Stardew Valley, but from hell. In Neverway, we will become a farmer in a world straight out of a nightmare
In Neverway, we'll see all the charming elements from Stardew Valley - plus a lot of supernatural horror.
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A horror version of Stardew Valley - that's how players received the trailer for Neverway, which somewhat sets a typical life sim in a very unusual world for the genre, straight out of nightmares.
The Triple-I Initiative show brought a lot of interesting announcements. Not necessarily completely new, but the presentation drew the attention of players to many promising indie games. Among them was a title by Coldblood studio - the name itself says a lot about the direction their "life sim" will take.
Life sims usually fall under the category of "cozy games": games that focus on relaxation and lack of violence. Not all games strictly adhere to this definition, but even those exceptions have many "cozy" elements. For instance, in Stardew Valley there is a combat system and dungeon exploration.
However, the Coldblood team doesn't even try to pretend that their title is a "cozy game." Neverway combines the convention of a "life sim with a touch of RPG" with the atmosphere straight from horror, in which a dimension full of unspeakable terror slowly seeps into the real world.
The main character - Fiona - after reg from her job, ends up on her own farm. A usual start of a "farmer's" life sim. Apart from the minor detail that the girl becomes the "immortal herald of a dead god," the game world is far from colorful—shades of gray dominate in Neverway. This makes it hard to believe that the visual setting was created in collaboration with the artist responsible for the graphics of the acclaimed Celeste, Pedro Medeiros (who left Extremely Ok Games after Hyper Light Drifter, among others).
Nonetheless, Neverway is still a life sim in the style of Stardew Valley - even if this style is hidden under gloomy graphics, terrifying scenes, and somewhat disturbing independent characters. Cultivating the land, fishing, decorating the farm, even romances with over a dozen characters with their own plots and quests - all these elements straight from SV can be found in Neverway.
At the same time, the game seems to put more emphasis on dynamic combat, with the possibility of adjusting the fighting style to the player's preferences. It will be easy to die, at least judging by what the devs have shown so far.
This is by no means the first project based on such a concept. In the development, there are also equally "cozy" Welcome to Elderfield by Chris Cote and We Harvest Shadows by David Whele. However, none of these titles focus on pixel art, like Stardew Valley and Neverway.
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