to the farming sim genre if we keep using the "Stardew Valley ripoff" garbage because the direction of Stardew feels very unfocused. I love farming games like Story of Seasons and Farming Simulator (and Animal Crossing since apparently we're talking about it), I don't like the farming sim genre direction for a lot of current games. Farming Simulator = (realistic) farming genre. Story of Seasons = farming sim genre. We should stop calling it Stardew ripoffs, farming sim is a better word that explains it. Do we really want to be the Doom Clones, Soulslike, Metroidvania crowd when we already have a word? I still call MOBA games as MOBA, not League of Legends even tho thats the MOBA game I like. Pokemon Unite BARELY plays like LoL yet people still call it Pokemon League of Legends. Comparisons works better when the people are more knowledgeable about the games in the genre, otherwise it just sounds confusing, I will just have to assume you mean farm sim. I think the best thing that came out of Stardew is that farming games are cheaper now...and same sex marriage. The rest feels very detrimental. Neighborvania also has zero traction on Google, so I doubt I would use that word unless it becomes used more. -Vania tho...what is that suffix? Its from Transylvania for Castlevania. Okay...Its wood, forest or land. Well, finding that out was more interesting than hearing about Stardew "ripoffs". People just use the words "cozy games" instead. Does cozy games really paint a clear picture? Not really, but I prefer it over Stardew Valley ripoff.
Forgive me if this has already been brought up, but I feel the need to mention “Harvest Moon” is not Harvest moon anymore in Jp it’s “Bokujou Monogatari” (ranch story) and was localized under the name “harvest moon” but people who make the actual hm/bm games got a new localization team and “harvest moon” is now “story of seasons” the original localization team just owns tye rights to the harvest moon name and any new hm games are not made by the original team
Really enjoyed this breakdown! I fully agree with your emphasis on the intent behind the game. And I will now be applying the idea of "every Pokémon is someone's favorite Pokémon" to so many contexts 😄
Harvest Moon is no longer owned by the people who originally developed the game. It's a lot of copyright issues and an American company stealing the name. Story of Seasons games are the real Harvest Moon games. So that is why you see them making crappy games now. Also surprised to see a lack of Palia on your list. It's another great additional to the genre.
Nah, the -vania comes from Castlevania, it's not just a thing you slap on genre names. You wanna make a portmanteau for the genre it should be like Harvestdew or something.
It makes literally no sense. There's absolutely nothing even remotely related to Castlevania in these games, whatever straw you can grasp at can be attributed to pretty much every video game ever.
It comes from a previous portmanteau of “Metroidvania”, much as Sal said in the video. Sure, it effectively drops the Metroid part out of it, but the term is used so much enough beyond those two franchises at this point that any portmanteau of ‘Metroid-something’ or ‘something-vania’ is probably a reference to a genre of non-linear game.
i feel like you can really tell when a game isn't just a "ripoff". it doesn't get talked about as much, it doesn't stay in the spotlight for very long. mistria? inspired but lives in its own world despite the similarities. idk you can just tell when ANY game was made with care vs greed imo and mistria easily passes the bar with the character interactions alone.
it's almost like games in the same genres have similar features! *le gasp* in all honesty, i just roll my eyes at these type of comments. stardew valley was not the original but that doesn't mean that it's impact is any less. considering the gap between that you mentioned in your timeline, it might as well have become an original since it was a successful reimagining. also, what's wrong with different but similar farming games??? that's the whole point of the algorithms showing you other "similar" games that you might enjoy since you've played "X" game. it's like finishing a song/book/show/movie that you really enjoyed and you want more of the same stuff but different since you don't want to just rewatch the same show again just now. some people act as if you can only every play one game exclusively. this is not in reference to those who can only afford one game. you know what the first thing i did with my adult money when i graduated and got my first full time job? i bought a switch for myself and went to town playing all kinds of games on it. did i also download stardew on it and play it religiously? yes, but that's besides the point. i see this across all kinds of media. as an avid bookworm, i went through a period where i exclusively read any and all reimagined brothers' grimm fairy tales. there's nothing wrong with taking inspiration from an existing piece of work to create your own. that's how innovation and creativity works. another example: i dabble in gacha games but i play genshin impact exclusively just because it's the one i've put the most hours into. there was another game called Wuthering Waves that came out this year in May. MANY people called it the "genshin killer". as if a new IP from a much smaller company (compared to mihoyo) could "kill" a game that has 60+ million active players and has been highly successful in the past 4 years it's been live smh. If anything, the only thing that will kill genshin itself is the amount of controversies the community creates for itself 🤦♀. anyway, just let people play whatever they want and stop gatekeeping games; games are meant to be played by those who enjoy them.
I’ve been seeing an absolutely crazy push in the opposite direction to overcorrect and claim that “Fields of Mistria is NOT like Stardew Valley” and it’s just so divorced from reality I can’t even
I feel like the Neighborvania that I’ve liked the most recently is Coral Island, because it has several of those necessary variations but also keeps the same energy as Stardew. The setting is super fleshed out, diving adds a lot of new routes for gameplay, and the art style is focused but different from Stardew. I feel likely for me to enjoy a new game that’s so similar to Stardew, I need at least a few intentional changes from the baseline (just talking about modern Neighborvanias).
ppl calling fields of mistria too similar to stardew are ignoring Stardew's origin as something that began with Concerned Apes origin as a harvest moon fan. As a Harvest Moon fan, I was ecstatic when I first played Stardew Valley. I feel the same way about Fields of Mistria
My one thing with Stardew Valley inspired games that I wish wasn't true is how often they make their dungeons mines. Both Mistria and Coral Island have their main dungeons just be mines. I loved Moonstone Islands little dungeons, and growing up I loved Rune Factory's dungeons. Rune Factory Frontier had you climb a giant beanstalk to the back of a giant whale! I wish we had more creative places to explore and fight.
I honestly feel like sometimes we have brilliant one-of-a-kind games pop up that spawn a whole new genre and everything after that is considered a rip-off.
I clicked on this video already 100% agreeing with it, lol. I just wanted to hear more neighborvania games mentioned because I’ve played SDV for thousands of hours and want a new one, haha. Mistria looks good, but it’s still early access! And Coral Island is, according to my kickstarter backer friend, still in the process of incorporating promises it made during the kickstarter. I might be interested in Fae Farm, but that’s a huge price tag, so I don’t want to commit without being sure I’ll love it. If anyone reading this has a neighborvania they’re passionate about, do share…!
i'd be a lot happier if it wasnt for the bare bones lighting models and bland models used for the 3d games (makes them look like low budget unity prototypes) and the washed out color palette with sprite art that just always looks out of place and unfinished. Exaggerated proportions on characters to try and mask a lack of creative vision (just look at the 3 Mii-Ripoff characters, the "disney movie background character" faces, just from this video alone). as you said, inspiration is ok. but there is a lot of trend chasing going on.
