Pixelshire: A crop harvested too soon

Farming-oriented life-sim games are a dime a dozen these days. Sometimes it can seem like there’s a new would-be Stardew competitor every week, and it can be hard for any of them to stand out among the crowd. Pixelshire has been touted as one such competitor, but having dived in immediately upon release, I’m sad to say that it needs a lot of improvements if it’s to stand a chance of survival. 

You know, I pride myself on finding the silver lining in most things. So, before I get into the nitty gritty of everything that’s gone dreadfully wrong for the release of Pixelshire, I’d like to go over some of the positive aspects that I discovered. 

Firstly, it actually does try to be different in its own way, and that’s admirable. Rather than the same-old, expected story of a dead relative passing on a run-down farmhouse, in Pixelshire, you have no house and have to build your own. You also aren’t restricted to a set area for farming, either, and you’re able to hoe anywhere that has grass. You can turn the entire town into cropland, if you want, and that’s actually really nice. You can also terraform, adding rivers and lakes, hills and valleys. 

Those are the major appealing features of Pixelshire that help it stand out in a positive way. Sadly, these don’t rescue it from the fact that, for the most part, it stands out for all the wrong reasons. 

Fans left disappointed with Pixelshire

Within minutes of the game going live at 12 p.m. EST on May 8, players flocked to the Discord server and Steam reviews to discuss a few issues, including one that came up time and time again involving one of the tutorial quests. 

This specific quest requires you to purchase and plant Rice seeds. Now, for anyone who has ever played a farming-based life-sim before, there’s a habit that’s become ingrained: Buy as much as you can afford and immediately plant it to try and make some profit. That’s how it’s always worked, and that’s what most players choose to do. Sadly, that’s not what we were supposed to do, but nobody told us that. 

After planting all six Rice seeds, a new quest pops up asking you to plant more. Except you can only buy six seeds, because the farmer doesn’t have any more in stock, and you just planted them all. You can’t go to sleep because the Inn doesn’t unlock until after you’ve completed the tutorial, and you have no way of progressing otherwise. There’s only one thing for it: Restart from scratch, and slog through the entire first day all over again, now knowing what you’re supposed to do. 

No game should ever expect you to be a mind reader. You shouldn’t be expected to just instinctively know what quest is going to come after the one you’re currently doing. Maybe I’m just spoiled by other games, but I feel like tutorial quests should be designed for five-year-olds. Tell us exactly what you expect of us; we’re not psychic. 

This, coupled with another bug that I encountered while trying to dig a pond and putting it one tile to the left of where the game didn’t tell me it was supposed to be, resulted in me having to entirely restart the first day three times. I spent an hour playing before I refunded, and I didn’t get past the tutorial.

Features are convoluted, or just plain missing

In most games of this genre, gifting villagers is a staple feature. It’s there in Pixelshire, too, but the gifting mechanic has been wildly overcomplicated. Rather than wield a gift above your head and pressing a set button to throw it at your intended recipient, you have to: 

• Interact with them by pressing E
• Press “Gift” 
• Select the gift from within the pop-up inventory window 
• Select “Give” 
• Select “Gift” 

That’s five inputs for one incredibly basic feature. And the gifting system isn’t the only feature that follows the same pattern. Gaining and using tools is done with the following list of inputs: 

• Receive the tool directly into your inventory
• Press B to open the inventory
• Right-click on the tool to assign it to your radial dial
• Close the inventory 
• Press and hold Q to open the radial dial
• Click on the tool you want to use 

Six inputs to equip a tool that you’ve been given. There aren’t any hotbars to make this easier, and there are no options that would allow a tool or weapon to go directly onto your radial dial. And if you happen to forget to close your inventory, God forbid, you can’t use the tool at all, even if you have selected it from your radial dial. 

It’s all just a bit much, and it gets really irritating, really quickly. 

While we’re on the subject of basic features, it’s a safe bet that in any other game of the same type, sleeping will regenerate your stamina. It’s a biological fact, sleep gives you energy, so why doesn’t it do that in Pixelshire? Instead, you need to eat. That’s fine, I suppose, but food rewards very little stamina, so you’re going to be gorging pretty regularly. 

The features that are there mostly work, in all their convoluted glory, but some of them are what can only be described as “janky”. Many players immediately noted that pop-up windows materialized half cut off by the edge of their screen, regardless of their chosen display settings or UI resolution, something that I also noticed when trying to quit the game after the bugs I encountered.

Pixelshire isn’t ready for full release… Yet

Pixelshire has been in limited early access for a while, and those who played during that period have commented that the game feels as clunky now as it did then. Improvements that were asked for haven’t been made, and feedback has seemingly been ignored. That’s not to say it isn’t coming, and you have to have some sympathy for solo dev Kappa Bits. What they’ve managed to create is impressive in its own right, but it certainly wasn’t ready to be released as a finished product. 

That’s not to say it never will be. There is a lot of potential for Pixelshire to end up as a sweet and enjoyable life-sim. With some tweaks and a lot of love, it could be beloved by cozy gamers looking to scratch the farming itch. Fans want this to do well, but most are in agreement that it needed more time to grow. 

Still, I’m endlessly hopeful at the best of times, so I’ll circle back to Pixelshire after a few updates and give it another look. According to a post on the Discord server, the first patch should arrive at some point within the first week of the game’s release, fixing bugs and issues that I’ve described. In the meantime, if you’re willing to overlook the issues and play anyway, a list of bug workarounds has been shared via the Steam community page.