A Cozy Farming System in Wicked

Wicked Feedback
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Some ARPG fans might have clicked on this post and thought it was about farming equipment and such. No, it is about actual farming :joy:

So let’s talk farming :seedling: :tomato: :potato:

I personally love to play cozy farming simulators, such as Sun Haven, from time to time. I can just turn my brain off and relax for a bit. Some ARPG players might be thinking this could be boring or tedious. Therefore, the gameplay loop should be quick, simple, fun and rewarding.

Some foreshadowing:

Farm in Sacrament
Farm in Sacrament1920×804 155 KB

I took my screenshot at this exact moment, deliberately :joy:

The Gameplay Loop:

  • Buy Seeds from a Farmer NPC.

  • Plant Seeds.

  • Water Seeds.

  • Optional, add fertilizer to increase yield.

  • Wait X amount of time.

  • Harvest crops, they should yield the crop and have a X% chance to yield seeds for convenience.

Ideally players should be able to harvest their crops in a longer session as a Quality of Life service. Normally, people will plant seeds, water them and add fertilizer at the end of a game’s session. This way when they log back in they can immediately harvest their crops.

My suggestions:

  • Start with singular plots at the start to familiarize people with the system, and allow for larger plots later in the story.

  • Allow players to interact with the system but don’t let it take too long. People complained about cutting wood etc., taking too long; that applies here as well.

  • If you add a watering mechanic with a watering can, please please please, place a well nearby so we can refill easily. Also allow for the dynamic weather system to water the plants.

  • The Watering Can should be a tool similar to the pickaxe and such. Tie the quality of the Watering Can to the time it takes to grow crops. This way current tier food will always take the same amount of time to grow when upgrading the Watering Can. This avoids the issue of having Higher Tier Food Materials taking more time to grow and creating player frustration.

  • Let us buy fertilizer from the Farming NPC, but also let us craft/obtain it from barn animals for example.

  • Fertilizer should be added to increase the yield of crops when harvested.

  • Visually show progress of them growing, potentially allow for different growth rates. Higher quality food materials take longer for example, this is then countered by watering can quality.

  • Don’t limit us to just plants, adding animals which yield resources is fun as well. Letting us have different farm animals should serve different uses. Higher Tier animals should be unlocked later.

  • What happens in some Farming Simulators is that Animals have Affection. Increasing their Affection increases their yield. It could be a fun idea to have an option to massage cows to increase the quality of their meat before we :cow: :hocho: :cut_of_meat:

  • Animals could also drop types of hide/leather, feathers when ‘‘harvested’’.

  • We should also be able to ‘‘harvest’’ animals for items such as eggs and milk without :hocho: them.

  • Reduce the amount of raw ingredients players can find around the map and add the ability to find seeds at diggable locations suggested by @Astont36

As a final word I would like to say do not make it too complicated. Don’t add mechanics such as insects or weather ruining crops. In Farming Simulators these mechanics are staple. But, this would just be annoying for ARPG players I imagine.

Focus on reward not punishment.

Edit: added a screenshot of a potential farm.

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First of all i hope that getting this higher tier food serves a real purpose. Investing so much time to plant must be extremly rewarding.

Not that running to Carolines husband for higher tier food is the better and quicker choice in the end.

And btw. must we use the term “gameplay loop” … i mean its correct for sure, professional and so … but it always feels so mechanic … like endless iterations of the same thing.
Hearing that gives me always the feel i am locked in a pattern (which i truly am in the end, but i dont what to know about) :laughing: just kidding … its ok

thanks for your input

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If I’m not mistaken there is already a farm in Sacrament that is dead, potentially this area will be used for farming. Again, I might be mistaken but I’m pretty sure not all of Sacrament is accessible so more could open up in the future.

Although, currently I feel like there isn’t a need for a farm yet, as whilst it’s an issue early on for consumables, later it gets too easy. So if the developers want players to interact with farming they need to balance some stuff out first. OR add a sense of reward for actually interacting with the system, like increased yield (as you said) or consumables that add special buffs or heal the player more.

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I think the easier food availability will be the reward, combined with maybe better food recipes requiring these foods.

I have to farm tomato’s in the open world, there might be X spots in area 1 and Y spots in area 2. Which takes active game time.

Now the farm plot I can do and then log off. Let the crops grow offline and harvest them when I’m back. Should be a reward in both convenience and yield.

I can see that, it gives this technical feeling of playing a game without the ‘‘wow’’ factor. Like it’s deconstructed :sweat_smile:

Very good point, I’ll add a picture of that to the post.

I share your sentiment for needing it at the early stages. I think it will start to matter more for the T3 food recipes and such. They could make it so certain foods are rarer to find in the wilds. And then let those food recipes be a requirement for the better foods. So farming is incentivized.

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I would actually prefer a rework/tweak to the gathering system to make it more diverse and to push players in the right direction of using the farm.

What they could do is reduce the amount of raw ingredients players can find around the map and instead introduce seeds as one of the items that can be awarded via the diggable spots. Due to the raw ingredients now being scarcer, they could reward the player with berries. These can be used to plant at the farm but also eaten too.

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These ideas could co-exist next to each other. I really like the idea of being able to find seeds when you dig. I’ll add it to the list with credit.

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NICE!

farming
farming694×361 128 KB

I’m already here, it’s one of the reasons I bought the game :joy: