Mixed Feelings on Staxel
Dec. 4th, 2024 02:27 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
juliewolffang64Recently got a chance to snag a game on sale from the eShop and well, I still don't know quite exactly what to make of it. It's trying to not be a surprise but I recently had been getting deep into the Cozy Gaming genre alongside the constant Pokemon and Sonic stuff... I want to say this was found via Reddit of all places online and seeing the post got me intrigued on wanting to see it for myself. If the title wasn't too much of a giveaway, that game was Staxel.
Best way to explain this game is this: Minecraft styled building mixed with just about every farming sim under the sun. Harvest Moon, Farmville, Stardew Valley - you name it. It seemed like a great idea on paper and the screenshots on the eShop made it seem like a cozy game for me to try, but the first impressions kind of took a u-turn the minute I started playing.
Much like Minecraft, you do get the option to go through the normal mode where you are limited by the amount of money - or petals in this game - in terms of building materials and farming goods whereas there's creative mode. Of course, creative mode needs no explanation if you're familiar with Minecraft. There's not much of a story to it as far as I know of other than you're taking care of some farmland that is in dire need of TLC. It's nothing like the typical inherited farmland or main character wanting to escape the city life intro most other farming games do, but it does seem very odd... But that could be a personal nitpick.
Game is split into four seasons comprised of 28-30 days each. Year doesn't get tracked to a tee compared to other games in the genre but that to me is less pressure because I notice that if I haven't done this and this by the beginning of year 2, I tend to get antsy a bit. Multiplayer is an aspect that I need to summarize quickly before going on though. There's the option of being able to play with friends in the game and the giveaway option when creating a world is the option of how many houses to have generated. I remember going for 2 just for the sake of hey, I get more money that way just from breaking the house apart. You do start off with a fairly basic tutorial and definitely not a hand holding one for sure. Nice save on the game's part because I seriously hate those with a passion at times. Although, they also tend to be very loose with how you go about the game. Which also leads to a few more problems along the way. One thing that bugged me was that I kept finding loose socks all over the place and on occasion a missing phone.
I ended up just placing them on a bookshelf in my house and hoping that maybe a future bit in the game would explain it. Turns out, it didn't and ended up using a fan made wiki for the game. It's going to be a wiki relied kind of game for a bit...
The loose socks and missing phones are actually optional requests by the NPCs you get on occasion. Completing these would reward you with an item: sometimes a gatcha box, other times a transforming potion turning you into one of the various NPCs. For what purpose? I dunno. Even the wiki doesn't know much on that. Speaking of NPCs, you do get encouraged to talk to them once in a while to really progress through the game and unlock more of the features you can use. Example would be that in order to use the order system to get items overnight, you'd have to talk to the shop keeper enough to become aquatinted with them. Next day, they would ask you to make a postal area near the store and look for postal service workers. Sadly, not an easy task as it sounds because one can be found in early morning one day and the next could take a couple of more to find. You do this three times just to finish that task and unlock the order system.
Still worth it in the long run as you now have a secondary spot to sell items at, and it seemed to be at a higher sell price as well. You don't get the petals right away and are delivered the next day so it takes a bit of patience.
The farm animals are nice but man do some of these feel like babysitting a toddler at times. I'm pretty sure the Tamagotchi critters are still worse... You do have your usual cows, sheep, and chickens. The mayor gives you the option between a cat or dog after a certain point in the game so there's that too, but they are less of a hassle to care for.
The farm animals tend to be very curious to the point of getting out of their specific area and regardless of how much effort you put into fencing the area closed, they will find some little loop hole to aggravate the heck out of you. At first, I thought critter crates would be the best option to getting them back into their place. That was until I found a better solution: you lure them back in with their feed in your hands. You don't have to feed them but you just need to have it selected and stand in front of them to get their attention. I found that to be a better alternative than the previous method, even if my cow is a bit of a bratty two year old...