If I'm honest i think calling them neighborvanias kinda sucks. I feel like it's somehow less intuitive than metroidvania. I've been calling them resource management games, because of the diverse game systems. But i understand why that name pops up, my description is too vague and doesn't point to the town aspect of the game. I guess i just don't vibe with neighborvania :/
Easy explanation for why it took so long for something like Stardew Valley to appear after basically only Harvest Moon/Story of Seasons and Rune Factory existing: the genre was so extremely niche that no one else saw profit in it. We had to wait for the kids who love the old HM games to grow up and get into game development. Then Stardew released and showed that people not only still enjoy farming games but can actually make them all on their own AND make lots of money. And boom, you suddenly have a thriving niche. Most of the games that release now are still very much inspired by Harvest Moon but take modern ideas from Stardew.
2:10 yeah I’m sick of people calling games stardew ripoffs when those games barely have farming in them! And as someone who enjoyed harvestella, I agree the farming was obviously just tacked on because of the popularity of farming games. The way they marketed the game that way too showed the devs wanted to tap into this player base. But as a jrpg I still enjoyed it for what it was. Not sure I agree about rf3s in that list tho bc it’s just a remake/remaster (sry keep forgetting which one) of an older game much before stardew. I guess you could say the fact that they’re releasing it as a special in this time could be bc of greed but idk there have been a lot of games getting released on more modern platforms too. It makes their game more accessible so I don’t really see it in a negative light. But I could just be biased bc I’m a rf fan.
Harvestella is a beautiful RPG, and I feel like it should have stayed just a MMO RPG. I bought the game secondhand in December of 2022, and I loved the characters, the beautiful world, the interesting characters, and everything the game has to offer. Minus the farming...honest to God I forgot about it's farming mechanic because I was so much more entranced with its dungeons and story, that I completely forgot about the like doomsday storm thing that comes at the end of every season. I think the game could have benefited much more from either sizing down it's farming mechanics, or axing them entirely
I think you hit the nail on the head for as to why I’m always very skeptical of Natsume’s Harvest Moon games. It’s always rubbed me the wrong way that since the split up it was the OG Harvest Moon that has to be renamed to Story of Seasons while Natsume just continued to use the name. It always felt as it was trying to immature what made SoS so popular and would ‘coincidentally’ release around the same time as a new SoS game, tricking those who were unaware of the split. Like with any genre Neighborvania’s are gonna have its ups and downs, but we need to let people experience while still using the same sets of mechanics. Some you may enjoy (I personally loved FaeFarm due to its simplicity) and some you may not (I personally cannot get into Stardew cause it stresses me out) and that’s totally okay
BTW, if you enjoyed playing Stardew Valley, you will prob like Sun Haven as well. Well not as polished as Stardew Valley, its very similar but has its own twist to the gameplay. me and my buddies weren't sure about playing the game but after sinking in like couple hours, we were having so much fun!
First came Harvest Moon, then came Rune Factory, then came the budget Harvest Moon titles from Natsume, then came Story of Seasons, then came Stardew valley. Then came everything else.. I think that is how it went. When you have innovation, you will have copy cats, but you will also have competition as well, which is needed for a market to be healthy.. Nobody wants to be in a market where one company owns everything, because that is a monopoly, and as I recall, monopolies are actually illegal, because it violates anti-trust laws. That is why the western market allows for so called, "copy cats, and rip offs", it's because they keep competition in the market, and keep monopolies from forming, not to mention keeping the price for goods honest..
I’ll finish the video, but this conversation just feels like a rehash or rediscovery of older conversations. We used to call every shooter “Doom clones” and we used to call every MOBA “Dota Clones” before we developed the names and nuances for the genre. I think people just forget that genres are forged by reinterpretations and remixes of what came before it.
All genres have the prototype, the archetype, and then the stereotype, and that’s a sign of good health.
That did come to mind, the genres are just so different that the same conversation needs to be had with a different audience
I think it's also worth mentioning that clone didn't used to be an insult. nowadays I'll see someone call something a stardew clone and people act like it was called a rip-off. clone was just an easy way to say what a game plays like.
@@salmence100 yeah that’s totally fair, and I think this video does do a good service for this community to advance the conversation beyond “this game copied that game therefore its lesser.”
I was just reflecting on my own time on the internet and having flashbacks to the days of yore lmao
Doom is just Doom idc about it.
Rougelike, Rougelite, Metroidvania, Soulslike, they're all pretty arbitrary in terms of what conditions needs to be met to be "close enough" to be considered as part of a genre.
Genre definers, genre originators, genre progenitors, and genre popularifiers(?), can all be separate instances.
STV was, AFAIK, the one that made the Farming Game popular.
But the aspects that define farming games is more of an innate thing that all farming games would have regardless.
In terms of other traits of a game that can be similar to SDV, it can often cause them to fall under a "SDV, but ______" category. The sort of "why would I place this over SDV?" category. Because that "but _____" needs to be something added, or something removed, but something different.
Which brings us to the snag SDV / farming games in particular: mods.
SDV is, in many ways, very simple. So if you play SDV and think "but what if ______?", then there's probably a mod for that.
Not to say that's all encompassing for the thought process behind these games.
Stardew revitalized the farming Sim genre. It's not different than any other hit bringing a genre back into focus
spot on!!
Bro Fields of Mistria is to Stardew what Stardew is to Harvest Moon. I love both games!
agreed! you can tell it's a love letter to Stardew like Stardew was to Harvest Moon and that's beatiful!
Here is the thing.
Yes you can said about Harvest moon is the inspiration for SDV
But, no Harvest moon sold 30 Million copies. Even with all their series combine.
100% agree
Not that having more sale is the point. I also started love playing farming sims because of HM and now I play SDV like an addiction. Gotta start humble.
@@ZenHorakti okay but sales arent what we're talking sbout here, its clear that FoM was made with love, you can see just how much they tried to polish everything and how neatly fit together everything feels so far even as an early access game. Stardew is a love letter to harvest moon and fields of mistria feels like a love letter to stardew valley.
Stardew's still gonns be the image of farming sims, probably for years upong years
I feel that Fields of Mistria is more of a love letter to farming games such as Harvest Moon and Stardew Valley than a rip off. Its 80s anime aesthetic and different mechanics (such as bug hunting, archaeology and levelling up system), along with a really well designed dialogue system and NPC functions are so unique in its own way and really make the game feel special.
