The squirrel sucks so bad.
I didn’t know they existed until I was looking at the achievements list after that run! I’ve just been figuring things out as I go along, and definitely doing some things suboptimally.
Fully upgraded it isn’t awful, but it’s too erratic without most upgrades (on top of having low ammo).
Hah. I did the same thing, playing merrily until like year V or so before I realized you could make mega trees. My record is 7 mega trees in a run.
Why the emphasis on planting 2x2? Do they get watered together or something?
Yeah, that’s my thinking too. I tried with both and was like… the three base characters are balanced, these two are just crazy.
Yeah, I’ve died many a time with the squirrel not upgraded quite enough. With the right upgrades it’s vicious and gives you a ton of seeds but anything short of that makes it a tough gun to run with.
If you plant a single crop in a square 2x2 pattern, and fully fertilize all of them, they merge into mega crop.
Mega crops take longer to water (basically using more water charges per “water stage” or something), and longer to grow. But they are worth considerably more than the four single crops. Also, while they take more water, they’re still easier to grow (they need a single watering, where as it takes much longer to actually water four single crops; they only tie up a single bee/hummingbird even though they tie it up a bit longer).
Everything should be geared towards trying to grow mega crops (and mega trees, but that’s harder). Circumstances won’t always permit it of course.
Oooooooooh, that explains why the first character I played randomly had lots of giant crops show up all the time. I guess I just got lucky a lot. Rye never got that lucky, so I thought it was character related somehow.
Nope, it’s entirely crop/how you plant related. Some crops take more fertilizer than others. Roses and Sunflowers are special and auto merge to mega (although the Rose thing might be a presistent upgrade, I can’t recall), but everything else takes fertilizer. There is an upgrade that makes Heart Beets auto merge. And lastly, one of the very best upgrades in the game is Participation Trophy, which auto merges everything you plant in a 2x2 pattern (tree or crop).
The fertilizer scrolls will not necessarily merge all of your crops that are properly planted. IIRC, the amount of fertilizer it shoots out is based on your farming stat. So you might want to save them for mid run. But if you have a decent sized plot, a seed scroll followed by fertilizer can be a good way to kick off a day. I tend to try and save scrolls for the end, but I will use some as I go depending on circumstance.
No, the rose thing is automatic. That would be some persistent upgrade, as so far most of them seem pretty paltry (+1% chance to this, small boost to, like, mushroom duration).
Oh yeah, it took me many playthroughs to discover what fertilizer is for, so for any new players, to save you some time:
- Press A on the controller to fertilize your plants. Fertilizer is for more than just collecting from dead enemies, you can actually use it! Who knew? Certainly not me in the first few playthroughs.
Booya! I had over an hour long session, kicked ass with Rye thanks to the advice here. I even beat the sun god. I had a ton of money between each day to upgrade things when I needed to. I was always up to my eyeballs in seeds too. I actually got through the two opening areas, the two one bridge each areas above and below the farm, and then the two bridge desert area part 2 on the left.
I still didn’t get through the 5th season, but I managed to plant a LOT of crops and got him almost down to 60% health before I died. (I started the stage with 13 heart health or something).
Good run.
Oh hell yeah. Year 1 done. First achievement unlocked! I believe this is the longest I’ve ever played a game to unlock one achievement.
Nice job!
Yeah, getting that first win took me by far the longest. Trying to simultaneously learn all the systems and enemies is a big hurdle.
Yesterday I flubbed what would have been an easy win on day 12 of year 6. I had a great set of upgrades, plenty of stuff stockpiled to deal with the bosses, and could have just waited it out, but I got sloppy in the furthest south section and ran the wrong way while kiting one group, right into a swarm, and wound up taking four damage. Made it back to the farm and planted heart beet seeds, but couldn’t survive long enough to harvest.
Made up for it tonight though, completing year 6 and 7, both with massive surpluses.
Completed year 8 and 9 last night, but they were much closer calls than previous years, and I was down to my last heart beet on 9.
Took a crack at 10 and even had a very lucky start with a day 1 atomic orchid, but died at the Autumn boss fight. I need to get better at splitting my attention. I mostly do okay when exploring when I can focus entirely on the enemies, but I wind up taking random stray hits while trying to cycle through my seeds or lay out a 2x2 plot.
Year 10 complete, after a quick jaunt back through year 1 to pick up a couple achievements and time capsule upgrades.
Didn’t get as lucky as on the first attempt, but played more cautiously and focused on survival, and it was enough. Also wound up switching back to Lavender. Thyme had helped me a lot with racking up giant scores in the middle years, but things get so hectic by the end that I decided I was better off focusing on survival rather than counting on almost never getting hit.
Really good game! Thanks @geggis and @peacedog for talking it up so much and getting it on my radar!
Amazing. Glad you enjoyed it Thraeg! Going from year 10 back to 1 is quite a shock, especially when you consider how difficult year 1 seems when you first start.
Holy shit.
Right on!
I have been farming cats. Every Tier (uh, 6? Max tier whatever it is) cat you unlock allows you to toggle a thing that changes runs. Generally you get some benefits for a big tradeoff. E.g. a 10% luck boost and “a head start” (still not sure what that means) but a boss spawns every night. Monsters get 50% more health but Mushrooms last 10 seconds longer + some other boost. A third gives +30% crit chance on the peat shooter but heart beets don’t restore health and the mega beets only restore one (no thanks).
I love this, in theory. In practice, it takes a looooong time to farm up cats. Three cats of one tier can be upgraded to one of the next. But there are multiple cats in each tier (save the first), and rerolling a cat to a different member of the same tier is random and expensive. So it takes awhile to get to the top tier. I think this stuff is too heavily gated. Also, some of them are absolutely not worth it (unless you are so good you can easily rock Thyme, anyway).
Wow. That’s impressive, Thraeg. I starting playing this last week thanks to all the chatter about it.
It’s pretty cool. A little obtuse initially, but I’m getting the hang of it. Beat year one and almost beat year two.
Thanks everyone for talking it up.