The farm is overgrown when you arrive, and that is the premise. Story of Seasons: Pioneers of Olive Town sends you out of the city and onto land your grandfather once worked, now swallowed by brush. Victor, the town’s mayor and an old friend of your grandfather, walks you out to the property. You clear it from there, tile by tile.
Trailer, via Nintendo of America.
Olive Town Sits on a Peninsula
Olive Town is a port town at the tip of a peninsula, a short walk from the farm. It is quiet, and the people who live there get by. The game’s pitch is that a little more tourism never hurt anyone, so your farm and the town grow together. That link is the strongest idea in Pioneers of Olive Town.
Every Patch of Ground Is Yours to Reshape
This is a new entry in the series, known in Japan as Bokujo Monogatari, and it debuts on Nintendo Switch. The freedom to shape an untamed wilderness and customize the farm down to the very tile is one of its new features. It is also where the game asks the most patience of you. Tile-by-tile clearing gives you control and gives you chores.
Earth Sprites Open Gardens and a Volcano
While working the farmland you find Earth Sprites. They lead to strange places: gardens where the seasons never change, an island in the sky, the inside of a volcano. These are the game’s best detours. They break up the routine of crops and give the map a sense of wonder the town itself does not always carry.
Marriage Candidates and a Request System
A new cast of marriage candidates joins the series’ romance thread. A request system gives the townsfolk something to ask of you. The town thrives as your farm does. The core elements of Story of Seasons stay in place, and the new features sit on top of them rather than replacing them.
Three Rings Built It for Three Platforms
Three Rings Inc. developed Pioneers of Olive Town. XSEED Games, Marvelous Europe Ltd. and Marvelous published it across PlayStation 4, PC and Nintendo Switch. It is a single-player role-playing game and simulator with strategy elements, viewed from an isometric, bird’s-eye angle. Business and romance are its stated themes, and both are present.
The Clearing Is the Draw and the Toll
The tile-level customization is the real draw. The precision it offers stands out, and the Earth Sprites give that work a payoff beyond the next harvest. The request system keeps Olive Town’s cast in motion instead of frozen in place.
The drag is the clearing itself. Freedom and labor are the same mechanic here, and the early hours lean hard on labor. The marriage candidates and the town’s growth arrive slowly, because the game makes you earn the pace.
What the Numbers Say
- Title: Story of Seasons: Pioneers of Olive Town
- Released: 2021
- Developer: Three Rings Inc.
- Publishers: XSEED Games, Marvelous Europe Ltd., Marvelous
- Platforms: PlayStation 4, PC (Microsoft Windows), Nintendo Switch
- Genre: Role-playing (RPG), Simulator, Strategy
- Modes: Single player
- Perspective: Bird view / Isometric
- Critical score: 7.0/10 (IGDB critic aggregate, 8 outlets)
Pioneers of Olive Town is a good farm sim that trusts you with more ground than most and then charges you for it in hours. The Earth Sprites and the tile-level building are the parts that hold up; the slow clearing is the toll. It lands where the aggregate does.
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