Omg I like that game Fields of Mistera
Me too! I agree with you @jaffiaguy9991
Good video, but I'd argue pixel art is a medium, not a style. Compare the original XCOM to Super Metroid, or those to modern games like Octopath Traveler, Celeste, or Carrion. These all have wildly different art styles, despite all being pixel art.
Yeah, as someone who does sprite art, its a medium.
It shapes your style and how you view things the same way 3D does. 3D allows for more intricate designs while pixel allows for more intention in shape language
I feel like while there are some clear rip offs but things like Fields of Mystria and Moonstone Island each bring something new, adding to what stardew valley added to Harvest Moon/Story of Seasons. I consider ripoffs things that directly copy but don't add to the game they are trying to imitate.
Perhaps someone said this already, but Dreamland Village Life didn't take kickstarter money and run. They cancelled the project (during the funding period) and nobody got charged, there was no money lost.
My only point of contention is that there are so many fantastic Harvest Moon, and then, Story of Seasons games between the first game and Stardew! Animal Parade, Magical Melody, Trio of Towns (just to name a few great ones!). They're real gems that really improved upon the farming sim genre and are still worth playing today imo.
Yeah but they all belong to the same franchise, which I believe is the point here. There are pretty much no other games outside the Harvest Moon/Story of Seasons franchise in this genre before Stardew Valley came along, and that was one of the major points why the creator of SV made it in the first place - he wanted to play Harvest Moon on his PC but it didn't exist. Stardew Valley then went and breath new wind on the whole industry, making even HM/SoS come back with things inspired by SV in them.
Of course HM/SoS is the original, that's impossible to deny, but SV is a genre-defining game and changed the gaming industry as a whole. It's very likely that none of the other farming sims we see today would exist without Stardew, just none did before of it regardless of Harvest Moon already existing. To me that's what makes Stardew Valley such an important game for the farming sim genre.
How can you not put friends of mineral town in your list of great HM games? :O ;)
Lmao that thumbnail is gonna grab so many rage bait viewers
had to click when i saw animal crossing
I will admit to the "surely everyone knows by now that Harvest Moon came first?" kneejerk reaction, but usually vidoes like this make a point to clarify that early on
@@m.ceniza4688same 😭
It got me but then I was like wait maybe this is to go AGAINST that and I am glad to findout it did!
I tend to call the genre "new in town" games, because to me, more important than and other single mechanic is the fact that you're building up from nothing in terms of skills and relationships. I also think the genre relies very heavily on vibes. More than any other kind of game, I'm inclined to write off new in town titles on art style alone. The story and mechanics aren't likely to win me over if I don't fundamentally enjoy just being in the world.
*Love* this specific classification of genre, definitely adding it to my vocabulary
I don’t count what animal crossing added to new horizons as something stardew valley inspired. I see the crops being added as an extension to the crafting system new to this series they implemented into this game. They wanted to get more things to craft but in new ways so it didn’t seem the same as other ways already in the game. And besides, the crops themselves are kind of an extension of how trees and flowers work in AC already, which have been there since the beginning decades ago.
@ryninja5788 Yeah I thought that take was a stretch lmao. Fans of AC had wanted food items to display for a long time, and the harvesting/cooking system just felt like a fun way to implement that with the already-existing crafting system.
And an entire parade of farming games on N. Direct (don't sue me) the very next year is a coincidence.
i don't think it was stardew valley inspired at all, but there was a wave of "cozy farming" hype going on at the time, and it capitalized off of it. i love the cooking in acnh--the food models are well designed and it's really fun!! but still, you can't deny that it wasn't necessarily unexpected
Oh it absolutely was.
But it definitely is a neighborvania. With New Horizons having a heavy focus on crafting and decorating, with the farming and cooking being a thing to support both crafting and decorating instead of being a main focus of the game.
New gaming vocabulary has been added to my lexicon, Neighborvania, thank you Salmence
Yea I really like that as a name for it. It feels right.
It's a terrible name that doesn't make sense. Even the vague "cozy games" handle is better.
@@safetyboots Fr, that's gotta be the worse made up genre name I've ever heard lol
It so funny seeing this reply section be 50-50 split on the name at the time of me writing this comment section.
I break the tie and say I like neighborvania more than cozy game.
Edit:
13:45 Salmence about the word
In the end, calling (the majority of) these games ripoffs is the re4l rip-off in the end
I guess for me it doesn't matter. I just want to go and farm and romance people. I have noticed a lot of people say X is Stardew because they've Stardew'ed first. (which is me. I remember my best friend gushing about it and I said and i quote "Why would I want to waste my time doing that?" (enter covid, and a very long illness where all i could mentally handle is farming games and 1180 hours and counting.lll because i love it LOL).
There are times where i say "I wish the farming was ala stardew" but there are a lot of times i say I wish stardew was like this game." there is no perfect game, (stardew included) and that's why there are so many versions. beacuse people want. something to scratch that itch. I am still surprised no one has made a farming sim where all the romancable people are 30++ because that's a HUGE chunk of the market.. that's a BIG backlash on games (like stardew, SoS and Rune Factory etc. the fact that they are older now and the marriagables are so young - or seem young are just immature). so. yeah I am happy for all the ripoffs for there is more land to till!
As someone who has loved cozy farming sims ever since I was a child, I love the fact that there are so many new ones coming out! Pardon my language but who gives a crap if not all of them are as „good“ as the ones hailed to be the best in the genre. As long as they are unique in some ways they can still be enjoyable. I dont like all this nitpicky comparing that the gaming community does to farming sims. Edit: I also firmly believe saying Stardew Valley is the blueprint is false. If not for the harvest moon series, stardew valley wouldnt exist as it was a huge inspiration. Game devs only picked up on it because of the huge hype it (deservedly) got at the time and how people seemed to be more open to the genre, but its not the number 1 just for that. That feels wrong imo.
You know, I'm going to admit that while I love the rest of the video, I absolutely disagree on harvestella being a stardew valley clone. I do think it was an attempt to ride the wave of farming games, but I don't think it was *just* that. As someone who finished all but the epilogue dungeon and the well dungeon, you can tell there was genuinely a lot of passion in this game. You can tell care and effort were put in!
But you can also tell that no one on the team with any power had played a farming game since the original rune factory.
Harvestella genuinely has its own identity and clear vision, but it also feels like they gave it to in-house devs who only knew how to do the RPG part of making games, but not the farming part.
