We had the wonderful opportunity to review the PC release of Story of Seasons: Pioneers of Olive Town! It was released on September 15, and there were noticeable improvements. We also took this opportunity to review the DLC additions.
For most of our thoughts on the base game, Ranch Story reviewed Story of Seasons: Pioneers of Olive Town’s initial release earlier this year.
Core Gameplay
Graphics
The graphics on the PC version of Pioneers are gorgeous, and markedly improved in comparison to Switch. One of the most notable benefits of playing on the PC is the extra details you get to see with the higher resolution and greater graphics option, you can see details like the smooth walking and idling animations of the town folks and visitors. It’s extremely easy to stream without any extra equipment, as is needed with the Switch. For regular gameplay, the game feels smoother than its console counterpart even with dated hardware and a particularly busy farm. Changing options during gameplay is also a simple process, letting you go from a full-screen experience to a windowed one without needing to restart.
Controls
After many hours spent on Pioneers for Switch, we assumed learning the controls between the two platforms would be intuitive. There was a learning curve however, and we think we might actually prefer setting up a controller instead of using keyboard and mouse. Fortunately, as with most PC games, this is an option.
It’s very easy to change which keys respond to what in controls under options when using keyboard and mouse. The default ones work well enough, however some options like scrolling must be done slowly with the scroll button on the mouse, or by clicking the arrows up and down in all menus. We would prefer a more responsive mouse to game functionality as the switch had with screen to game on handheld.
We did appreciate when using the keyboard, there’s a way to make hotlinks to all menus you might want a quick peek at, such as your crafting menu and resident information. It would be nice if there was the option of an onscreen keyboard when using the controller so these hotlinks could be utilized while playing with controllers.
Some menus that we found extremely useful on the switch were less so on PC, such as Grab Mode vs Send Mode when in the Bag/Box Inventory. I was always switching to Grab Mode on Switch, however I find Send Mode a lot easier to use on PC, because the amount of clicks are lessened.
DLC Additions
As veterans of the series, the DLC was an exciting addition to the game for us. We enjoyed seeing characters we remembered from other towns as well as the townsfolk who accompanied them. As for the additional marriage candidates, each one had so many events that added to their character’s development that it brought back both wholesome memories of playing the older games as well as made new memories in Pioneers. The characters, especially the ones from A New Beginning, had significant boosts in their individual story lines. Witnessing the development from the prior game to this one offered some satisfying continuity to tales we thought were otherwise finished in prior installments.
There are some disappointing aspects to the DLC, in particular the forerunner is the lack of connection between the new islands surrounding Olive Town and Olive Town itself. We don’t see the islanders and Olive Town residents mingle, and the islanders don’t participate in festivals. If this changes in the future, it would greatly improve the immersion of these returning characters to the new world created in Olive Town.
Patch Updates
There have been several quality of life updates to Pioneers over the last few months, all of which are extremely noticeable if you’ve plugged a lot of hours into this game from the minute it was released. We appreciate the dialogue additions to the entire cast, which are significant enough that it can take a few days to hit the same line twice. The loading times are even further improved between areas. The Chat Camera is a fabulous option for anyone missing the portraits from previous installments. The unique models when ordering different kinds of food at the restaurant are also a welcome addition.
Final Thoughts
The PC release of Story of Seasons: Pioneers of Olive Town won’t disappoint interested purchasers if they’re looking for PC games in the farming genre, and for fans, this is a great installment to the Story of Seasons series that you won’t want to miss. The DLC in particular is a great accompaniment to the base game if you’re a fan of the series or have played any of the prior Story of Seasons games included in the package. A great sign for any game is the desire to pick it up again after breaks between playing: one of the greatest pleasures one can find in Story of Seasons: Pioneers of Olive Town is the ability to revisit Olive Town over and over with new parts of the game to explore each time.
Ranchstory News Blog 