I'm no stranger to Stardew Valley and all of the cozy farming sims it's inspired since its 2016 release – but Moonlight Peaks might just be my favorite in concept yet.
In case you've not heard of it yet, Moonlight Peaks is a wholesome farming and life sim that takes everything I love about games like Stardew Valley and gives it a Monster High-esque twist. It ticks all of the genre boxes – bug-catching, cooking, farming, fishing, questing, and, of course, romance – but also adds a bit of morbid magic. There are vampires (whom you play as yourself), mermaids, werewolves, witches… what more could a girl want?
The town itself follows a unique nighttime schedule, too. You don't wake up in the early morning to farm through the day in Moonlight Peaks. Instead, you rise out of your coffin at the turn of the night and take care of your daily tasks before sunrise… because, well, you are a vampire.
Visually, it's appealing, to say the least – but it also adds an extra "cozy" layer to the game, in my opinion, with all of the purple-y blue visuals.
Moonlight Peaks boasts an adorable aesthetic overall, honestly. I'm sold thanks to the Animal Crossing: New Horizons-esque designs and cute itty-bitty beasts (is that a three-eyed cat?) – it's a nice cartoon-y change of pace from the pixel-y style other recent genre gems like Fields of Mistria have opted for.
The whole mystical, magical side of the game from indie developer Little Chicken is what really has me hooked, though. From potion-making to spell-casting, there's no shortage of witchy, whimsical vibes to be found in Moonlight Peaks. The devs even tease mystical crops – whatever that might mean. It's spooktacular, but not in a legitimately frightening way that would break the cozier immersion we farming sim stans crave. The game is, as Little Chicken so aptly puts it, "a sweet and spooky journey."
If you're just as obsessed with cute monster people and farming games as I am, you can grab the game over on Steam, Nintendo Switch, or Switch 2 when it unlocks tomorrow.
Searching for more to look forward to? Browse through our roundup of the best new games coming this year and beyond for other great titles to wishlist.