I can't say that for some of the genuinely awful or cash-grabby games I've played in the past. If there had been some special 20 dollar DLC content I'd be more likely to agree with you that this was more cash grab than not, but instead I think that it was Square Enix genuinely trying to dip its toes into the water of farming games to find out if it's worth their time to invest in something even bigger. Especially when you look at it compared to all the rest of the non-rpg (and even some of those) games coming out by them.
That said? I love literally all of the rest of the video. And I am going to see if I can get neighbourvania to proliferate among my friends because "Cosy farming game" is less fun to say.
Honestly while I do love both games, as a longtime Harvest moon/SOS fan who's had to deal with Stardew fans dismissing all new releases from the series as "ripoffs" (including the remake of AWL, a game which originally released in 2003), watching Stardew fans freak over people praising Fields of Mistria has been great schadenfreude. Like damn there's a group of fans of a new game who are unfairly dismissing an earlier series you really love? That sucks, I can't imagine what that's like.
Genuinely brings me joy to see them in dismay after how they've disrespected us. Too bad they can't even argue they actually have the better game tho lol
as an avid stardew fan (well over 4000 hours lol) i never understood the hate towards other farming games, especially harvest moon. like i get it if you just prefer stardew over other farming games but just because a game comes out with farming and npcs you can build relationships with doesn’t mean it’s a ripoff. i can’t imagine how devilishly good you feel with the unwarranted stardew hate lol
tbh I think modern copyright law has done terrible things to the way we perceive ideas and ownership of those ideas. Think of how we related to fairytales 200 years ago. No-one was going to call you a rip-off hack for telling your own version of a fairy story with your own embellishments to suit how you liked it. No-one claimed they told a fairytale first. In practice, that's not how ideas work.
Originally, copyright laws were supposed to maintain that idea, while giving creators enough time to profit fairly from their work before it was released to the public domain. Now, ownership of an idea is ZEALOUS. Bodies fight tooth and nail to hold onto creative control of a work for decades, and though artists absolutely should profit fairly from their works, even in circumstances where neither money nor reknown are on the line, people are still just as possessive against potential copycats.
It's a deeply unhealthy and anti-creative mentality, and the system itself does far more for large corporations than it does for smaller independent creators. We have got to find new ways to suitably compensate artists for their work, in order to facilitate a move away from the ownership of ideas.
Harvest moon is the OG farming game and ConcernedApe never hide the fact that he got inspired by harvest moon and Minecraft
I haven't watched the video yet, but I will say I think fields of mistria is an incredible game. It's just different enough from stardew to be enjoyable without straying too far from what I like about it
The nintendo direct thing is really funny to me. I think it definitely put the phenomenon on to people radars. On the other hand Considering that two of the titles were remakes of Story of Season/Harvest Moon games (Rune Factory is a spinoff of Story of Seasons, for those who don't know), and one was the next entry in the Atelier series. I don't know much about the other games that were announced, but it's very funny to me that this big thing that made people start talking more about Stardew Valley ripoffs contained 3 games that were so far from being that.
Lukewarm take, I'd still be playing SoS - Sunshine Isle if it got free updates making it better every so often. The best thing to ever happen to Stardew is that ConcernedApe never made a Stardew Valley 2.
Nice summary of the "problem", but I have to ask, what does Atelier Ryza have to do with it? That can hardly be likened with a neighbuorvania? And the Atelier series goes back as long as Harvest moon if I not misstaken.
I didn't categorize Atelier Ryza as a "Harvest Moon-like" game, just as another release that also had farming in that Nintendo Direct
@@salmence100 The problem is that you specifically mentioned it with the cash grabs without any followup disclaimer like you did for Fae Farm.
It's another entry in the Atelier series. They're alchemy games. Of course there's going to be a gardening element to them. There were no changes or additions that would suggest an attempt to capitalize on Stardew's success.
It just feels like a lack of due diligence, because your lack of clarification means that a viewer who is not familiar with the Atelier games is going to come away from this video with the impression that Atelier Ryza 3 falls into that cash grab territory. You could have very easily just not mentioned it in this video.
The term I've heard and used myself is "Farming Life Sim." These are kind of a loose fusion of both the Life Sim genre and being a farming simulator, but lighter on the overall mechanics that would put games like Stardew Valley actually into either category. This in turn makes these a more appealing alternative for those who find playing a full on Life Sim like, well, "The Sims" or an actual farming simulator incredibly tedious and boring.
I know it's for clicks, but I take umbrage at having a Harvest Moon character on a thumbnail of a video talking about "Stardew Valley ripoffs".
If anything for single player games, what could kill it is another game that most people would think of first. If someone ask me for a relaxing farming game, I think Stardew first. If asked for another I've played a Harvest Moon (one on the Switch can't remember the name), or Sun Haven. I still recommend other games too, but Stardew is first to mind.
I believe that Neighborvania can describe more than just farming games. There are a lot now games where main focus can be on any kind of stuff. Like alchemy, smithing, shop or restaurant ownership etc. And s lot of them can be united in the case that they are about doing it in some sort of society, being part of neighborhood so to say
Please lord, don't let the player base of Journey ever die!
I've played a few too many of these by now to mention. Fae Farm was just OK to me, I think I liked Harvestella slightly more, but I didn't "finish" either of them. Wylde Flowers was the most pleasant surprise, but well crap, didn't finish that one either. Sun Haven has been the most tempting one that I haven't tried.
As for Mistria, it's gonna be huge and I'm here for it. Not having to worry about when shops are open? Be still my beating heart.
I believe it's really the age of the community that insists on this being a "problem". Not the age of the player base but with the bulk of the games coming in after 2016 the community is still young and subsequently will claim everything is a rip-off for a long while yet. There were years and years of FFPS called Doom rip offs and MOBAs Dota rip offs. But you've also got to recognise that Souls-like is it's own genre now and every deck builder is a "rip off" of the boardgame Dominion.
Stardew gets to take its seat in history with Harvest Moon and Story of Seasons as pioneers of this genre. New games can come out and you can compare them to your fav game but immediately shutting it down for being a rip off because it's the same genre is a childish take.
I'm so saddened that people call Stardew the standard of farming games when Harvest Moon/Story of Seasons did it first.
First isn't always best. There's a reason "X invented a thing Y perfected it" is a cliche. Stardew is the standard in the sense that it's the reference point people measure other games against.
@@evilgeniusha01 I guess it's just my nostalgia or boomer take. I grew up with Harvest Moon: Friends of Mineral Town and played that so much as a kid and other installments of the series (not the current crappy pay 2 win ones though. The Story of Seasons installments). Don't get me wrong, I love Stardew as well and Fields of Mistria is just as enjoyable.
the reason people compare it to Stardew is 'cause that's what most people know as the standard now. Stardew was inspired by HM but these new ones are inspired by Stardew, so it makes more sense to compare to that. like, I always see someone mention the originals but I never see people talking about the new Harvest Moon or Story of Seasons games.
