Ahead of Steam Next Fest, we’ve been given the exciting opportunity to demo Horror Stories: Harvest Hunt, an exciting new survival horror game from developer and publisher Villainous Games Studio. Harvest Hunt marks the second entry in Villainous Games Studio’s Horror Stories series, following the release of Horror Stories: PLEASE COMPLY in 2021. But whereas that game was more of an interactive horror experience, Harvest Hunt makes for an intense game of cat-and-mouse as you’re tasked with avoiding a pursuing monster — that is when you’re not hunting it down.
The premise is simple. The remote farming village of Luna Nova, comprised of 32 individuals who mysteriously can’t leave its boundaries, finds itself under the deadly curse of the Devourer: a blob-like entity marked with a terrifying skull mask and dozens of razor-sharp teeth. Being a rural village, their continued existence relies solely on the production of a single life-nourishing crop named Ambrosia. But as the Devourer’s presence becomes more persistent, the creature’s taint has left the resulting crop listless and wilted. The people of Luna Nova, therefore, have taken to defending themselves through the assignment of a “Warden” to the village’s crops. Over the course of five nights, or the length of a “Harvest Season,” the Warden is tasked with putting a stop to the Devourer and harvesting as much Ambrosia as they can carry before making a hasty retreat, hopefully securing the village’s future.
A key for the demo version of Horror Stories: Harvest Hunt was graciously provided via Villainous Games Studio in exchange for an honest review. In a little under an hour, it’s certainly left a significant impression, with plenty of opportunities to improve upon what works as a steady foundation.
Starting off, Harvest Hunt‘s presentation is a little uneven but overall pleasing to the senses. You’ll immediately be hit with stylized visuals reminiscent of a graphic novel, which help make Harvest Hunt stand out from its horror contemporaries. This style can be found throughout the game’s map, menus, characters, card illustrations, and so on. It’s easy on the eyes, but in tandem with the game’s lighting and map design, it does a good enough job of conveying a sense of rustic horror throughout.
The map, a circular location with several prominent landmarks, also deserves some praise for its design. Dubbed the “Farmlands,” you’re given a brief preview of the map in its entirety after surviving the first night. Three prominent landmarks — a gargantuan yellow tree, a gloomy blue windmill, and a vivid green church — form a triangle pattern across the map, with other landmarks like dilapidated buildings, campsites, and tanning racks filling the gaps between them. In the dead center, there’s a bone-littered area that serves an important purpose in banishing the Devourer for the night. Connecting everything is a network of noise-making bridges, monster-infested waters, and concealing stalks of flora, with each possible route between destinations having its own advantages and disadvantages.
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Don’t worry about getting lost. You’ll have the ability to activate “Warden’s Sight,” a visual modifier that highlights distant tools, items, and exit points on the map in exchange for practically blinding you. But while this is a useful tool whenever you need to get your bearings, it won’t carry you through the night alone. There’s a reasonable expectation to understand the map and its various quirks to efficiently complete the Harvest Season.
If there’s any downside to the presentation, it’s the Devourer itself. As in, its range of motion is a bit limited. The thing can turn on a dime like an amorphous lawn mower, making its movements feel more robotic and less natural than expected. But, in another way, maybe that’s to make the creature feel even more alien and unnatural. It’s not a terrible issue, and you’ll rarely notice if you’re focusing more on accomplishing your objectives each night.
So, onto the important part: how does Harvest Hunt play? Well, excluding the first night, something you’ll immediately notice about the game is its rogue-like elements.
After a brief tutorial, you’ll be taken to “The Village,” a set of menus that allow you to plan out what you’d like to have available in order to accomplish your goals in a specific night. Your tasks will vary from night to night, but you can either expect to collect a certain amount of Ambrosia before fleeing or outright banishing the Devourer to progress. Some objectives associated with a particular night are optional, and you’ll either be rewarded for completing them or punished for ignoring them.
Prior to everything else, you’ll be able to select a character to play for the ensuing Harvest Season. While we could only select one due to the demo’s limitations, it’s quickly made apparent that multiple characters can be unlocked as you progress through the game. Each one offers different upsides and downsides that need to be managed thoroughly.
Character buffs (Warden Strengths) and village modifiers (Village Fortifications) come in the form of cards related to the game’s deck-building mechanics. In a similar vein to games like Inscryption or Hand of Fate, these cards are collected at the end of every night, with a total of five Warden Strengths and four Village Fortifications being available to utilize. Should you hit your max card capacity at the end of a night, no more cards will be collected. Instead, you’ll have to “sacrifice” cards already in your hand in exchange for a free slot and some additional Ambrosia.
