Homestead Arcana

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Homestead Arcana

by Aethyna May 30, 2023 | 1 Votes | 89 Played | 0 Reviews

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Genres:

Simulation

Graphics:

3D

Labels:

Adventure , Magic , Life Sim , Building , Crafting , Farm

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Skybound Games In this game, you play as a witch on the Homestead Arcana program with the goal of growing and harvesting crops for your hometown of Little Rock. However, with the dangerous miasma closing in, and the mystery of your missing Aunt Tilly hanging over your head, maybe you could take this opportunity to do something more. Play Now Similar Games Played Post a Review

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Summary Plotline Gameplay Graphics/ Sound Conclusion

Summary

Homestead Arcana is an adventure-driven life sim with plenty to craft, a variety of crops to farm, and even more resources to harvest in the wild. In this game, you play as a witch on the Homestead Arcana program, just like your Aunt Matilda did, with the goal of growing and harvesting crops for your hometown of Little Rock, to supplement their dwindling food supply. But of course, things are easier said than done.

With the dangerous miasma closing in, and the mystery of your missing Aunt Tilly hanging over your head, maybe you could take this opportunity to do something more; at least more than just a glorified farmer with magical green thumbs.

Plotline

The Homestead Arcana program is the lifeline of the small barren town perched on top of a rocky mountain that’s aptly named Little Rock. Here, they send promising witches down to the valley to grow and harvest a variety of fresh food, using magic to greatly accelerate the growing process, allowing them to harvest a lot of crops within a shorter period of time. This is partly thanks to the dust-eater (tree) that has seemingly sprouted on that plot of land, making the land nearby magically charged with mana – the resource you’ll need to channel into the plants to make them grow faster – and, hence, incredibly fertile.

You are chosen to the Little Rock’s next program participant, just like your Aunt Matilda (affectionally known as Tilly) before you and your Grandmother Betty before her. Thankfully, you won’t be venturing onto unknown lands yourself – your family’s familiar, a black cat who can talk called Huckeberry, will be accompanying and mentoring you.

Why can’t just everyone from Little Rock join you in the valley and live there anyway, you may wonder. Well, one core reason against this is the presence of the miasma. No one knows how it came to be, but one day, it’s there, and it has always been expanding in unpredictable ways ever since. The miasma is something like a smog – It turns the air thick with corruption, making people, especially those with weaker immune systems, fall ill easily. It has also claimed many lives, the most prominent and recent of them all – your beloved Aunt Tilly, who also happens to be quite the talented witch when she was still around.

The thing is though, Aunt Tilly’s body was never found when the miasma finally claimed the land she had built her home on. Maybe… just maybe… there are clues in the miasma that will lead you to her?

Gameplay

At its core, Homestead Arcana is a life sim similar to titles like My Time at Portia. Here, you’re expected to venture out of your little campsite to harvest a variety of resources, ranging from wood to metal, to even wild fruit and veggies, from the wild and bring them back to camp, turning these items into crafting stations, decorations, and of course, precious and more filling (as compared to the raw versions, that is) food that you can whip up at the grill which you’ll need to keep hunger at bay and stay alive.

Farming is also another important aspect of the gameplay. However, it’s a lot different - and hence, unique - than other farming sims or life sims I’ve had the pleasure of reviewing in my lifetime. Instead of setting up multiple plots like in No Place Like Home, you just get that one plant from a single seedling you may have found in the wild or in the miasma. The plant can only be planted within the fairly small circle of fertile and mana-charged soil around the dust-eater tree at your base camp.

Once planted, you’ll need to cast a watering spell to make it sprout further and subsequently use the channeling spell to channel mana from the ground into the plant to greatly accelerate its growth and start fruiting. Harvesting the fruits/crops is as easy as pulling them from the plant. It’s not as simple as simply clicking on them and expecting them to just hop into your inventory and this way, the harvesting process does feel a bit more realistic.

