Littlewood

I'm going to start this off by saying this game isn't a farming sim like Stardew Valley, it's a life sim, closer to something like animal crossing (which is pretty obvious from looking at the description, but a couple years ago when I was looking for a farming sim and bought this game, I was slightly disappointed so just a fair warning lol) This game has a lot of good things, some mediocre things, and quite a bit of bad things so this might be a bit long. So tl:dr, this game has a unique time system that is action-based rather than real-time, has a lot of skills to upgrade, requires you to grind a lot to make progress, and has a lot of progression locked behind drawing the right blueprints through weekly randomized shop items, which only really becomes an issue mid to late-game. The dialogue and npcs are fun and nice at first but are incredibly one-dimensional and are kind of just there as a mechanic. This game is for people who like grinding and collecting OR want a fairly simple easy game to play during breaks that is easily pauseable and/or quick to get to the next save between days since its timer allows you to go at whatever speed you want to, and for people who like organizing and designing homes/towns and making things look pretty. This game is NOT for people who want an engaging story, or unique and interesting characters since all of the characters can be described in like 3 sentences or less, there is also a minimal sense of progression in the game and it feels like you're doing things for the sake of doing something rather than gaining meaningful insight or benefits from doing so (not a bad thing, just not a lot of people's things honestly). ok, now to get started on the full review. The good: This game has a VERY good time system. Instead of making the time system real-time, like virtually every farming sim and life sim on the market, they decided to make the time based on how many actions you perform rather than actual real-time. it forces you to think about what you want to do in your limited time and go slower and more relaxed than just simply go as fast as you physically can because it takes so much time to get back to a season you missed something in that it feels like a chore to try go progress until then and this mitigates almost all of that extra stress from having a timer, which also makes the game so much more friendly for people who want to play something during breaks since how fast the days progress is entirely self-paced and there is no punishment for going slowly or quickly. This is almost single-handedly the reason I played so much of this game since it's something you don't see nearly often enough. The leveling system in this game is unique since there are skills for virtually everything (gathering, crafting, farming, mining, woodcutting, bug catching, fishing, merchanting (selling stuff in your town), cooking, and even one for the card game that they made named Tarott Monster) and almost all of them feel pretty worthwhile in terms of rewards (excluding the card game, that one is entirely optional and gives you few rewards, the only real reward for that one is if you have fun playing the card game itself). This is one thing that they could have done a lot more with, though, so there are some elements that are better than others for this. The thing I enjoyed the most about the leveling is specifically the merchanting and crafting since they both feel like natural progression that gives good benefits (allows you to earn more money and have more slots to sell things in / gives you more resources when crafting and allows you to use fewer resources which makes it take less energy). The town system is very good, specifically the fact that you can go into a building/moving mode to place stuff anywhere you want, and manipulate everything, adding water, higher pieces of land, instantly move buildings to different places, it's so easy and simple but very well executed, it allows for people who get irritated from trying to put a lot of effort into making their town look pretty to actually do so without nearly as many problems since the interface is so user-friendly. The mediocre/neutral: The town hall is a unique take on an upgrade system that enables you to have more benefits from unique things, like getting more money from selling specific resources, get more benefits from specific npcs, increase the time you have in a day, expanding the number of fruit trees/plants that you can have at a time, and more. This is a system that I personally like, especially later in the game, but it feels fairly unbalanced due to the fact that you're given three things to upgrade at the start of the week that you have the option of purchasing with money, and those are completely random. Since you don't have much money at the start of the game, you can get screwed over by hoping for an energy upgrade to appear and then not getting one to spawn for a whole month. This is a reoccuring problem that I will touch on later in the bad section. The reason this isn't in the bad is because this is solved later in the game when you aren't impacted by a lack of money and are just able to buy all three upgrades every week with no problems, but even then that isn't exactly the best solution, it just feels good to be able to buy out every shop all the time with maximum merchanting and loads of money. This game is almost entirely a grinding game, which can be good or bad depending on the person. For me, I don't like games where the sole purpose is to grind for resources for multiple days to finally upgrade a building and then be back to square one of getting resources and crafting them again. This game, however, does it relatively well, mostly that the grinding is made more manageable because of how I played the game, using it as a semi-mindless break in between working, which imo is really where this game shines. Even just looking at the achievements shows how incredibly grindy this game is (there are achievements for catching 2500 fish, harvesting 4,000 crops, chopping 6000 trees, etc.) It has a specific niche which is good, but if you actively dislike mass grinding in games, this game is definitely not for you. The bad: The shops are entirely luck-based for what they have in stock, which isn't necessarily a bad thing until you find that you have to wait an entire year for a single piece of furniture that you need the blueprint for to show up so that you can complete an npc's quest for their house, which you happen to need to do at least twice, up to four times per npc. This is by far the worst thing about this game and the main reason I stopped playing; I could only complete maybe two people's quests because this took so long to actually complete. It's good that this problem only starts to become detrimental after you've spent over 25 hours in the game or else I would have played almost none of this game, it's only kind of annoying before you get to the point where you literally need these random items to progress since before that point you actually have other things you can do. The npcs are very plain and have little character. They exist for the sake of having people to talk to and quests to give, and they are fun at first but quickly become boring. Them following you around is cute, and relationships between them are a good idea, but very poorly executed. It feels like how Animal Crossing New Horizons did it, where characters kind of just like you all the time because you're the main character and are awesome. You don't play this game for the writing, though the minimal story at the beginning is kind of cute but that's it. Overall, this game has a lot of really good concepts that makes the game worth playing in my opinion but lacks content in a lot of other places, and a lot of the concepts that are genuinely good are only half-cooked. I think this game has more good than bad, but depending on the person, this could be a disappointing purchase.