@evilgeniusha01
Harvest Moon did it really well, Stardew Valley is just the most famous currently.
Your argument is no different from saying that Undertale perfected the "Earthbound formula", which is a ridiculous and nonsensical oversimplification.
The thing is that farming games as we know would exist without Stardew Valley, but not without Harvest Moon.
It is the standard. Harvest Moon and Rune Factory walked so Stardew and its brethren could run. The standard means baseline in quality, not first.
IIRC, the Harvest Moon vs Story of Seasons thing is due to Natsume, who localized the older HM games, holding onto the name rights after some kind of split. (I'm not invested enough to google it for a youtube comment, just remember something along those lines.) Since HMDS Cute was my intro to the genre, I refer to them as anime farm sims lol. I used to call them my guilty pleasure, but Stardew has been my main game for a while now so I think it's well beyond that level lol.
I think I prefer the term "Slice of life game" myself. Neighborvania just doesn't roll of the tounge as easily (maybe because I ain't a native English speaker?).
There is always a discussion about if a game is a clone, inspired by or just generally in the same genre and I don't think we should use "clone" too often.
Clone implies it is a cashgrab, trying to get a piece of the pie from a successful games and those games tend to be pretty soulless.
Mistria is heavily inspired by SDV, that is clear but I think they put in a bit too much effort into it for it just being a clone.
I am not so sure it can sell more then 30 million copies like Stardew though, but Stardew really had no competition at release and it came out at the perfect time so I have my doubts if any similar games actually can beat in in sales.
Stardew also have another advantage: It is a game about escaping the stress of modern life to settle down in a small town and becoming a farmer. I think many people have fantasized about doing just that so it is a theme anyone can understand and see themselves in. A fantasy adventurer settling down in a small town is less general.
On the other hand, Mistria do add more customization to your house which certainly have a lot of fans. Personally, I think it's biggest weakness is that all the NPC have anime styled portraits while the player only have the chibi character they walk around with. I hope they add that because the character portraits are rather good, they should have the character creation system focus on that instead and just simplify it for the walking sprite.
I feel like this video topic is important for this genre of games (Neighborvania) because it is so tiering to just hear "xyz is a clone/dupe/ripoff" when folks don't understand it is a GENRE. great job!
Stardew set a standard but other farming games still rock too!!
No, the standard was set by Harvest Moon. Stardew Valley is just the most famous currently.
@@safetyboots come on, I acknowledge and appreciate Harvest moon for basically kickstarting an entire genre, but let's be honest, Stardew Valley has objectively surpassed Harvest Moon and is definitely the standard that other farming games are compared to. Like it's not even close
@leonidesbabanto1585
Stardew Valley being better doesn't mean it set the standard. Besides, Stardew Valley doesn't implement anything groundbreaking to the genre, it only improves on the foundations laid out by Harvest Moon.
You could say that Stardew Valley is the new industry standard, but that's not what we're talking about. Every new game on this genre is following the steps of Harvest Moon.
@@safetyboots *That obscure 'E.V.O.: The Theory of Evolution' game though, nice!* 😎
Stardew didn't set the "standard." Stardew didn't implement anything that can't be found in the Harvest Moon games made before it besides maybe the combat system. Even then Rune Factory was still made way before Stardew Valley.
Play Harvest Moon Friends of Mineral Town or DS and you can totally see where all of Stardew's roots (heh) came from.
"Neighborvania" is as imbecilic a genre name as "souls-like" or "multiplayer online battle arena." Just saying.
Neighborcore is what i’ve been calling them 😊
The Stardew Valley discourse over the last near-decade has really completed my transformation into an old head. I love STV for expanding the genre beyond Marvelous' niche. But the monkey's paw curls because the fans that came along with STV's success are often extremely dismissive of the history of the genre.
And if I were not an old head, I'd ignore it but it bugs me that STV is the standard for the genre the STV set of mechanics have become the standard set. And we never get more modern interpretations of like romantic rivals, robust family life, etc. I just think that's a bit sad.
This video would be better without the Harvest Moon/Story of Seasons disrespect.
I understand that this isn't a "History of farming games" video, but that is a big oversimplification of HM's legacy, as if they only ever made one kind of game. Yes, they're all farming games/neighborvania, but if you erased the names and references I bet most people would think they're made by entirely different people. Because they are, they just happen to come from the same company and can be lumped together because of it and the "farming game" concept, yet at the same time they can all very extremely different.
All these farming games so far, have not yet beaten either Harvest Moon Hero of Leaf Valley, HM Back to Nature or Stardew Valley, for me yet.
Also calling out Atelier games is owning to the fact you never played an Atelier game, they are magical.
I haven't watched the video yet, but I will say I think fields of mistria is an incredible game. It's just different enough from stardew to be enjoyable without straying too far from what I like about it
Neighborvania sounds horribly inaccurate. I want to fight Dracula with a shovel before I consider it as such.
More seriously, I have a more important distinction: Which games let you ACTUALLY SAVE IN THE MIDDLE OF A DAY and not have to fully commit to that day to save. And yes, Stardew is included on the negative side here because you need a mod for that. Rune Factory lets me and that's one BIG reason it's my go-to for these games.
You can save in the middle of the day in Fields of Mistria.
Fields of Mistria allows you to save in the middle of the day.
You can quit in the middle of the day and keep your progress in Sun Haven too! It loads you back to the farm of the area you were at.
Little anecdote; I just started a new Stardew file and almost closed midday once cause I got used to doing it in my latest Sun Haven game lol
Can we get a list of every game you showed in this video in the comments or description? I'm interested in checking them out!
I used to think "ripoff" is a neutral term of something is copying something else. So I would call a game ripoff while saying it is a better version.
As a kid, I always wanted more games like my beloved Harvest Moons. Now that Stardew Valley has expanded the genre, I now have my pick of games that bring me joy. I do definitely think that some of them were or are money grabs, especially the "New" Harvest Moons, but I am seeing more effort being put into those so maybe there is hope. But it makes me happy that if I want to chill, I can pick up Fields of Mistria, if I want some fantasy, I default to Sun Haven, if I want some monster taming, I go to Re:Legend and when I want to actually have the opportunity to play as my farmer's child, Echoes of Plum Grove has me covered. And all four of these have turn into comfort games for me right alongside Stardew and my old Harvest Moons. These games bring me joy and I am so happy to see the genre thriving!
