Magical farming game Fae Farm makes my heart flutter

Prepare yourself for an incredibly cozy and magical experience in Fae Farm – an upcoming, witchy, farming game with plenty of friends, fishing, and fairy dust. I got the opportunity to play Fae Farm ahead of release, and I didn’t expect to like this quite as much as I did from just a quick preview, but I’m smitten with the game already.

What’s the story behind Fae Farm? Well, you find a message in a bottle washed ashore that invites you to a town you’ve never been to – so you agree and set sail immediately. Alas, your boat meets a sad fate and you become shipwrecked, washing up on a mysterious shore. Conveniently this is Azoria – exactly where you intended to go. How about that?

First things first, there’s a character creator in Fae Farm, and it’s pleasantly stocked with a large color picker for skin, hair, and eye colors. There are flexible pronoun options, plenty of hair do’s to choose from and is overall very easy to use.

Now you’ve got a cute new villager, it’s time to head into the world. Immediately you’re set on your new farming life by the mayor, discovering tools and how to work your land. Get this – tools automatically select themselves for whatever it is you’re doing. Walk up to a rock and your pickaxe is in your hand. Turn around to chop wood and the axe is there. No switching required! This feels revolutionary to me.

As you go about your life planting seeds from a robust catalog and creating a workspace for yourself, you’re also filling in a hefty Almanac with sections for foragables, recipes, potions, and more. This is a helpful item that collects all the information you could possibly need, like how to build workstations and all the numerous crafting benches.

Building up your farm couldn’t be easier, either – simply open the menu, choose the recipe, and place it down. Done! Easy. Soon there are gem polishers and critter conservatories all over the place. If you fancy a break after a long day of building and farming, then you can go fishing for a wide variety of underwater creatures. Fishing is simple, though you’re at the mercy of fickle fish who swim away from the bait. Perhaps lures and bait await us at full release to really tempt them to us.

When your pockets are full up, you can sell your home-grown produce and any other stuff you pick up around the place at a stall in the middle of town to earn yourself some gold, while chatting to the other townsfolk, and soaking up Azoria’s culture. This includes a selection of eligible bachelors just waiting for you to woo them.

If you’re feeling a little tired after all this exploring, then head back to your homestead where a carefully calculated Cozy Rating replenishes your health, energy, and mana all at once. Different furniture items boost different things, so it’s wise to pay attention to the recommended decor. Keep an eye on the time while you’re adventuring and decorating – each day has a midnight cut-off. But there’s no penalty for staying out past your bedtime, instead, you’re gently transported home where you wake up again in the morning.

There’s truly tons to discover in Fae Farm from the Spooky Woods to the Fae Realm, where you can set up another farm for even more crops and critters to grow. Here you also find a magical dungeon area that holds special gems and strange enemies that wish to battle you. Thankfully, with a magic wand at your side, combat is as simple as a swish and flick.

For you farming game veterans, there are some neat things I just have to tell you about. A Sadness Potion creates a cloud to follow you around that’s essentially an automatic watering ability – you may spot this in the latest trailer. There’s also a gust spell on the magic wand that works on crops to gather loads at a time, making it super quick to gather all our fully-grown turnips. And yes, there are also animals here – Mamoos and Woolyhorns provide milk and wool, and there are chickens to raise as well.

Fae Farm has multiplayer options for up to four players, which essentially acts as an assist mode in the mines and provides some friendly company. The Switch supports both local and online play, and you can invite players through your Switch’s friends list.

Now, the copy I played did have some muddy graphics the further I went on, however, I withhold judgment for the final product – when I’m not investigating every corner of a pre-release build and pushing it past limits I probably wasn’t supposed to. I just wanted to find all the mushrooms, alright? Even so, the blurry NPC faces didn’t bother me one bit as I became engrossed in fulfilling daily requests for them. Other than that, there were no issues in terms of frame rate or performance, just the blurring.

I’m genuinely excited to play more of this at release and you should add it to your Switch wishlists – or Switchlists – right now. Fae Farm flutters onto Nintendo Switch on September 8 so there’s thankfully not too long to wait before we can dive into the magical world of Azoria.

For more wholesome recommendations, here are all the best farm games currently on Switch and the best Switch multiplayer games for some friendly matches with your family.