Tales from The Dancing Moon

I don't particularly like to thumb down someone's solo project, and I'd rather prefer if Steam had a more nuanced review system than it does, but I couldn't really bring myself to keep playing this. It tries to do a lot of different things, but there's not a really anything that I could point to and say was actually enjoyable. What's here in terms of mechanics, it's just ...there. Nothing feels fun, or rewarding. Farming and gathering resources are chores, combat is clunky. Everything is a fetch quest, in a static, drab brown world. The mix of generated areas is a cool idea, in theory, but it's actually just the same tiny map with minimal variation. And then it forces you to wait a few days while some NPC does some task, to stretch it out. Before giving up, I was already rich, I'd rather not do any farming or building if I could avoid doing it again. I was basically just sleeping through the days to advance time, until I couldn't take it anymore and decided there's better ways to be spending my time. If you try the demo and really enjoy your time with that, maybe you'll enjoy it. I gave up hope that it's going to add something down the road that makes it more fun, it just dragged on too much. That isn't to say that there aren't positive things to say about the game, though. Others clearly enjoy the game, and I feel like those reviews cover those pretty well. I'm rather adding why the game didn't click for me. Edit for dev response: I'd just finished with the bard/stage part, and opened the caves. The main issue for me was the town feeling very static and stuck on repeat, with NPCs giving the exact same responses, and nothing to do but the same chores I didn't particularly enjoy. The story was ok, but not enough to keep me going. But others clearly enjoyed it more than I did. I wish you good luck with the game :)

I think this game has great potential, however its a little rough right now, but not enough for me to give it a bad review. It is being developed by one guy and hes doing a great job. I havent encountered any bugs or crashes yet. The mix of old school crpg and newer graphics is a welcome addition to the genre. I cant wait to see where this goes.

Not a bad game but it wasn't long until it revealed a character to be gay so.... I'm out.

I don’t know exactly what made me attracted to the game but it didn’t let go and so I bought it and it surprises me that there are only 23 reviews at this point. I so enjoyed this game. The story is a little piece of art. Huh, what’s this tire doing here? Find those journals, be creative in cooking, buy and decorate your home, decorate town, go fish on a lake, sell your crops, do extra quests for extra cash, fast travel or skip time when you’re too eager to continue, give a blob a burger, make magical teas, enjoy seasons… There’s so much there… My gameplay was about 20 hours but I stayed a bit longer for some achievements and for buying every piece of decoration I could get. It’s the first game ever that could make me do that, stay to decorate. It’s for sure a long, long time ago that I felt a bit sad a game was over. This game deserves way more attention. Anyway, I’m glad I found this one.

I'm really enjoying the game so far. I'm still learning various bits as I only did a bit of the demo a while back and then bought the full game as I believed it had potential. The story is intriguing, and the visuals are rather nice. Edit: Having now completed the game once (though not 100% yet), I have really enjoyed playing it. The story is engaging all the way through, with an interesting twist. I'm loving the music as well, nicely done area themes. I do recommend for RPG and life sim enjoyers

Played the heck out of the demo. Works great on Steam Deck. Looks like skilled care went into the looks and design of this game. Can't wait to play more when it gets slow at work.

Tales From the Dancing Moon is a charming adventure game in the guise of a classic RPG. The world is fairly small and there's not a ton of NPCs, but they're all wonderfully fleshed out by the game's terrific narrative. You get to really know each character as you complete jobs for them and unravel the game's mysteries. The game also has fishing, cooking, crafting, and farming systems that can be explored and exploited along the way. You'll need to play with each to solve different puzzles, but much of it is left up to the player to work out and discover. For example, in the autumn you can farm pumpkins, but they take a long time to grow. I created a 100+ square farm, sold everything off after the harvest, and was swimming in money like Scrooge McDuck. It's possible to acquire the materials necessary for cooking a burger, brewing a tea of invisibility, or even a cooking a variety of soups. You can build your own house and furnish it however you want. My house was nothing but chests that I used to organize all of the things I was finding and collecting. I made my farm in the middle of town and put my workshop right next to the inn (sorry about the noise!). It's all extremely flexible. Total playtime for a first playthrough will be about 20 hours. The demo itself is the entire first act of the game and lasts for around 7-ish hours, so there's a lot of quality value here. I played through the whole thing on just the Steam Deck and it worked great. The one negative about the experience was that it really runs through the battery life of the system. Untethered, you'll only get about 1-1.5 hours on a single charge and the system's fan will be working overtime. That said, I never had any performance issues throughout the game. Very recommended!

