Monster Harvest's story could be any more unoriginal
פורסם: 19 דצמבר 2022, 11:38There’s a new indie game on the lot and it’s finally coming into bloom after several delays. Monster Harvest lets players grow crops of varying monsters and even take them into battle. It’s a novel idea, becoming a reserved blend of Pokémon and Stardew Valley where ‘Plantimals’ grow. It seems like it should have all the makings of an indie gem, but does it break new ground as a farming simulator with a twist?
While there are plenty of iterations that play on Stardew Valley's mechanics without shame, copying nearly everything there is to copy, Monster Harvest attempts to take those building blocks and add on something unique by mashing the monster-catching and combat mechanics from the Pokémon series into this otherwise straight-laced farming title.
I don’t think Monster Harvest’s story could be any more unoriginal. You’re dropped onto a farm and are immediately tasked with growing crops to flip for profit. I know; you’ve been here a million times before. But these games are always more about the journey than telling a riveting tale, and I’m fine with that. Where Monster Harvest falters first, however, is in its utter lack of direction. Maybe the developer, Maple Powered Games, just assumes you’ll have the knowledge necessary to get going. Either way, inevitably, my first few hours were mired in lingering anxiety caused by not knowing whether I should be spending my days farming, or fighting, or building relationships, and so on.
As an indie game, Monster Harvest does lay a good base with the number of Plantimals accessible to the player. For each of the three seasons, there’s 4 basic crops that can be mutated in 6 forms which are the Plantimal; Megamal, Single Crop, Multicrop, Livestock, and the Mount. All up that’s 72 possibilities from 12 different crop types. Getting each one is a moderate grind, though it becomes easier as your playthrough continues. The game also has hybrid seeds of two plant varieties, though disappointingly they aren’t able to be mutated into living Plantimals like the non-hybrids. Their only purpose is to be sold for twice the normal amount.
Monster Harvest wanted to follow the basic format found in the award-winning Stardew Valley while adding unique monster-catching and RPG mechanics found in Pokémon, and it succeeded in doing so.
The issue is that those baseline mechanics from the farming sim genre lack the depth and nuance you'd want to see for Monster Harvest to really be found among the greats, while also failing to capitalize on the new mechanics by making them lackluster and borderline boring.
Hardest to ignore of all its problems, Monster Harvest just isn’t a game meant for the Switch hardware. It’s clearly designed to be played with a keyboard and mouse, routinely making me double (and sometimes even triple) click a selection to actually register the input. In addition, navigating the menus is an absolute chore, thanks to a cursor that seemingly has a mind of its own. For example, I’ll try to move one space up, and it’ll shoot three spaces past where I wanted to go. Regardless of how much I was enjoying myself, it wasn’t ever long before I was reminded that I should probably be playing this elsewhere.
There’s a lot of potential to Monster Harvest, but it falls short on delivering a farming sim game that comes close to rivalling others in the genre. Hopefully, with time, Monster Harvest continues to grow, but until then it feels like it’s missing what makes the hard work worthwhile. Honestly, this feels like an Early Access title that still needs more time before it’s ready for full release. It seems the phrase ‘third time’s the charm’ does not apply to game delays.
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While there are plenty of iterations that play on Stardew Valley's mechanics without shame, copying nearly everything there is to copy, Monster Harvest attempts to take those building blocks and add on something unique by mashing the monster-catching and combat mechanics from the Pokémon series into this otherwise straight-laced farming title.
I don’t think Monster Harvest’s story could be any more unoriginal. You’re dropped onto a farm and are immediately tasked with growing crops to flip for profit. I know; you’ve been here a million times before. But these games are always more about the journey than telling a riveting tale, and I’m fine with that. Where Monster Harvest falters first, however, is in its utter lack of direction. Maybe the developer, Maple Powered Games, just assumes you’ll have the knowledge necessary to get going. Either way, inevitably, my first few hours were mired in lingering anxiety caused by not knowing whether I should be spending my days farming, or fighting, or building relationships, and so on.
As an indie game, Monster Harvest does lay a good base with the number of Plantimals accessible to the player. For each of the three seasons, there’s 4 basic crops that can be mutated in 6 forms which are the Plantimal; Megamal, Single Crop, Multicrop, Livestock, and the Mount. All up that’s 72 possibilities from 12 different crop types. Getting each one is a moderate grind, though it becomes easier as your playthrough continues. The game also has hybrid seeds of two plant varieties, though disappointingly they aren’t able to be mutated into living Plantimals like the non-hybrids. Their only purpose is to be sold for twice the normal amount.
Monster Harvest wanted to follow the basic format found in the award-winning Stardew Valley while adding unique monster-catching and RPG mechanics found in Pokémon, and it succeeded in doing so.
The issue is that those baseline mechanics from the farming sim genre lack the depth and nuance you'd want to see for Monster Harvest to really be found among the greats, while also failing to capitalize on the new mechanics by making them lackluster and borderline boring.
Hardest to ignore of all its problems, Monster Harvest just isn’t a game meant for the Switch hardware. It’s clearly designed to be played with a keyboard and mouse, routinely making me double (and sometimes even triple) click a selection to actually register the input. In addition, navigating the menus is an absolute chore, thanks to a cursor that seemingly has a mind of its own. For example, I’ll try to move one space up, and it’ll shoot three spaces past where I wanted to go. Regardless of how much I was enjoying myself, it wasn’t ever long before I was reminded that I should probably be playing this elsewhere.
There’s a lot of potential to Monster Harvest, but it falls short on delivering a farming sim game that comes close to rivalling others in the genre. Hopefully, with time, Monster Harvest continues to grow, but until then it feels like it’s missing what makes the hard work worthwhile. Honestly, this feels like an Early Access title that still needs more time before it’s ready for full release. It seems the phrase ‘third time’s the charm’ does not apply to game delays.
If you want to save more money, is the right place for cheap Monster Harvest Account, we have been a store for more than 10 years, and been proven reliable to work with. We can provide cheap in a safe and quick way, once your order is completed, we’ll confirm that and deliver your items immediately. 99% of orders can be delivered in 5 - 30 minutes. Whether you order Monster Harvest Account for sale during the day or night, our customer service is always online to serve you.