Right at the beginning of JRR Tolkien’s The Hobbit‘adventure’ is a bit of a dirty word.
When the wizard Gandalf first meets the timid Bilbo Baggins, a comfort-loving, tobacco-smoking Hobbit, he asks: “I’m looking for someone to share in an adventure I’m arranging, and it’s very difficult to find someone.” Bilbo’s answer?
‘I should think so – in these parts! We are ordinary, quiet people and have no desire for adventures. Nasty disturbing uncomfortable things! Don’t be late for dinner!
So, at least at the beginning of the famous Middle-earth adventures, Hobbits do not want to leave their cozy, modest life. Tales of the Shire by Wētā Workshop – best known for working on props and special effects for Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings And Hobbit movies – embraces this homey Hobbit vibe for the franchise’s first cozy life simulation. Despite dabbling in multiple genres over the years, from text adventures, turn-based RPGs and action adventures, the Hobbits have always been compromised in one way or another, but Wētā Workshop has seen fit to bring the little guys and give girls some relief.
When we went to play the game at Summer Game Fest, we were very cautious about Tales of the Shire. The market, and Switch’s library in particular, is saturated with fun life sim games that focus on making friends and living life. the only goal. We even demoed a few similar games at Play Days. Fortunately, our doubts were immediately erased when we picked up the controller.
Tales of the Shire may take place between The Hobbit and… The Company of the Ring, but it’s all about the warm fuzzies, with an art style that feels like a watercolor artist’s impression of an idealistic Middle-earth. And it looks great on PC, where we demoed the game, so post your Switch warning/caveats here. But the Hobbits bring their own identity and personality to the game Doing let it be entirely its own thing.
As we played the game, we laughed out loud several times. The Hobbits are extremely charming, with silly humor and a great love for food. And this is the heart of Tales of the Shire: food. In the newly created Bywater, which has not yet been recognized by Hobbiton, your job is to help build community and relationships through the power of cooking and good food.
We played two different parts of the game: the beginning, where we settled in and got to grips with the basics of cooking; and a mid-game sequence where you helped a tavern develop some specific dishes. In the first case, we were given a tour of our little Hobbit hut (you can create your own Hobbit in the full game, with no restrictions on clothing or gender). There is a bedroom, a large kitchen and a small pantry where you can store ingredients. And if you throw your ingredients in the pantry, you’ll also see those items in the in-game storage space.
This is where our Hobbit character also learned to cook, which is its own low-pressure mini-game. Centering a Hobbit life sim around food is so obvious, but it’s also quite compelling. You start with just a cutting board and a mixing bowl, and you can actually affect the food depending on how finely you chop the ingredients: once or twice means the texture will be coarse, but the more you chop, the finer, and mushier , it will be.
It’s not just about the cooking process either. Sometimes you have to put the dish on the table and sit down at the table with your guests. It adds to the warm, family feeling that Tales of the Shire is going for. It was a little tricky to put the dish on the table, but we love the idea of actually hosting the food we put all our love and care into.
All of these aspects of preparation and cooking play a role in the game’s quest system. Other hobbits living in Bywater will ask you to make dishes to improve the town or build relationships, and these become more difficult as you progress. Some Hobbits specify the texture and flavor they’re looking for, and you have more opportunities to influence these things as you get more tools and ingredients.
Most of the quests in the game take the form of letters, which you can collect from the mailbox outside your house. But because this is a life simulation, each character in Bywater has their own schedule. In games like Stardew Valley and Animal Crossing it can sometimes be difficult to find each person or remember their schedule, but in Tales of the Shire that’s not necessary. When you open the map, you can view a list of residents who live in the city. When you select the person you need, such as the quest giver, his/her location will be marked on the map even if he/she moves. The game then subtly guides you to that person with a bird who perches on walls and lamps along the way, keeping the experience even more stress-free.
As for gathering ingredients, you can forage throughout the city or in the nearby forests, or you can harvest them from your garden. In the second demo we had several planters full of tomatoes, onions, potatoes, mushrooms and more. And we were told that depending on which vegetables you plant together, you can actually influence the yield. This means that a certain amount of planning is required to maximize your harvest. In addition, you can move your planters at any time, allowing you to customize your garden to your liking.
As we entered our kitchen, we now saw many additional tools. There was a pickling spot, which makes the food crispier; a pot for cooking and softening; a frying pan to increase tenderness; and a pestle and mortar for grinding certain foods. And we also had access to spices that could influence the taste. From spicy, sour, sweet and salty, each ingredient can be individually seasoned.
One of our quests called for something spicy, so we checked our recipe book and ingredients to make sure we had the right seasonings – pepper and garlic worked here. With what we had at our disposal we were able to make some spicy fish cakes, to the innkeeper’s taste. Of course, it was accompanied by a weird story about how an adventurer had killed a dragon – or possibly asked someone else to do it for him. Lazy hobbits, eh?
There were plenty of things we didn’t get to try during our 30-minute demo, but Tales of the Shire wears its food-loving identity on its sleeve and we walked away genuinely surprised by something that didn’t quite look right. that seductiveness from outside. You can decorate your Hobbit house, go fishing and improve relationships with the other Hobbits. It doesn’t feel whole unique and combines many different elements from other life sim games, but Tales of the Shire at least tries to create its own identity in the space by focusing on the cooking aspect.
We’ll have to see if the Hobbitses can cause a storm when the game hits Switch later this year. Is Tales of the Shire on your wish list? Make the comments below even more exciting.