Hokko Life, as an early access title, holds a lot of promise. It is the relaxing, down to earth game that you can spend hours playing, creating a town that you can be proud of.
Hokko Life, developed by Wonderscope and published by Team17, takes you to the charming but quaint town of Hokko and released on Steam early access on June 3, 2021. You start your story by accidentally falling asleep on a train and making your unexpected arrival to the quiet town. You easily make yourself at home when the adorable townsfolk ask you to help give their quiet town some much needed TLC, in hopes to bring the town back to life.
If you are a fan of titles such as Animal Crossing and Harvest Moon, this game will be familiar to you. The beautiful and relaxing soundtrack will warm your heart as you explore the picturesque town of Hokko, helping residents with tasks such as fishing, crafting, and being able to bring to life your plans for this quiet town.
Once your creativity kicks off and you are giving the town of Hokko the makeover it deserves, new residents will start to join your community. All you need is the materials to make a house and place a bed, and they will start to arrive. The characters that make themselves home in your town can be loveable and absolutely pleasant to speak to, whilst others can be quite bland and lack personality.
The one feature in Hokko Life that stands out among other farming simulators is the crafting system. Not only do you create items but you can edit individual parts of an item to make them entirely unique. What is even better is there are no snap mechanics when placing down items and furniture so they can practically go in any direction and angle. Playing a game where you have creative control, this feature is so significant.
What I would like to see improved in the game is the character creation process. Whilst the colour scope when creating your character is in-depth, the styling is very basic. As much as I love having full reign of a game and being able to make my own choices, a set out quest to trigger in-game events, or have goals you can work towards, will keep my interest when my creativity levels are starting to burn out.
Hokko Life, as an early access title, holds a lot of promise. It is the relaxing, down to earth game that you can spend hours playing, creating a town that you can be proud of. Currently there is no set date for a full release but Wonderscope state on their Steam page, “Hokko Life will continue to be in Early Access until it is deemed to be a complete and solid experience, and one that the community enjoys.” This review utilised a key provided by Renaissance PR.
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Written by: Alexandra Nitschke (RogueSultana)