RUNE FACTORY MENTIONED 🎉🎉🎉
anyway, i think its just because this is a very small genre. imo it's best compared to something like soulslikes, all taking much of the structure from a few games and trying to turn it into something new. sekiro plays way different from elden ring plays way different from lies of p, and like the farming sims. a lot of importance is in the details too. learning the world... and there is quite some diversity within the niche here even.. i've played a 'farming sim' without any farming, even! (i can't remember the name, i'll have to tell later)
I don't think it's fair to lump Animal Crossing in with the thesis statement for this video, as it's largely its own thing. It is true that more recent additions to the mechanics of the Animal Crossing franchise, like crafting, cooking, and farming, were almost certainly a response to the booming popularity of Stardew Valley, but those mechanics hardly make up the core identity of the franchise. They're hardly even the elements that I think of first when I think of the series, and certainly aren't what I'm turning to the game for. Animal Crossing has a very unique charm to its social mechanics and town building that I don't quite think is replicable by Stardew or its kin, and that vibe has been consistent across the franchise since 2001. It is, in my opinion, what makes Animal Crossing special
Great video! I like the bit about that everyone will have their favorites and that's a good thing. I know Traveller's Rest has gotten a ton of accusations of being an imitation, but I love that game for such different reasons than I love SDV.
Any game that popularizes or revolutionizes a genre gets this kind of treatment. Any monster collection game is considered a Pokemon ripoff, leaving *actual* ripoffs like Palworld less scrutinized than something inherently different like Digimon. The Metroidvania name being what it is implies that all other games are clones of Metroid and Castlevania. Survivors-Style comes from Vampire Survivors (though sometimes it's also called bullet heaven). All bullet hells are Touhou. All farming games are Stardew Valley or Harvest Moon: Friends of Mineral Town. You have Soulslikes. You have Roguelikes. You have Magic or YGO clones, even. It's more a mark of a game's success when these comments start popping up than it is a mark of people chasing money, though there's plenty of that too.
Because before SDV, all Harvest Moon game so hard to get at least... 1 Million copy sold
Then, SDV is 30 mil sold. People never ever think farming game can be that popular.
The whole thing with games that dont have heart and just chase the money is something thats really annoyed me for awhile, its gotten to the point where a vast majority of games i play are indie games cause most AAA games just dont have any heart anymore. Even if i dont like a game after playing it if i can tell the devs were passionate about it i have a very hard time hating it, but the games that are unapologetically bad and lack any passion just upset me.
The video makes a lot of good points but there's a lot of stuff just swept under the rug. To say harvest moon (and by extension story of seasons) should be left out of the conversation is like saying the original AC had no affect whatsoever on today's rise of "cozy" games. Along with that, the vegetables in AC was an extension of the fruit and flowers system that had been there since the beginning in 2001. They didn't sporadically update ACNH with crops either, it's been documented that crops has always been part of ACNH's code since release and during 2020 the game had already been doing monthly updates that added in content like swimming or the art part of the museum.
I think these comparisons/rip off claims also come because of people classifying all of these games as "cozy games" and then getting frustrated when a lot have similar mechanics as if they arent in the same genre. I agree as you said many of the mechanics are key pieces to the genre.
I dont like the cozy gamification of sims as any game is a cozy game for someone. Ori and the Blind forest is a cozy game for me, so is Hades.
(This is stemming from seeing people complain that all "cozy games" have is farming and fishing and then they only spoke about SD, FoM, and HM which is greatly reducing what these games have to offer like they didnt buy a farming sim)
I think this kind of games should be called "farm life simulators"
I'm assuming your timeline is only showing the first entry of each series of games, but you showed it as if to say "harvest moon shouldn't be considered in the same realm as Stardew because it was released so long ago" but there have been at least 20 different Harvest Moon games and 2 Story of Seasons games (which are the same series as Harvest Moon, just with a different title) before Stardew was even released. And the third Story of Seasons was released just a few months after Stardew. Just wanted to put this here because the timeline you showed wasn't really an accurate depiction of how the farm sim genre evolved over time leading up to Stardew.
Pfft, I felt like Stardew is a ripoff of Harvest Moon when it first came out. In time i found that it has some original ideas and solutions, but the bare bones of it is the same as Harvest Moon.
i was skimming through the video and then i saw doki doki literature club?? i was so confused (what does ddlc have to do with stardew and farming games) til i got to that part of the video.
Because most people are completely ignorant of history and think the first thing they saw in a genre must have the orgin. Diesnt matter if Harvest moon and its derivitives are old as dirt. It doesn't matter if Concerned Ape flat outnsaid he was inspired by them a suprising number of people are just incapable of recognizing the world didnt start with there birth.
Great analysis! I like the neighbourvania term to discuss the genre.
I feel like a lot of the criticism on these games is also influenced by a light side of misogyny: “oh another farming game that’s not for REAL gamers but just for little girls”. As if your seventh first person shooter game is massively different from the first six 😂
I’m not sure why some people fuss over the fact that a lot more people are making farming life sims these days … If you don’t want to play it, then don’t. I love the genre and there can’t ever be enough of them because I will eventually play them all as long as they good! I was so tired of waiting back in the day for a new harvest moon game to come out because that was the only of its kind back then. And I agree, sometimes new games can try to be too different and end up making a worse game for it.
Octopath travelers reference my Sals a gamer, but might I recommend the 8 playable character GRAND DADDY Romancing SaGa Minstrel Song. The original came out on the nes as sprites, got a remaster on the PS2 in full 3D that was banned in the US for reasons, and true to their word Square said they would take excess money made from FF14 and remaster their lesser successful titles and they delivered there is a full PC remaster of this game on steam $25 USD.
i mean, if most of them didn't have the exact same artstyle and gameplay, it wouldn't be as much of an issue. There's a lot of room to change things around, even when doing pixel art. They don't all have to be dating sims either.
In Indonesia, Harvest Moon: Back to Nature was so popular until this day, due to its became the first game that got localized to Indonesia. So, when Stardew Valley was start to get attention in 2016-2017. A lot of people's call it Harvest Moon copycat, but they were shock when they saw the combat mechanic
If it wasn't for crash issues, I might have moved on from Stardew to Coral Island. Of all the follow-ups, it seems to have kept the stuff that works and expanded the stuff that CA probably couldn't have made on its own. It feels both bigger and broader, a natural evolution of a classic. But...the crashes.
Stardew Valley is a marriage and divorce simulator game
I agree! It's all about intention. If someone says "I want to make a farming game" and takes inspiration from Stardew Valley, then that's fine. If someone says "I want to make Stardew Valley", then it's a ripoff.
I really enjoyed Travellers’ Rest, there’s the Stardew element of growing ingredients, cooking/brewing with your ingredients and serving the townspeople. The pub also gets an adorable cat.
