桃源村日志 Steam Charts & Stats

Very relaxing, fun quests and easy to pick up

Such a fun game!! I love the aesthetics, gameplay is smooth, and the bartering system is so unique - I know some people don't like it, but it's very much real to what it might have been like back in the day. Keep being yourselves and stick to the traditional Chinese ways, that's one of the USPs!! Wish the developers can add in more Chinese festivals as well. So that I have more to look forward to each month :)))

This has definitely become one of my favorite games, it is beautiful and still is having new stuff added.

Stardew Valley with Chinese characteristics. It's very good, and I feel that it's worth the money. It lacks some of the polish of Stardew Valley, but it feels unique enough to stand on its own. The setting and characters are also a breath of fresh air. It feels much more laid back than Stardew, and is great if you just want to relax. The developers are also currently giving it some post-release love, so I hope that it gets even better in time, as Stardew has. As for gameplay, there are 6 basic gameplay systems to interact with in the game: Farming: It's a lot like Stardew, but without the automation, and much more powerful hand tools. Pain points revolve around crops whithering, destroying any sort of order in your crops (especially early game), and information about seasonality and growing times of each individual type of plant is not forthcoming in-game. You need to possess seeds to get that information. Hoarding is also much easier than in Stardew, as there are not quite so many crop types and qualities, and you can stack things to larger than 1000 items. Forestry: Herb gathering/Foraging/Wood gathering. Unlike Stardew, you have to replant the trees that you chop. Herb gathering also involves a small minigame that honestly gets a bit tiring. But there's an option to turn minigames off in the settings, and I haven't done that yet. Cooking: Recipe/Blueprint learning also involves a small minigame. Honestly, the furniture ones are pretty fun. But the cooking ones are largely just a bit of button mashing. Cooking was my primary means of income in the early game, as you can cook food at the village tavern, and it sells for a decent price. It largely involves gathering ingredients and then cooking them from a menu. I think Stardew is a bit more streamlined, but Taoyuan somehow feels a bit better. As of the time of this review (1.0), liquor making doesn't make much profit, and is a bit labour intensive, but the process is more realistic than Stardew. Mining/Combat: Like Stardew, you have to mine for metals to get better tools/equipment. The mining works pretty much the same way. The combat is honestly inferior. There's no knockback, so it's largely based around well timed dodges, straight up cheesing the system by hiding behind a rock and striking through it, or just taking the hits. Outside of bosses, enemies don't do much damage. Fishing: My least favourite mechanic in Stardew, but I honestly think it does it a bit better. Taoyuan is more like Animal Crossing in that you just click at the right time. My biggest problem with the fishing is a netting minigame that provides very little reward for a lot of work. But again, you can turn minigames off. I've largely been ignoring fishing past the very early parts of the game.

Sometimes you have to ignore the negative reviews and buy things to try out for yourself this game can be difficult to understand at first but so far it's really good.

Accessibility note: Subtitle font & size is not sufficiently readable. It looked larger in the trailers, but it really isn't good enough, especially with the font that makes the subtitle kinda blend it with the text box at times. As I am unable to continue playing I will be refunding this. This is in no way a knock against the game, but people should know. I debated getting this a long time for this very issue, but decided to give it a shot and yeah - it was bad.

This is an interesting one that I'd want to give a middling review for. The game is fun, and I enjoy the basic aspects of it, but there are a few points that just make me lack motivation to keep playing even if I like the characters well enough. The story is very easy to speedrun through, to the point that I wondered if I missed something, and that actually makes it less of a good story because if you're following the plot and missing interactions with characters, the plot just doesn't hit as well. It also REALLY struggles with a bartering system that makes it difficult to know how much things are worth, and often left me awkwardly swapping the number of peaches and hay as I tried to make up that last little bit. It's a good game, certainly, but there are several times as I'm playing it that I felt bored. I think the game would have been better off if it didn't have a story. You just live in this weird village where things are a little strange but you're all happy and living your best lives.

Highly recommend this game!! It a fun rural China game that reminded me of Stardew- but honestly I prefer this one over it. - The dialogue and worldbuilding is incredible, the designs and characters are all beautiful and unique, and the battering system is amazing. The battering system allows you to achieve items more easily while still maintaining a "grind" like sense a lot of people look for within games. - My only complaint is that the game isn't longer (I've heard it can be completely fairly quickly- however I have yet to complete it.) I understand the development team is incredibly small, but I look forward to how this game changes and progresses. It is my favorite game so far :)!

such a fun take on cozy farming games! if you like stardew valley or games like it, but want something with a little bit unique to it, this is totally worth a play. for a history buff like me who loves cultures from all over the world, getting to roam an ancient Chinese village and engage with folklore, social conventions, and festivals is a dream come true. that plus the unique barter system in place is so cool! I love navigating and finding out what villagers treasure more. overall reasonably priced and worth the purchase!!

I'll preface this review by saying that I am one of those players that is always hunting for Stardew Valley clones. I'm always looking for new ones that bring something fresh, and would say I've played 90% of the games on the market right now. Halcyon Days at Taoyuan looks good on paper - it has everything I want. Fishing, farming, romance, mining, combat, seasons and festivals etc. I also quite liked the beast taming and rarity aspect which is unique enough. But the game just falls flat for me. What I didn't like: - The game uses a bartering system instead of money, where you can trade items for other items or sell things to collect tickets used for purchasing specialty objects. It's an interesting concept, but I really just found it frustrating. The value of your items is really hard to determine, plus the trades don't seem all that fair at times (you're telling me I painstakingly soaked my rice, fermented it, brewed it and aged it over multiple days, and all it's worth is like 15 seeds?!). So at times, you'll go to a vendor to barter, realise your items aren't worth enough, go back to your farm to get more and return, all the while the vendor has closed since they're only open on half days on days ending in 3, 6, 9 and 0. - It has such a cool concept for a story, but it's executed unbelievably poorly. The whole plot is tied to the mines, where you get a bit of story every time you beat a boss. But because it's tied to mining, and you need ore to upgrade your tools, I completed it super quickly. Like, I still had all level 2 tools except for my pickaxe and sword, only had 2 hearts with like 3 villagers and was in Summer Year 1. Plus, I feel like there was barely any story, then on the third boss they just lore-dump this insane plot that comes almost out of nowhere. - The map is painful to me. There are parts that are huge and pretty much useless other than collecting a couple of herbs or some fruit. You have to jack your movement speed up to make it bareable. There is fast travel, but to unlock it you have to complete skill-related tasks, one of which requires you to cook 600 meals :(. By the time I'd unlocked it I was pretty much finished the game. - Something I like about other games in this genre is that you can be fully self-sufficient. Unfortunately, in this game you are very much reliant on vendors - like going to see at least 1-2 of them every day. Like you're telling me I have a whole farm to myself, yet I can't make the spices required for literally 90% of the cooking items? Or that I can't just smash open jade stones myself? All in all, I really wanted to like this game. But it just doesn't live up to expectations in its current state.