Farmagia First Impressions – Is It Fairy Tail With Farming?
Marvelous, Inc. announced its latest action game, Pharmacyduring the June 2024 Nintendo Direct, promising a mix of battling and farming and featuring characters designed by famous manga artist Hiro Mashima, known for Rave Master and Fairy Tail. The most unique feature of the original Pharmacy trailer was the ability to plant, water, and harvest monsters rather than crops. The game was released this past Friday, November 1, so I spent as much of my weekend as I could diving into Pharmacy on the Nintendo Switch.
As an avid fan of farming games for decades, I had high expectations for Pharmacyand I’m sure thousands of other farming sim enthusiasts did too. Marvelous already has a few farm-sim franchises, such as Rune Factory and Story of Seasons. While the games in those franchises often receive mixed reviews from players, Marvelous should understand what passionate farm-sim gamers want in that genre. So the question is “did they get it right for Pharmacyand is it worth the USD $49.99 price tag?”
The World of Farmagia
I went into Pharmacy only being familiar with its reveal trailer and was immediately thrown into story cutscenes presented in a visual-novel style. I was hoping for fully animated cutscenes to do justice to Mashima’s character designs, so I felt a bit disappointed to discover that most of the story would be in this visual novel style. However, almost every line was spectacularly voice-acted, so even when the story’s writing falls short, it’s not completely dull.
Throughout the story, you’ll follow the main character, Ten, and his friends as they protect their home, Felicidad, from invasion by the evil ruler, Glaza. Farmagia’s story so far hasn’t been compelling to me. It seems predictable, with forgettable characters wrapped up in the typical shonen “friendship = power” cliché I’ve grown bored of since the mid-2000s. Thankfully, the world-building of Pharmacy was fascinating enough to keep going.
Another disappointment for me was how none of the game’s important locations are connected naturally. For example, you don’t move a character from your farm to the tavern or general store by walking – it’s all done by menus. The menu layout reminds me of mobile games, which isn’t always a bad thing, but I was expecting a walkable town so that I could fully feel immersed in the same way I do in other Marvelous games.
The gameplay loop of Pharmacy is as follows: plant and harvest monsters on the farm, build a team of creatures to help you in dungeons and defeat bosses, accept quests from local townsfolk, unlock new stories, and repeat. Despite a name like Pharmacythe farming portion of the game ironically falls short.
The farming field starts off very small, offers no room for customization, and feels very disconnected from the rest of the town/world. I spent a minuscule amount of time on my farm and way more time reading the story and exploring dungeons, so keep in mind that Pharmacy might not be the game long-time fans of the farming sim genre expected.
The most enjoyable part of Pharmacy is battling it out with your freshly grown monsters in the dungeons. Even early on, you can access multiple maps for exploration and quest completion. You can also quickly have up to 40 monsters with you at a time and order them to attack nearby enemies. Each area has treasure chests to be discovered and power-ups for your monsters, making exploring these dungeons key to clearing them.
My favorite thing about the Pharmacy gameplay is that it is as complicated or simple as you want it to be. I tend to be a very button-mashy gamer, but the game also allows for a high level of strategy if that is the path you wish to take. There are treats you can buy to give to your monsters, different buffs throughout the maps, and a wide variety of species of monsters to fit your playstyle. I was surprised by how many unique species you could grow from early on in the game, which can make your team completely different from another player’s.
The first thought I had when I played the tutorial level was “wow, this is similar to Pikmin.” Pharmacy being similar to Pikmin can be for better or worse. I’m not a diehard Pikmin fan, despite my respect for the series. It’s just not my type of game. However, I feel that fans of Pikmin may also enjoy Farmagia’s unique type of hack-and-slash strategy/action gameplay.
Pharmacy is probably not the game most farm sim enthusiasts want. The game feels distanced from Harvest Moon and Rune Factory characteristics and much closer to RPG, action, and strategy elements. The gameplay is still fun and rewarding, it’s just different than what I expected. I still enjoyed the upbeat music and cell-shaded style graphics during my weekend of gameplay. The gameplay loop is easy to get used to, the tutorials are helpful, and the menus are simple, making Pharmacy a great title for casual gamers to jump into.
If you keep your expectations low for the farming parts of the game and embrace the RPG elements of Pharmacyyou’ll have hours of fun. The game is a great concept, though not completely expanded upon, and lacks what makes titles like Rune Factory shine – memorable characters, extensive farming options, and a town to explore. With its USD $49.99 price tag, you might want to wait for a sale, as I think other similar games cost less and are more fulfilling with seamless exploration and compelling stories. A Pharmacy anime adaptation was announced in June 2024, which will be perfect for those only interested in the art and story.
Pharmacy is now out for Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 5, and Steam.
Disclaimer: Anime Corner received a game code for review purposes.
©2024 Marvelous Inc.
