A new farming survival horror game, ‘Village in the Shade,’ is out now across Nintendo Switch, PS5, and Windows. Learn more.
A cutesy farming sim may not seem like the perfect match for horror fans, but developers Nippon Ichi Software (NIS) beg to differ with their latest endeavor, Village in the Shade, out now on Nintendo Switch, PS5, and Windows.
Village in the Shade seems to be Higurashi: When They Cry in game form, which immediately puts it at the top of my must-play list. At first, players assume the role of an amnesiac character starting a new life in Kagatsu Village. The standard farm sim elements are all there, including raising livestock, social sim elements with other villagers, and that ever-addictive farming loop.
What sets the game apart, however, are the eight rules villagers must follow and the game’s distinct day/night cycle. While Kagatsu Village is a cozy hamlet by day, by night, it’s a hotbed for supernatural terror culled from the annals of rural Japanese mythology. While there’s an option to disable all the different horror elements in the game, why would you want that? Truly, as a fan of cozy games myself, I’ve genuinely always wished they had a little more edge. Let me perfect my soil quality while outrunning eldritch beings, dammit. Village in the Shade looks to deliver that.
It’s what I’ll be playing this weekend, and if you’re planning to do the same, let us know over on X @DreadCentral or in the comments below!