Critter Cove showed up in the video for, like, a second, so I'm here to tell all furries (and honestly anyone who wants to mess with a good character creator) PLEASE check out the demo. So good
Recently playing Chef RPG.. Not heavily focused on farming tho but enjoying a lot so far
People who are saying shit like "Harvest Moon walked so Stardew Valley could run and become the standard" has obviously not played enough Harvest Moon/Story of Seasons games. Stardew Valley has clear direct inspirations coming from Friends of Mineral Town and DS. (And the entire series, but I mostly see it in those games.)
These are not rip offs these are just more of the same ingredients mixed into new meals that i can eat again and again I get more of what i love in a new package
I mean one could say stardew is a harvest moon clone.
In the end when something is popular, people replicate it, and try to expand on it
less than a minute ago im guessing there's a lot of stardew valley games because they are relaxing and people enjoy turning off their brain while gaming and also developers want a slice of the stardew pie and they view making farming games as easy i hope i am correct in this prediction
edit; okay my prediction was COMPLETELY wrong!! this video was not what i thought it'd be and i am embarrassed for commenting this now with how the video actually was but this has changed my outlook on what i view as a "generic farming game" / "omg such cool not generic farming game". neighborvania is such a cool word aswell?? like my god i want this word to become widely used,,
that ending tie in to pokemon was also an amazing parallel omg
Come back in 2 months, I think this video will do really well
Yay!!!!! A Salmence video on my birthday.🎉🎉🎉🎉
Ryza catching strays for absolutely no reason lol
I rate games based on how much rabbit they have.
Ironically, Stardew Valley is a Harvest moon rip-off.
Stardew valley is a ripoff of Stardew valley
The sooner we can get rid of the "Stardew Valley ripoff" garbage the better. And no, I will still call Stardew a "Story of Seasons ripoff" if we're using the word ripoff. The good things in Stardew are the Story of Seasons parts. And no, ACNH did not copy because ACNH actually has focus and plays what it does very well.
Story of Seasons a New Beginning has crafting, arranging buildings, different ways to farm, some online multiple functionality, etc. that was way before Stardew. Idk how A New Beginning is considered "empty", I think its more focused. Rune Factory (also by Marvelous) implemented a lot of cool things to go with the farming and combat, the first game has farming monsters and camping in dungeons. I didn't really care for Rune Factory and kinda wrote it off since the NDS but it apparently got really good with soil mechanics and stuff, so I'm buying Rune Factory games on Switch. Stardew's dungeons don't really feel like I should care about, its very separated from farming.
I'm not going to look forward to the farming sim genre if we keep using the "Stardew Valley ripoff" garbage because the direction of Stardew feels very unfocused. I love farming games like Story of Seasons and Farming Simulator (and Animal Crossing since apparently we're talking about it), I don't like the farming sim genre direction for a lot of current games.
Farming Simulator = (realistic) farming genre.
Story of Seasons = farming sim genre.
We should stop calling it Stardew ripoffs, farming sim is a better word that explains it. Do we really want to be the Doom Clones, Soulslike, Metroidvania crowd when we already have a word? I still call MOBA games as MOBA, not League of Legends even tho thats the MOBA game I like. Pokemon Unite BARELY plays like LoL yet people still call it Pokemon League of Legends. Comparisons works better when the people are more knowledgeable about the games in the genre, otherwise it just sounds confusing, I will just have to assume you mean farm sim.
I think the best thing that came out of Stardew is that farming games are cheaper now...and same sex marriage. The rest feels very detrimental. Neighborvania also has zero traction on Google, so I doubt I would use that word unless it becomes used more. -Vania tho...what is that suffix? Its from Transylvania for Castlevania. Okay...Its wood, forest or land. Well, finding that out was more interesting than hearing about Stardew "ripoffs". People just use the words "cozy games" instead. Does cozy games really paint a clear picture? Not really, but I prefer it over Stardew Valley ripoff.
Fields of Mistria is definitely a special one between all of them, I loved the QoL changes and especially the NPCs, they're all lovely
Forgive me if this has already been brought up, but I feel the need to mention “Harvest Moon” is not Harvest moon anymore in Jp it’s “Bokujou Monogatari” (ranch story) and was localized under the name “harvest moon” but people who make the actual hm/bm games got a new localization team and “harvest moon” is now “story of seasons” the original localization team just owns tye rights to the harvest moon name and any new hm games are not made by the original team
Really enjoyed this breakdown! I fully agree with your emphasis on the intent behind the game. And I will now be applying the idea of "every Pokémon is someone's favorite Pokémon" to so many contexts 😄
Harvest Moon is no longer owned by the people who originally developed the game. It's a lot of copyright issues and an American company stealing the name. Story of Seasons games are the real Harvest Moon games. So that is why you see them making crappy games now.
Also surprised to see a lack of Palia on your list. It's another great additional to the genre.
The name Neighborvania is fantastic. I sincerely hope it gets widely adopted.
Nah, the -vania comes from Castlevania, it's not just a thing you slap on genre names. You wanna make a portmanteau for the genre it should be like Harvestdew or something.
It makes literally no sense. There's absolutely nothing even remotely related to Castlevania in these games, whatever straw you can grasp at can be attributed to pretty much every video game ever.
It comes from a previous portmanteau of “Metroidvania”, much as Sal said in the video. Sure, it effectively drops the Metroid part out of it, but the term is used so much enough beyond those two franchises at this point that any portmanteau of ‘Metroid-something’ or ‘something-vania’ is probably a reference to a genre of non-linear game.
@@benrichetti1360
Meteoidvania is a terrible name for a genre and should be dropped just like doom clones was.
i feel like you can really tell when a game isn't just a "ripoff". it doesn't get talked about as much, it doesn't stay in the spotlight for very long. mistria? inspired but lives in its own world despite the similarities. idk you can just tell when ANY game was made with care vs greed imo and mistria easily passes the bar with the character interactions alone.
it's almost like games in the same genres have similar features! *le gasp* in all honesty, i just roll my eyes at these type of comments. stardew valley was not the original but that doesn't mean that it's impact is any less. considering the gap between that you mentioned in your timeline, it might as well have become an original since it was a successful reimagining. also, what's wrong with different but similar farming games??? that's the whole point of the algorithms showing you other "similar" games that you might enjoy since you've played "X" game. it's like finishing a song/book/show/movie that you really enjoyed and you want more of the same stuff but different since you don't want to just rewatch the same show again just now.
some people act as if you can only every play one game exclusively. this is not in reference to those who can only afford one game. you know what the first thing i did with my adult money when i graduated and got my first full time job? i bought a switch for myself and went to town playing all kinds of games on it. did i also download stardew on it and play it religiously? yes, but that's besides the point.
i see this across all kinds of media. as an avid bookworm, i went through a period where i exclusively read any and all reimagined brothers' grimm fairy tales. there's nothing wrong with taking inspiration from an existing piece of work to create your own. that's how innovation and creativity works.
another example: i dabble in gacha games but i play genshin impact exclusively just because it's the one i've put the most hours into. there was another game called Wuthering Waves that came out this year in May. MANY people called it the "genshin killer". as if a new IP from a much smaller company (compared to mihoyo) could "kill" a game that has 60+ million active players and has been highly successful in the past 4 years it's been live smh. If anything, the only thing that will kill genshin itself is the amount of controversies the community creates for itself 🤦♀.
anyway, just let people play whatever they want and stop gatekeeping games; games are meant to be played by those who enjoy them.
