As a first time Luma Island visitor, I was enraptured by the game’s new Pirates update. Having previously eyed the game on its journey through cosy social media, it was the perfect excuse to finally jump in for a wholesome time. What I discovered was a neat mix between slow-moving farm simulator gameplay, and more fast-paced questing, and adventures through a deadly new pirate cove.
In its latest update, Luma Island has been transformed. There’s now an entirely new pirate world to explore, haunted ruins to conquer, new mini-games, new quests, new collectibles, new NPCs, and a whole bunch of fresh challenges to tackle. If you’re done with life on the range, it’s time to pick up a lasso or sword, and set about clearing the land of roaming skeletons and ghosts.
What is most refreshing about Luma Island as a newcomer with ample experience in cosy farm sims is how Feel Free Games reinterprets the genre, adding in spice with a focus on dungeons and exploration, as well as farm management. Hours in, I still hadn’t even unlocked crops or animals (besides my dog companion). Instead, the game encourages you to journey around your new home, discovering all sorts of secrets in hidden caves before you settle down.
When I popped in to check out the Pirates update, I wasn’t quite expecting Indiana Jones vibes, but that’s exactly what you get. Armed with your lasso, you’ll journey through various dungeons littered with traps, and roam through a pirate cove filled with all manner of roving skeletons, jungle vines, broken bridges, and obstacles.
It’s worth noting this update also introduces three new difficulty levels – cosy, adventure, and hero – so you can either sit back and explore a new realm at your own pace, or become embroiled in battles against the skeleton army. I went for the adventure middle ground, and quite enjoyed romping through dark caves, being consistently frightened by skeletons popping around corners.
There’s also a nice little questline to discover within these caves, as you’ll encounter a number of benevolent ghosts wandering this landscape, many of whom have forgotten their names. By process of discussion and elimination, you’ll eventually help these ghosts remember, and allow them to return to their crew, one at a time.
When you’re not indulging in these chats or venturing forth to live your pirate dreams, you can also explore the rest of what Luma Island has to offer. Away from the shore and any awaiting caves, you’ll have the space and time to wander freely, gathering ingredients, and making friends with local townsfolk.
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Here, Luma Island is a much more traditional farming sim, with a structure that’ll be familiar to genre enthusiasts. You begin your life on a tiny farmstead, and must develop various machinery which can process and transform the items you collect. Cotton turns into cloth, wood turns into logs or slabs, and ore is turned into bars. If you enjoy the multi-step process of creation, with light elements of grinding in collection and processing, you’ll find so many reasons to invest your time.
While this isn’t always a favoured system, and there has been plenty of criticism lobbied at Luma Island for its elements of grind, as someone who enjoys organisation and busywork, it feels particularly brain-tickling. There is perhaps a few too many machines required, with each element of building construction requiring a different setup, but once you’re established, you can get a neat conveyer belt system running.
Then, you can set off for more adventures in other parts of the game, roaming through dungeons or the nearby town in search of new jobs to take on, and new pals to befriend. There’s actually elements of Fantasy Life in this design, with players able to take on a variety of professions, each with their own unique goals and skills.
There is a fine line for life and farm simulators.
They need to be fun and bright, but not feel too breezy. They need to have purpose behind everything, with all systems feeding into each other. They need villagers with personality, that are satisfying to befriend. They need a town and surrounds that feel lively and worth exploring.
Luma Island has all of this. With the arrival of the game’s Pirates update, it has even more, with a whole new world to experience, and plenty to keep you invested in your ever-growing town. With a focus on bright, cosy vibes and a lack of limitations to each day (in addition to everything else it offers, Luma Island has no stamina bar) you can spend your time roaming a world of freedom and adventure.
A PC code for Luma Island was provided by the publisher for the purposes of these impressions.
