Fields of Mistria Is My Favorite Farming Sim Since Stardew Valley [Review]

Everyone in my personal life better get ready for me not to shut up about Fields of Mistria, because I absolutely love it.

What Is Fields of Mistria

Developed by NPC Studio, Fields of Mistria is a farming/life sim in the vein of Harvest Moon, Rune Factory, and Stardew Valley. In the game, you take on the role of an adventurer lured to the small, rural town of Mistria to help them stockpile food in case of a disaster and with a revitalization project. Along the way, you unpack the history of Mistria and discover a mystery lurking in the old mines just outside of the town.

How Much of Fields of Mistria Did I Play

Although there’s more to the game during Early Access, I underestimated just how much there was to do in Fields of Mistria. I put in more than ten hours and only got through the first season. I absolutely loved my time with the game, though. When I wasn’t playing Fields of Mistria, I kept wanting to pick it back up. If I didn’t have to write this review and do my job, I would be playing Fields of Mistria right now. I didn’t stop because I wanted to. I stopped because time exists.

What’s the Gameplay Like?

Since Stardew Valley launched, a lot of games have tried to capture what made it successful by blending the farming/life sim with some other genre, or even just copying it relatively outright but with a different coat of paint. There have been some really good ones, but most have failed to capture what really made Stardew Valley work.

What Stardew Valley did that was so special was take Harvest Moon formula and add some spice to it in the form of deep lore, excellent characters, and some new gameplay elements like combat to break up the monotony. The game was such a tectonic change for the genre that it made the Harvest Moon, later Story of Seasons, franchise basically irrelevant. Stardew Valley had, after all, done everything they’d done but better.

Fields of Mistria plays really similarly to Stardew Valley, though with a beautiful ’90s-style pixel art aesthetic. The game sees you farming, fishing, mining, fighting, and befriending villagers in an attempt to help a struggling town rebuild.

I’m not sure if Fields of Mistria re-invents the genre quite as much as Stardew Valley did, or at least not yet, but it does feel like it’s refined that game in some key ways.

The fishing, farming, mining, and combat in Fields of Mistria all feel like a finely tuned version of those in Stardew Valley. They’re well-designed, and the game is a bit more explicit with how things work and what to do. Most of the time, I appreciate this extra guidance, since it cut through some of the confusion that makes starting Stardew Valley a bit hard, though at the same time, I can see why that might not appeal to some folks, especially since Fields of Mistria does, right now, feel a fair bit easier. Still, it’s enjoyable to play, and the gameplay loop is addictive and fun. I never found myself bored.

Crafting does definitely feel more important in Fields of Mistria than it does in other games. Although you can just buy upgraded tools, you can also forge them yourself by gathering the right ingredients, which is a great way to encourage people to actually use the crafting system. Crafting also takes time. You don’t just go into your inventory and instantaneously come out having made a hundred fence posts. It adds a nice dynamic to the time management aspect of the game.

Cooking feels more necessary in Fields of Mistria than a lot of games as well. Stamina is in relatively short supply, and the best way to regain it is to eat food that you’ve made. Going into the mines without a good supply of food is a massive mistake, and I really liked that the game made me actually prepare. A lot of the crafting that can feel extraneous in other games, or like flavor during the endgame. In Fields of Mistria, crafting and cooking feel immediately and obviously necessary.

It’s in the character interactions that Fields of Mistria really shines, though. I can’t get over how much dialogue there is in the game. Normally, the farming/life sim genre has a problem of character dialogue looping relatively quickly. Characters in Fields of Mistria seem to react relatively dynamically to what’s going on in the world around them. They comment on things that you’ve done, the nearness to a seasonal change, and other small details that makes the world feel alive.

There’s also a sense that characters in the game know each other in a deeper way. For example, every Friday night, all of the villagers gather at the local inn. One group samples fine wine, one group players cards, and another plays a version of Dungeons & Dragons. Each of the groups has their own little storyline running through the time. Everyone in Fields of Mistria feels not only absurdly well flushed out, but like a real member of a community. And when the game’s themes focus so much on the power of community, it’s an absolutely brilliant choice.

Even though Fields of Mistria does involve a lot of “the player character is responsible for doing everything and saving everyone,” the game does a wonderful job of making it feel like you’re playing a role in a larger community project by having other people actually do things in the revitalization cutscenes. It’s such a small detail, and where Fields of Mistria excels most is in that attention to detail. The game is clearly a well-crafted, well-thought out labor of love.

The incredible sense of community in the game makes the plot even more interesting. I want to keep improving the town and exploring the mines to make things better. At the heart of Fields of Mistria are the game’s characters, and the game’s characters are good and worth working hard for.

I don’t really have any major negatives for Fields of Mistria. The map feels a bit large at times. There’s virtually always something to do when you’re going from point a to point b, though, so it’s not that much of a problem. Considering the game is in Early Access, I expected something a fair bit rougher. I had two crashes that didn’t affect my progress in any significant way. That’s about it.

Verdict: Highly Recommended

I love Fields of Mistria. It’s the best new farming/life sim that I’ve played in years. It understood what worked about Stardew Valley and introduced a bunch of really nice quality-of-life improvements that help make the gameplay feel smooth. At the same time, the characters are genuinely some of the best to ever be in the genre. Since it’s an Early Access game, that means this is likely only the beginning for Fields of Mistria, and I genuinely cannot wait to see how the team behind it keeps improving on it.

Fields of Mistria is on sale now. A review code for the game was provided by the publisher.