Tales of Seikyu is just your regular farming simulator, apart from the fact I've got shapeshifting abilities and I'm engaged to a pretty persistent kappa

Town in Tales of Seikyu with two townsfolk sat on the stairs — (Image credit: ACE Entertainment)

Steam Next Fest always tends to be a thriving hub for farming and life sims, but the demo of Tales of Seikyu takes you on a more magical adventure than your standard dirt tilling, seed sowing simulator. Instead, you're a shapeshifting member of the fox clan who has moved to an island infested with yokai and yokai-adjascent villagers. So as someone who already finds every excuse to try a new farming simulator and adores the weird and wonderful world of Japanese folklore, this game wasn't exactly a hard sell.

Tales of Seikyu starts by following the classic routine of moving to a new place and into a beautiful farmhouse that for some reason has been empty for ages, with your first task being introducing yourself to a rather eclectic bunch of yokai-related townsfolk. There's a pretty significant variation in characters which I appreciated rather than being lumped with the usual run of the mill edgy character, loveable brute, overly optimistic charmer, and the self deprecating nerdy sort. Everything from humans to anthropomorphic cats, birds, and otters welcome you in Tales of Seikyu. Even the playable character has magical abilities, such as shapeshifting into a boar.

When I was done introducing myself to the community, I wanted to spend some time exploring the limited section of the map to try and get as much out of the demo as I could and try to paint a picture of what I could expect when the game rolls into Early Access. It usually takes me a while to gather my bearings in a new game, yet even the small slice of map Tales of Seikyu's demo offered felt bigger than it actually was.

There's only so much you can get out of a short demo, and with the game launching into Early Access (though we don't have a date for that yet) there are bound to be some gripes. Although there is something whimsical about the land of Seikyu, I couldn't help feeling like a lot of its rolling fields were lacking. You've got a few enemies to run up to and defeat, and there are a lot of forageable items to collect. But for the most part, the demo had me spending a lot of time wandering around looking for something to admire rather than actually enjoying what I was seeing.

Player inside farmhouse in Tales of Seikyu — (Image credit: ACE Entertainment)

One of the things you're asked to do at the start of the demo is find fox shrines around the map, which become your fast travel points. These shrines aren't marked on the map, so there's an awful lot of walking around the empty spaces praying you might find one. This sort of mission always feels way more exciting in theory than it does in practice, especially when the map already feels pretty empty. So after a while I ended up heading to the bulletin board instead to pick up a quest so I at least had what felt like an achievable objective rather than continuing my somewhat aimless amble around.

Luckily this is where I got to experience the highlight of the demo, thanks to the fishing quest I picked up, where the otter fishmonger Torleone asked me to collect two crucian carp. So, armed with my beginner rod, I cast my line into the river and immediately reeled in a cucumber rather than any sort of fish. Knowing this was a reference to kappa, one of my favourite yokai, this reference could've been a highlight on its own. I hadn't found one yet in Seikyu so I was a little worried they didn't have a place in the game. So when the cucumber morphed into a kappa in front of my very eyes, saying I was elated would be an understatement.

Almost immediately, the kappa insisted that we were soulmates since I'd been the lucky fisher to reel him in, and if I didn't agree to being together he would simply drown himself. A bit of an exaggeration if you ask me, but also not completely unrealistic for a kappa I suppose. It's little elements of personality like this which made me appreciate the demo of Tales of Seikyu more than I thought I would.

Although my adventure was only short, this definitely made me excited to find more secrets when the game launches, but I'd like to see a little more life on the land before Tales of Seikyu comes into Early Access. As much as I like to think I'd enjoy my new life as a kappa wife regardless of its empty map, I know that it would lead me to feeling underwhelmed in the long run. With that said, I know the demo only scratches the surface of what's to come, and I'm overly hopeful that I can finally fulfil my dream of living among yokai in due course.

Kara is an evergreen writer. Having spent four years as a games journalist guiding, reviewing, or generally waffling about the weird and wonderful, she’s more than happy to tell you all about which obscure indie games she’s managed to sink hours into this week. When she’s not raising a dodo army in Ark: Survival Evolved or taking huge losses in Tekken, you’ll find her helplessly trawling the internet for the next best birdwatching game because who wants to step outside and experience the real thing when you can so easily do it from the comfort of your living room. Right?

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