From there, you’ll be given a brief glimpse of that night’s “whispers,” a set of modifiers in the form of cards with either positive effects (Blessing), negative effects (Calamity), or modifications to the Devourer’s behavior (Monster Mutation). For example, the whispers found throughout the demo stated that the Devourer would deal half damage, that there would be an increased presence of additional hazards, and that the Devourer would leave behind a cloud of toxic gas. The latter could be used as a means to track the beast’s movements but could also directly block potential escape routes if you’re spotted. Monster Mutations also last for the entirety of a Harvest Season instead of just a single night.
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You’ll also be able to assign different tools to parts of the map in exchange for a portion of your health, or “vigor.” These tools can range from throw-able axes, grenades that only become effective when in the presence of the Devourer, and lures that attract the Devourer with a loud bell sound, among others. While you can restore vigor somewhat easily with dedicated stations littered across the map, it’s in your best interest to balance your necessary tools with the amount of vigor you can possibly recover. In lieu of the tools you pick, you also have a basic pitchfork available at the major landmarks on the map. Its effectiveness is pitiful, but it can still knock off chunks of the monstrous creature if absolutely necessary.
Yes, to banish the Devourer — which will no doubt become a necessity in some nights — there’s a very simple process involved. You’ll need to damage the beast three times before collecting the pieces in the center of the map. Once this is done, you’ll have to enter a tense ritual that draws the attention of the creature before it’s ultimately banished. Once that’s done, collecting its terrifying bone mask will complete the process.
These elements form Harvest Night‘s core gameplay loop. You’ll wander around the map, collecting Ambrosia, avoiding the Devourer, and taking the fight to the Devourer should the opportunity arise. It creates an interesting environment wherein you’re forced to give some thought to how to approach the creature, how to effectively damage it, and when the most opportune time to strike is. It’s a giant cat-and-mouse game, and given the Devourer’s ability to kill off Ambrosia crops, you really can’t afford to cower in the shadows for too long.
But as the Harvest Season continues, even the Devourer will start to bring in additional support. Fiends become more prominent after every successive night, and they’ll cry bloody murder to the monstrous creature if you wade too close to them in water, make too much noise, or walk into their line of sight. While only three nights were available in the demo, they gave an excellent idea of what to expect from the last two.
It’s always appreciated when a game’s horror stems less from having spooky stuff thrown on screen and more from your genuine ability to make it through whatever it throws at you. There’s some real tension to be had if you miss an axe throw or accidentally alert the Devourer to your presence. Successfully escaping an angered Devourer is pretty difficult, and you’ll often have to keep your eyeballs scanning the environment at all times for gaps to slither into or plant life to immerse yourself in. While the Devourer’s damage output was halved for the entirety of the demo, the amount he takes off per attack is consequently even more upsetting. It wasn’t obnoxiously hard, nor did it ever feel too easy. I felt rewarded for playing smart and cautiously, whereas I was punished for running around with reckless abandon.
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There are some bugs. That’s to be expected, and they thankfully don’t detract from the experience. In my short time with Horror Stories: Harvest Hunt, performance was incredibly stable, with only a handful of frame drops here and there. But I can’t necessarily complain. My graphics card doesn’t meet the “recommended” specs listed on Steam, so I should’ve adjusted some settings. When consistent performance really mattered, Harvest Hunt never let me down, which is greatly appreciated.
The only major bug I feel is worth mentioning is something associated with crouching. I relied on crouching to minimize the noise I made, but I noticed something odd every time I switched between standing and crouching. I’m not quite sure how I triggered it, but if I were moving before entering a crouching state, I would suddenly “teleport” a few steps forward. Admittedly, it was quite beneficial, as it significantly reduced my noise across loud surfaces. I can’t help but feel that this wasn’t necessarily intentional.
One last thing to note is the game’s friendliness in explaining its mechanics and lore. A dedicated compendium describing each aspect of the game’s world, characters, and mechanics is available, which will ideally be updated with more successful Harvest Seasons completed. Tutorials for each menu in the village are always available if you need a refresher as well. After having the game’s instructions introduced all at once, it was incredibly helpful to revisit these areas for a more thorough understanding of how to play.
Overall, my positive feelings towards Harvest Hunt outweigh the negatives, and that’s all I can ask for in a game. What’s there holds a lot of exciting potential, and I hope this was just a taste of the full Harvest Hunt experience. Survival horror games are always a delicate balance between easiness and frustration, and Harvest Hunt looks to toe that line as if it were a high-wire artist.
As of writing, Horror Stories: Harvest Hunt has no set release date. However, you can hunt the Devourer in this year’s Steam Next Fest, which kicked off on June 19th.
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