At first glance, one might think it’s similar to Stardew Valley, and of course, as with all those type of sim games, there are some similarities. But, after having finished it, I have to say, it’s not, not really. The goals are just too different. Most of all, this is not a farming game. It’s a “follow the red line to rebuild a town according to requirements while grinding for money and materials” game. You meet new people, they move into your town when you build their houses, and along the way you unlock new structures you can upgrade. The world is rather small, your town, a few destinations you can travel to, as well as two randomly generated dungeon maps. Mostly you run around, raise skills and gather materials, to build and upgrade and unlock new stuff. image [h2]Positive Points[/h2] [list] [*]Stress free. There is no time, but every action costs energy. You can walk around, talk to people or decorate for as long as you want each day. Early on, the available energy might seem a bit low for all the things you want to do on a day, but there really is no downside to time passing. Later, you get a tool to have limitless energy. [*]Character generation is basically hair and clothes, and a way to change them can be unlocked in the game. The only thing you’re stuck with is your name, skin tone, and the town’s name. The personality is, I believe, only used for the town square statue. [*]I’m not sure it’s even possible to mess up permanently. Resources are technically infinite (if sometimes heavy rng based), and tearing down objects gives the used resources back. I guess you could cook with a rare fruit before you’ve planted it and hate yourself in the following hours until you find it again. [*]This is very subjective, but I enjoyed the obligatory card mini game very much, once I got the hang of it. [*]The game’s wiki is perfect, and has all the information you could ever want. [*]You can shape your town as you want, raising hills or creating lakes and rivers. You need to fulfill the villagers’ requirements, but after unlocking the rewards, you can technically move their houses as well. [/list] [h2]Neutral Points[/h2] [list] [*]There isn’t really a conclusion to the story. Which is kinda fine, I’m not playing this for the story. [*]Similarly, the NPC personalities aren’t that deep. Every character has a couple of quirky dialogues, but they repeat constantly, are not subtle at all, and I think even the marriage dialogues are all the same. [*]I spent the first I don’t know how many hours having to take care what I spend my money on, and it was fine. Then I reached 2-3 milestones pretty quickly and from one moment to the other, money was no problem anymore. Unlocking a vegetable that sells for a nice amount so I could get a few thousand per day - nice. Unlocking selling each cooked dish for 3000 no matter what, so I am swimming in money after a week - meh. [*]There isn’t that much freedom. Every villager wants exactly one set of furniture, and their house at a certain spot, and exactly one set of objects next to it (as in, right next to it, touching it). You only have room for a set amount of vegetables, fruit trees, animals, namely three of each. In my opinion, it does give the game some structure and a tangible goal, but also lowers the replay value. If going for achievements, you should start the timegated ones (flower breeding, villager quests) early on. There’s three save slots, as well as cloud saves. [/list] [h2]Negative Points[/h2] [list] [*]Oh, the grind. There’s two different kinds: For items, and for achievements. [*]For items, there are a lot of special items you can get while doing an action. Chop down a tree, have a chance of acorn. Most of those are fine, you can farm them by just doing that action over and over and over. Some are less fine. Super rare, super random, needs a wiki to figure out where they might drop. [*]I spent a substantial amount of late game time just checking the fully upgraded (and therefore offering any item in the game) merchants each day. That’s not fun gameplay. [*]There are several achievements that require you to do a huge amount of chopping/mining/fishing etc. The fishing one was the most obnoxious one. It took me half a (real life) day after finishing all the others just running around, fishing each spot dry each day, sleeping, repeat. And I already did do the fishing trip each day way before that, as well as catching every fish I came across in the forest and mine while doing the other ones. [*]Keybinds cannot be changed. This was the main reason I did not buy it on desktop PC, because I hate that. It also didn’t like my controller/the steam deck much, not being able to move with the d-pad, and not recognizing the x button to turn chairs, but that was easily fixed with the deck’s configuration tool. I am not sure if the windows version has the same issues. [/list] [b]I bought this with two expectations in mind:[/b] [list] [*]I knew it was grindy, most of the reviews on steam mentioned that. I was actually looking for a game with a bit of grind, to brainlessly play a day or two before bed, making progress without having to think. [*]I wanted to play it on the deck, where I knew I could rebind my controls. [/list] Considering that, I did get exactly what I wanted. It took me about 50h to 100% the game (well… I got all the achievements, and leveled all the skills up, but didn’t bother maxing all relationships or dating all villagers or beating them in the mini card game.) [b]Things I wish I had known before:[/b] [list] [*]All recipes use two ingredients, but you can just slam the bar full and the game will prioritize undiscovered recipes with the ingredients you picked. [*]There is a stat page in the menu, showing you progress on the “do x” achievements (I forgot, ok). [/list] Anyway, I’ve already written too much, and if you’re into that kind of games, this is a good one.