The building aspect of the game is heavy to the point of being included in the main tasks. It even had a quick note on how you'd have to turn off the protect area feature when interacting with the buildings signpost. In retrospect it's not a bad thing until the grass and flowers get far out of hand that mowing your fellow neighbors' lawn requires you to do that little thing just to get the task done. Granted, the mowing chore is just an optional thing and only gets you flower petals for crafts and the occasional mixed seeds.
You're going to be relying on the mixed seeds for a while though. If you can, start small and get aquatinted with the controls before you deep dive into the farming portion.
Each season has its own events but the main thing I want to talk about in great length is the Portal Festivals. For a good bit of the game, you're going to be relying on these a lot. Whether it's for specific materials or just money fodder, you're going to be doing the portals a lot. The two main ones are the wood and mining portals considering there's a lot of recipes to craft that require wood and/or minerals. This is especially the case with blue and pink crystals being the main target.
Blue moreso considering that this is what is needed to upgrade your tools when able to. The portals are indeed the most different parts of the game that you are on your own for a while with no access to a shop to sell your extra items at so your best bet is to make plenty of space before taking the trips. More care is needed with each step as there are some spots where you can fall down a bottomless pit. Unlike either Sonic or Minecraft, you don't necessarily die when you fall in there but instead - you just respawn in the area in front of the portal. All items in tact and none the wiser.
All in all, it's definitely not the best game I've played nor the worst. It definitely kept my attention more than what Minecraft could do and incentive to keep going and build more on to my current projects was enough to spend hours into this mess. I think even at the time of writing this, I'm still working on the underground house on my farm, two houses for incoming villagers, and finishing the museum up for the fossils. Hey, it's no Animal Crossing in terms of building the museum up but I like the flexibility with it.
NPCs are just forgettable at this rate though, most of the time I remember them by their status or what they do. Only one I know by name is Farm Fan because... You constantly talk to them throughout the tutorial and still do for getting achievement prizes. They tend to be pretty snotty about having a full inventory when they try to give you something though. Even the Fae Queen is just as bad especially when you catch a fairy regardless of curiosity or just catching every bug. Sorry I caught this blue fairy, no need to chomp on me like a chili cheese big Mac...
While a good time waster, can't really say that Staxel is top game of the year, especially when the original devs have moved on from this game.
Best way to explain this game is this: Minecraft styled building mixed with just about every farming sim under the sun. Harvest Moon, Farmville, Stardew Valley - you name it. It seemed like a great idea on paper and the screenshots on the eShop made it seem like a cozy game for me to try, but the first impressions kind of took a u-turn the minute I started playing.
Much like Minecraft, you do get the option to go through the normal mode where you are limited by the amount of money - or petals in this game - in terms of building materials and farming goods whereas there's creative mode. Of course, creative mode needs no explanation if you're familiar with Minecraft. There's not much of a story to it as far as I know of other than you're taking care of some farmland that is in dire need of TLC. It's nothing like the typical inherited farmland or main character wanting to escape the city life intro most other farming games do, but it does seem very odd... But that could be a personal nitpick.
Game is split into four seasons comprised of 28-30 days each. Year doesn't get tracked to a tee compared to other games in the genre but that to me is less pressure because I notice that if I haven't done this and this by the beginning of year 2, I tend to get antsy a bit. Multiplayer is an aspect that I need to summarize quickly before going on though. There's the option of being able to play with friends in the game and the giveaway option when creating a world is the option of how many houses to have generated. I remember going for 2 just for the sake of hey, I get more money that way just from breaking the house apart. You do start off with a fairly basic tutorial and definitely not a hand holding one for sure. Nice save on the game's part because I seriously hate those with a passion at times. Although, they also tend to be very loose with how you go about the game. Which also leads to a few more problems along the way. One thing that bugged me was that I kept finding loose socks all over the place and on occasion a missing phone.
I ended up just placing them on a bookshelf in my house and hoping that maybe a future bit in the game would explain it. Turns out, it didn't and ended up using a fan made wiki for the game. It's going to be a wiki relied kind of game for a bit...