Check out the Full First Act of Gameplay: https://youtu.be/UTaUPVIfSF4 Gameplay Review: Honestly, this is quite the little Indie Gem if you're a fan of Isometric or RPG games. This isn't nearly as stressful as a combat-oriented RPG and focuses far more on being a mystery / life-sim than anything else. I say life-sim lightly as while you can cook, grow food, build (incredible freedom in building btw), and make friends, the real reason I got sucked into this one was the mystery behind it. Without ruining anything, what kept me going was wanting to know who the heck I was, why I was in this strange place with no memories, and convince the one other person in the area with similar experiences to tell me what the heck was going on, not to mention chase down every diary entry of the person who came before me yet had suspiciously vanished right before we got there. This one plays like a mystery title would, keeping you intrigued and curious with every quest you complete, and while you can entertain yourself for hours with the side activities, ultimately your curiosity will drive you to blow up mysterious portals or giant boulders and take on slimes 5x your size. The writing is fantastic and for a single dev, this one has always impressed me. I haven't played past the first act yet but will be getting there soon and will happily update this review once I have. Dev & Improvement Review: Gameplay aside, I've been lucky enough to have early access to this game for months now and have watched it evolve over time with quality-of-life features galore, including the dev implementing some of my own personal feedback and thoughts. They truly care about this project and I'm excited to watch it through its EA phase into 1.0. If you're having any issues with the game, I implore you to join the Discord, your feedback will be seen, acknowledged, and responded to / addressed. I have nothing to gain from leaving this review and have not been paid or promoted, I just *genuinely* enjoy this game and adore the dev that's been slaving over it because of how much they care for their project and have sought to improve it based on the community's feedback. Don't believe me... check the playtime... and that's not even past Act 1.

Really fun little game, and the developer is really active on Discord - listens to all complaints and suggestions and addresses them. Definitely worth a purchase!

After playing through Act 1 mostly offline, I can enthusiastically recommend this game! There's a demo, so give it a go! Great: Chill, focus on adventure and slowly unraveling the story of what happened (and what to do about it). Gather, farm, craft, mine, chop, fish. Fishing game is different and NOT frantic button mashing. Cooking and tea brewing are simple. The calendar AND the crop seeds will tell you if there's not enough time left in a season to harvest something. Quest and journal system work great. Neutral: fighting is minimal and feels the least elaborate, with a basic attack and block (at least so far.) Music hasn't varied much or been remarkable (at least so far.) Dying is harsh, but it's easy to dodge back and then sprint away from any fights. Worth noting: First, the game adds things as you progress. For example, I couldn't find a way to sell stuff OR much use for money right at first... but then the market box unlocked and Lucas started offering crafting recipes for sale. Second, if you have two different quest progressions with the same person, you may have to wait for one before you can do the other. For example, I needed to ask Lucas for some help with repairs and for what he'd need to help out in the pub. I asked him about repairs first... and he was so absorbed in his work that he wouldn't talk with me about the pub... for 3 days. No harm done, I just did other stuff for a few days. On the downside, but not serious: I've run across a couple of minor bugs, but the game autosaves and keeps a spare. I also manually save before things that might be key, so I've been able to reload from a bit earlier point in each case without much fuss. So, this is worth checking out the demo, which is playable through the first season and a few starting areas. Then it's well worth the price.