This game was advertised to me as something to scratch my Stardew itch, and because of that, I grew disappointed and bored. This game is not like SDV. It’s not even a farm sim. If you want a Stardew clone, look elsewhere. But once I realized what Littlewood actually is, I enjoyed it enough to put in 70 hours and get all 60 achievements. This game is a cozy, repetitive, low-stakes grindfest, with cute pixel art and enough lore (if you talk to the characters and read the item descriptions and other flavor text) to make up for the minimal story. This game is great to play in short bursts while also listening to a YouTube video or podcast, and it can get addictive, doing the same thing again and again to work your way up to the “chop 6000 trees” achievement. The length of the day is tied to your energy, so you can make it as long or short as you want — you can spend a long time going through the caves and forests looking for chests and not using any of your tools, or you can use up the day in a couple of minutes crafting dozens of logs. This helps break the monotony a bit; I liked to spend each day focusing on a different skill (catch as many bugs/fish as possible, mine as many ores as possible, you get the idea). The card mini game was also surprisingly fun. I’m not really a decorator in most games, but in this one I actually decorated my town (the birds' eye build menu is nice), and of course one of the achievements requires you to decorate the villagers’ homes according to their preferences. I did romance/max friendship every single eligible character, and they do all have distinct personalities, but don’t expect to actually get attached to them as much as they’re attached to you. This game was obviously made with love and there is humor if you pay attention to the flavor text; this is not a soulless 1-dimensional cash grab under the “cozy” label like many games nowadays are. But neither is it going to be your next favorite game — and it isn’t trying to be. Overall, I recommend Littlewood for people who like grinding for achievements/game completionists, and/or like to spend half their brain playing the game and the other half watching/listening to something else. I enjoyed my 70 hours with it, and I don’t ask for any more.