The loose socks and missing phones are actually optional requests by the NPCs you get on occasion. Completing these would reward you with an item: sometimes a gatcha box, other times a transforming potion turning you into one of the various NPCs. For what purpose? I dunno. Even the wiki doesn't know much on that. Speaking of NPCs, you do get encouraged to talk to them once in a while to really progress through the game and unlock more of the features you can use. Example would be that in order to use the order system to get items overnight, you'd have to talk to the shop keeper enough to become aquatinted with them. Next day, they would ask you to make a postal area near the store and look for postal service workers. Sadly, not an easy task as it sounds because one can be found in early morning one day and the next could take a couple of more to find. You do this three times just to finish that task and unlock the order system.
Still worth it in the long run as you now have a secondary spot to sell items at, and it seemed to be at a higher sell price as well. You don't get the petals right away and are delivered the next day so it takes a bit of patience.
The farm animals are nice but man do some of these feel like babysitting a toddler at times. I'm pretty sure the Tamagotchi critters are still worse... You do have your usual cows, sheep, and chickens. The mayor gives you the option between a cat or dog after a certain point in the game so there's that too, but they are less of a hassle to care for.
The farm animals tend to be very curious to the point of getting out of their specific area and regardless of how much effort you put into fencing the area closed, they will find some little loop hole to aggravate the heck out of you. At first, I thought critter crates would be the best option to getting them back into their place. That was until I found a better solution: you lure them back in with their feed in your hands. You don't have to feed them but you just need to have it selected and stand in front of them to get their attention. I found that to be a better alternative than the previous method, even if my cow is a bit of a bratty two year old...
The building aspect of the game is heavy to the point of being included in the main tasks. It even had a quick note on how you'd have to turn off the protect area feature when interacting with the buildings signpost. In retrospect it's not a bad thing until the grass and flowers get far out of hand that mowing your fellow neighbors' lawn requires you to do that little thing just to get the task done. Granted, the mowing chore is just an optional thing and only gets you flower petals for crafts and the occasional mixed seeds.
You're going to be relying on the mixed seeds for a while though. If you can, start small and get aquatinted with the controls before you deep dive into the farming portion.
Each season has its own events but the main thing I want to talk about in great length is the Portal Festivals. For a good bit of the game, you're going to be relying on these a lot. Whether it's for specific materials or just money fodder, you're going to be doing the portals a lot. The two main ones are the wood and mining portals considering there's a lot of recipes to craft that require wood and/or minerals. This is especially the case with blue and pink crystals being the main target.
Blue moreso considering that this is what is needed to upgrade your tools when able to. The portals are indeed the most different parts of the game that you are on your own for a while with no access to a shop to sell your extra items at so your best bet is to make plenty of space before taking the trips. More care is needed with each step as there are some spots where you can fall down a bottomless pit. Unlike either Sonic or Minecraft, you don't necessarily die when you fall in there but instead - you just respawn in the area in front of the portal. All items in tact and none the wiser.
All in all, it's definitely not the best game I've played nor the worst. It definitely kept my attention more than what Minecraft could do and incentive to keep going and build more on to my current projects was enough to spend hours into this mess. I think even at the time of writing this, I'm still working on the underground house on my farm, two houses for incoming villagers, and finishing the museum up for the fossils. Hey, it's no Animal Crossing in terms of building the museum up but I like the flexibility with it.
NPCs are just forgettable at this rate though, most of the time I remember them by their status or what they do. Only one I know by name is Farm Fan because... You constantly talk to them throughout the tutorial and still do for getting achievement prizes. They tend to be pretty snotty about having a full inventory when they try to give you something though. Even the Fae Queen is just as bad especially when you catch a fairy regardless of curiosity or just catching every bug. Sorry I caught this blue fairy, no need to chomp on me like a chili cheese big Mac...
While a good time waster, can't really say that Staxel is top game of the year, especially when the original devs have moved on from this game.
