What Did We Play Yesterday?

I'm experimenting with terrain patterns in Farm Together 2. Made an actual checkerboard and filled it with bushes. They're supposed to be in sort-of seasonal order, with spring-blooming facing my cherries which are also spring-blooming, and summer facing the summer tropical section. It's a little tricky because for example only black mulberries bloom in spring, but winter had I think 4/6 varieties that bloom. It's a work in progress. I like it so far.

I was thinking about how I've glommed onto this game lately. I don't consider myself stressed per se, the State of Living has changed for most of us and I've adapted to that, but I think a big part of what draws me into this game right now is order. I can construct extremely orderly, logical environments that still have a lot of creative elements and--design wise--surprises. Looking over my color-coded lettuce resource crops gives me a sense of satisfaction and calm. And a lot of the changes I'm making right now are actually making my farm MORE orderly and a little less chaotic. I guess I'm just working out some stuff here.

So on the one hand, I'm like... I'm nearing 200 hours in this silly farm game and I'm neglecting some of my creative projects, should I be concerned about that? And on the other hand, I'm like you know what, I'm blowing off a lot of steam playing a creative game that has $5 DLC packs and I have not hit the bottle once this is OBJECTIVELY FINE, THANK YOU.

Relocated most of the tropical trees to their new hopefully forever home, and ended up building pineapple palace. Pleased with that!

I got the idea to organize my berry bushes in a pattern so the fruiting times go from season to season. It's kind of dumb but whatever. I had to map it out on paper first.

I realized I misjudged tickets because I didn't actually understand how they work. When they first debuted, I glanced at the resources offered, was unimpressed, and never bothered redeeming any tickets and didn't worry too much about collecting them. Well, recently I decided to spend a few and that's when I realized 1) the resources improve considerably after you level up the stall and 2) the resources rotate, so when you buy, a new set of offers is loaded up. So if you wanted to upgrade a stall and you were short a resource, you could pop over to the ticket booth and try to trade for what you need. So. The more you know. 🫱🌈 🫲

If you heard delighted shrieking at any point yesterday that was me. They released decorative trees, so I got my beloved willow trees back, and promptly put them EVERYWHERE. Then I unlocked dragonfruit trees. It was truly a bounty.

I psychologically and emotionally prepared myself to move my banana and mango farms, and did so yesterday. Not only was it crazy cluttered over there, but I figured out having my coconut trees, avocado trees, and prickly pears all in that general area worked better. I need to build a different area for the other tropical fruit.

I recently discovered I like building certain fences with gates only so I can pop in and out at any point without triggering the climb animation. It is VERY fun to run in circles around these. Whee!

Finally met the Clover Parade unlock goals. For some reason, this one felt a bit grindier than the last, maybe because the last one had less event plants. I wanted the event area to be a little different so I made a hidden leprechaun grotto tucked away in the NE corner of the map.

Continuing to expand cramped areas as I unlock more lots. Cows are probably next, I've stuffed them all onto their own island and most types are 20ish animals. I'd like to get it up to about 60 per type, so the 120 cow goals are hit in 2 harvests rather than say 6. I think the game tries to encourage larger herds of animals like that. I ran out of diamonds which was EXTREMELY HORRIFYING but hopefully I'll replenish by the time I get my next land unlock.

Yesterday was a lot of event silliness. One of the event rewards is a harp, which looks just like the harp statue you craft to earn points. The difference? The real harp plays music! I experimented a bit with the clover parade road pattern, trying to find ways to isolate the horseshoe and clover, and ended up using them to top-off other roads.

I also grabbed a screen of a megafarm so you can witness the absolute craziness that is possible. This farm was so loaded with llamas, money trees, crops, and special decorations my PC was whirring like crazy trying to keep up. I wasn't entirely sure I'd get all 60 points by the end of the event so I grinded out a few goals just in case.

I experimented with ramps. I wish two ramps side-by-side merged, because it would help visually even out even-space-wide plateaus and whatnot. As it is, it just places 2 ramps side by side and you can actually get stuck in that tiny gap if you aren't paying attention.

Lately I've been expanding existing areas so I can up my livestock numbers, a lot were in groups of 20 or 30 and I've managed to double most of them by rearranging areas or filling up dead space. I was originally pretty resistant to having lots of square grids of animals for aesthetic reasons, and I've tried to come up with creative ways to fence or otherwise section these areas without it being a major PITA to harvest.

I got the idea to do a chicken/shrub "checkerboard", the idea is to use trees, flowers, etc., as natural fences. At the very least, it provides visual interest and helps break up the sections. With the pigs... IDK man I don't really like pigs! But I came up with a grid area that can be expanded easily when I unlock the plots on either side.

The Clover Parade event has a LOT of cool unlockables, it's basically a mini-DLC. The pot of gold generates diamonds, ribbons, and puzzle pieces every 18 hours and is by far the best passive building I have. I unlocked a bunch of frankly cool fences and a much needed extra border. The stuff is all clover/celtic-knot themed and it works well as normal decorative pieces, whereas some of the event stuff like the valentine's day path is a bit too holiday-centric to really fit in as general decorations. I would say this is the second best event I've played so far, next to the Halloween one which was so cool I devoted nearly a whole plot to event unlockables and that theme area is one of my favorites on my farm.

I've begun experimenting with the sidewalk ground texture with mixed results. I was over-engineering the little garden by my blue house and noticed a weird bug when you're layering ground textures near curved land areas. I'm sure the devs are aware of it but I might pop into the discord and share a screenshot at some point. I had to terraform the area a bit to avoid getting a weird pavement pattern diagonal to the corner. If you stand on that paved area it is identified as "grass" but shows the paved icon.

Lets see what else. Oh I finally found a reasonable aesthetic solution for my koi ponds, for now. I've fussed with that area a great deal, originally playing around with linked bridges and other things. Having a peninsula terrace works for now.

I'm primarily focused on unlocking lots so I can expand, which means grinding out my farm level. I don't care to grind in this game, so I've begun looking into which crops/animals will give the most XP when boosted. Poinsettias are the obvious choice but 1 to 2 day waits are Not It so I'll think some more about how I want to do this.

BIG DAY. Finally unlocked golden poinsettias, which matters because I was waiting patiently for all those level 150-152 unlocks and now it's a fairly long stretch before I unlock more anticipated stuff. Most of the poinsettias take 1 to 2 days to mature, but they give a lot of XP, so it's a good time to invest in boosts and grind. I have way too many marble poinsettias, which are event flowers and therefore offer middling rewards, but there's no point in ditching them until I need the space.

I finally moved the Christmas section to to upper right quadrant, which was something that was really bugging me. I'm probably gonna turn that whole upper right corner into a snowy area, assuming I have enough stuff that "belongs" to warrant that much snowy terrain.

Had to expand the rabbit area. Slowly but steadily filling in the map. Etc. Etc. Just lots of moving things around, making my happy places, with the occasional grinding when high level items are available.

I am once again reorganizing my farm. This time, decided to stuff all the Valentine's day event into it's own tiny section, since there isn't a lot of it.