It gives you enough to get attached and invested, then throws you into a meaningless grind you don't realise leads nowhere till its too late. I bought this game in early access, and was surprised to see very little was added in the full release. I kept playing assuming an endgame explorable location would be unlocked, but nope. If your new to cozy farming sims like this, just buy stardew vallley (which is cheaper then littlewood). If you already have stardew valley... just play it again with mods. Im also shocked this got a full release on switch.

All we have is time. In the first hour or so of playing, I wasn't sure if I was going to like it. There's no stress, nothing to really overcome at first. I was chatting a few of the characters up, kinda mindlessly exploring the game. I thought it was cute, but maybe not enough to really hold my attention. Working on tasks uses up time in the day, or your "stamina", but socializing/traveling does not. The only limitation is really how much stamina your character has, which doubles as a representation of the time in a day. When I was growing up, my dad used to tell me, "All we have is time. Don't rush." I used to think he was just telling me that I didn't need to speed while driving or something, or to look where I was walking. Littlewood subtly made me realize what he actually meant. I noticed that I started to min-max my stamina usage for the day. Each new character brought into my Littlewood created additional things for me to prioritize for every day. Since socializing and moving around doesn't use up "stamina", I would always make sure to talk to everyone at least once per day. When I got into Summer in-game, it hit me. I realized that I always had time for a chat. My motivation at the start was to "build" as much as I could simply for the sake of playing the game. As I played, it developed into a desire not to "produce" as much as I could, but to get to know each new person more. I went from thinking "I'm going to spend the whole day chopping wood," to, say, running into Bubsy, hearing the intensely-eyebrowed bird-person say something funny, and then wondering what he'd want in his house, then having him tag along while I built things for his house, just so I could hear what else he's got to say. You can only do so much in a day. We get tired, eventually we have to rest. But in-between all our hustle, there's always time to listen to what someone else has to say. The game helped me understand what my Pops was really trying to say. All *we* have is time. Its what we all share. It's not an original thought, right? "Take time to stop and smell the roses," and such. I've heard it said, but Littlewood just kinda nudged me into really getting it, and I honestly appreciated that. The game is neat. :) It's a chill time, the writing is fun, and I really started to care about my town. I recommend it!

I supported this game while it was being developed but was burned by the abrupt cease of development and unfinished aspects that I was eagerly looking forward to. I was disappointed enough that I hid the game from my library. Now that I installed Steam on my new linux machine, it showed up for some reason. And, since it asked me to review it, I have to say that I don't. You'll invest a lot of time and connection to the game only for it to leave you unsatisfied and those connections lingering like you've been ghosted.

I must say I really love this game! It's like a mixture of Stardew Valley (one of my BIG favorites) and Animal Crossing. I like the fact that time doesn't progress as long as you just wander around and do certain things that won't give you "experience". Like shaping the ground in your little village, moving stuff, building/planting (as long as you have the materials, blueprints and the right to place that number of certain things)! Most other activities will gain you xp and cost energy though, so chose wisely what you want to do with your day. If you've done all that you want, you can always go to bed and start the next day. I like the NPCs too, each has their own personality and a little story line. I haven't progressed very far yet though. I tend to forget a lot of things you should do daily to progress - but it doesn't matter that much. It's never too late for anything. Just like in Stardew Valley there will always be a new day and a new year to get all the stuff you need/ level up what you need. That's the kind of games I like the best - when you can do everything in your own time and set your own goals and always discover new things while you go along. Do try this if you like those things too, I absolutely recommend it.

I liked the game and I finished it on 100% but I feel like that it is a time wasted. This may sound strange, but this game is great, it is relaxing and very organized or neat. You farm, grind, gather and then craft. Sounds quite usual for farming sim but all of it is for nothing. You farm to get tools and upgrades to farm more or faster. It is like this in many similar games but there is nothing worthwhile at the end of the game. Bland conversations and cutscenes does not help either. All of the endgame content is just cosemetics or decorations for your town. Which is kind of nice, but I expected something else. If you want to play a farming sim, play sdv, if you are done with sdv, play it with mods, if you are done with this as well, play something different but not this.

game has been abandoned by devs, controls get stuck and is full of bugs