I’ve been seeing an absolutely crazy push in the opposite direction to overcorrect and claim that “Fields of Mistria is NOT like Stardew Valley” and it’s just so divorced from reality I can’t even
I feel like the Neighborvania that I’ve liked the most recently is Coral Island, because it has several of those necessary variations but also keeps the same energy as Stardew. The setting is super fleshed out, diving adds a lot of new routes for gameplay, and the art style is focused but different from Stardew. I feel likely for me to enjoy a new game that’s so similar to Stardew, I need at least a few intentional changes from the baseline (just talking about modern Neighborvanias).
ppl calling fields of mistria too similar to stardew are ignoring Stardew's origin as something that began with Concerned Apes origin as a harvest moon fan. As a Harvest Moon fan, I was ecstatic when I first played Stardew Valley. I feel the same way about Fields of Mistria
My one thing with Stardew Valley inspired games that I wish wasn't true is how often they make their dungeons mines. Both Mistria and Coral Island have their main dungeons just be mines. I loved Moonstone Islands little dungeons, and growing up I loved Rune Factory's dungeons. Rune Factory Frontier had you climb a giant beanstalk to the back of a giant whale! I wish we had more creative places to explore and fight.
I honestly feel like sometimes we have brilliant one-of-a-kind games pop up that spawn a whole new genre and everything after that is considered a rip-off.
I clicked on this video already 100% agreeing with it, lol. I just wanted to hear more neighborvania games mentioned because I’ve played SDV for thousands of hours and want a new one, haha. Mistria looks good, but it’s still early access! And Coral Island is, according to my kickstarter backer friend, still in the process of incorporating promises it made during the kickstarter. I might be interested in Fae Farm, but that’s a huge price tag, so I don’t want to commit without being sure I’ll love it. If anyone reading this has a neighborvania they’re passionate about, do share…!
i'd be a lot happier if it wasnt for the bare bones lighting models and bland models used for the 3d games (makes them look like low budget unity prototypes) and the washed out color palette with sprite art that just always looks out of place and unfinished.
Exaggerated proportions on characters to try and mask a lack of creative vision (just look at the 3 Mii-Ripoff characters, the "disney movie background character" faces, just from this video alone).
as you said, inspiration is ok. but there is a lot of trend chasing going on.
If I'm honest i think calling them neighborvanias kinda sucks. I feel like it's somehow less intuitive than metroidvania.
I've been calling them resource management games, because of the diverse game systems. But i understand why that name pops up, my description is too vague and doesn't point to the town aspect of the game. I guess i just don't vibe with neighborvania :/
Easy explanation for why it took so long for something like Stardew Valley to appear after basically only Harvest Moon/Story of Seasons and Rune Factory existing: the genre was so extremely niche that no one else saw profit in it. We had to wait for the kids who love the old HM games to grow up and get into game development. Then Stardew released and showed that people not only still enjoy farming games but can actually make them all on their own AND make lots of money. And boom, you suddenly have a thriving niche. Most of the games that release now are still very much inspired by Harvest Moon but take modern ideas from Stardew.
2:10 yeah I’m sick of people calling games stardew ripoffs when those games barely have farming in them! And as someone who enjoyed harvestella, I agree the farming was obviously just tacked on because of the popularity of farming games. The way they marketed the game that way too showed the devs wanted to tap into this player base. But as a jrpg I still enjoyed it for what it was. Not sure I agree about rf3s in that list tho bc it’s just a remake/remaster (sry keep forgetting which one) of an older game much before stardew. I guess you could say the fact that they’re releasing it as a special in this time could be bc of greed but idk there have been a lot of games getting released on more modern platforms too. It makes their game more accessible so I don’t really see it in a negative light. But I could just be biased bc I’m a rf fan.
Harvestella is a beautiful RPG, and I feel like it should have stayed just a MMO RPG. I bought the game secondhand in December of 2022, and I loved the characters, the beautiful world, the interesting characters, and everything the game has to offer. Minus the farming...honest to God I forgot about it's farming mechanic because I was so much more entranced with its dungeons and story, that I completely forgot about the like doomsday storm thing that comes at the end of every season. I think the game could have benefited much more from either sizing down it's farming mechanics, or axing them entirely
I think you hit the nail on the head for as to why I’m always very skeptical of Natsume’s Harvest Moon games. It’s always rubbed me the wrong way that since the split up it was the OG Harvest Moon that has to be renamed to Story of Seasons while Natsume just continued to use the name. It always felt as it was trying to immature what made SoS so popular and would ‘coincidentally’ release around the same time as a new SoS game, tricking those who were unaware of the split.
Like with any genre Neighborvania’s are gonna have its ups and downs, but we need to let people experience while still using the same sets of mechanics. Some you may enjoy (I personally loved FaeFarm due to its simplicity) and some you may not (I personally cannot get into Stardew cause it stresses me out) and that’s totally okay
BTW, if you enjoyed playing Stardew Valley, you will prob like Sun Haven as well. Well not as polished as Stardew Valley, its very similar but has its own twist to the gameplay. me and my buddies weren't sure about playing the game but after sinking in like couple hours, we were having so much fun!
First came Harvest Moon, then came Rune Factory, then came the budget Harvest Moon titles from Natsume, then came Story of Seasons, then came Stardew valley. Then came everything else.. I think that is how it went.
When you have innovation, you will have copy cats, but you will also have competition as well, which is needed for a market to be healthy.. Nobody wants to be in a market where one company owns everything, because that is a monopoly, and as I recall, monopolies are actually illegal, because it violates anti-trust laws. That is why the western market allows for so called, "copy cats, and rip offs", it's because they keep competition in the market, and keep monopolies from forming, not to mention keeping the price for goods honest..