There's a reason all "cosy" games are called Stardew Valley clones, but it's not easy to put it to words. It's not just because it's just stellar in any aspect - there are balancing issues both mechanically and in battle, the idle chatter gets a little repetitive too fast for my tastes, the art has obvious and maybe intentional limitations - but somehow it works. It's startling how quickly you feel at home in the Valley, how easy it is to take pride in your work, and get attached to characters that thread a strange space between idealised and deeply flawed. Moreover, there are depths to the game, in a way that is rare these days.

If that sounds too pretentious, let me summarise it like this: Great game, it may feel like there isn't much to it at first, but all it has does a lot of work.

If somehow this review is your first contact with Stardew Valley, my advice is take your time, and don't worry about your decisions too much - except for one. Pick the Mushroom Cave, the bats are unreliable and get obsolte quickly.

It's a sweet game in so many levels!

Anytime civilization you start in Timberborn, it plays in two acts: The Struggle & The Sprawl. The first act is really cool, and really tightly developed, it's fun resource management and water engineering to make sure you can survive the dry seasons until you find stability. The Sprawl, however, still needs brushing up. Like in so many games in this genre, once you get to a certain level, there's not much of a challenge anymore, and no reward other than making the map look really cool and achieving ever higher amounts of beavers.

Even though this later stage game feels almost morose - without much to pursue or tangible reward to keep chasing - I still find myself playing on and on, painting the world green, trying to create mega structures, and just generally enjoying my prosper beavers, since all of that feels just fantastic. I hope to see more lore, beavers feeling more alive, and more late game challenges, or variety in general.