Note that since you don’t get new seedlings often, you’re expected to make full use of the ones you have. This means using the channeling spell as often as possible to grow and harvest a lot of crops from a single plant within a short period of time.

But, there’s a huge catch here! The plant can only take so much and will become blighted – basically, the plant will become stunted and won’t produce anything - if you channel mana into it for too many times. This is indicated by the color of the mana orbs you’ll need to kind of rope into the focal point of the plant. If the orbs turn into bright blue color, then you’ll know that it’s the final time you can channel into the plant safely. If the orbs turn purple, you’d best cancel out of the channeling spell immediately because your plant is guaranteed to become blighted if you proceed.

This isn’t really mentioned in the game until you’ve accidentally blighted your first plant, which in my case, is my only Lavender plant. The game then tells you that there are two ways to counter this – one, you could talk to Huckleberry who will give you the recipe to craft a Sunlight Potion that can then dispel the blight, or two, you could wait it out and the blight will dissipate on its own.

The thing is though, option 1 works only if you do it immediately and option 2 definitely doesn’t work as intended and will instead, bug your plant seemingly forever. Since these plants produce resources that you’ll actually need to progress the story, you’ve essentially bricked the game… that is unless you’ve managed to make enough progress to unlock the second seedling for the crops you’ve blighted. However, in my case, Lavender seems to be quite a rare plant and I still haven’t found a second seedling for it.

Needless to say, Homestead Arcana does have some game-breaking bugs that you’ll do well to avoid if you’re determined to play the game until the end without having to start a new game.

The resources you gather, either from your plants or from the wild, or even from the miasma, especially once you’ve obtained the plague doctor’s mask from Huckleberry, can then be turned into various, more useful items via the handful of crafting stations you have, with the cauldron (potion-making) and the grill (food-cooking) being the most important. There are storage boxes that you can craft as well.

However, note that, unlike recipes, which you seem to be able to unlock by purchasing the final product from the Abraham the trader when he visits your camp, new crafting stations will only unlock as you advance in the game. For recipes, you will also get new ones as rewards for completing requests from Little Rock and its people or as a gift from your “mom and pops” from back home via the parcel hatch or even through good ol’ mail.

Progression in this game is mostly tied to how far you’ve managed to explore the miasma. The further you go, the more stuff you may find, such as new seedlings, journals left by your Aunt Tilly, and more. Of course, the dangers in the miasma will ramp up accordingly as well, featuring hostile creatures that will actively hunt you down if they spot you.

Items you find in the miasma will remain in the miasma if you “die” there. Only items that are successfully brought out of the place will remain in your inventory. This little gameplay design, although not at all unique – Hint: The Greedy Cave - is still very interesting here in the sense that it is the first time I’ve seen it being used in a life sim.

For a fan of life sims in general, Homestead Arcana is, no doubt, a very fun game to play. However, the game is marred with some bugs, at least one of which can be game-breaking. From what can be seen on the game’s Steam page, it doesn’t seem like the game is being worked on anymore by the developers.

Graphics/ Sound

The low poly-like graphics in Homestead Arcana are nothing short of amazing. Granted that I’m not much of a fan of certain parts of its shading effect, which for instance, greatly darkened Abraham’s face, the game features a fantastic palette of colors that really brings out the beauty of the “great outdoors”. This contrasts greatly with the gloomier visuals, tinged with a reddish fog, that you’ll see while you’re exploring in the miasma.

In terms of sound, the game comes with a selection of soft and relaxing music that matches well with the game’s Western theme and ambiance. The tune changes into something more ominous once you enter the miasma.

Conclusion

All in all, Homestead Arcana is a life sim with the potential of really making it big, thanks to its fun and chillax gameplay, as well as some unique farming, harvesting, and scavenging mechanics. However, the game does have its fair share of bugs, some of which can be game-breaking, that may ruin a run for some players. Hopefully, the devs will pick up the pace and roll out a patch to at least solve the game-breaking issues, giving this game a chance to really shine.