Last week, I started Fields of Mistria, a game my friends have been raving about for ages while it was in early access, but which just now entered its full, 1.0 launch. And man, my friends were right. This game rules. It’s like Stardew Valley with a bunch of quality-of-life improvements and some new features inspired by both Animal Crossing and Harvest Moon on GameCube added. I’m having a marvelous time.
But you know, it’s a new game, with some things that are different from what I’m used to in other games of this genre, so sometimes I got a little lost and confused during those first few days. I don’t want you to be lost and confused like I was. Here are some tips based on what I learned dumping way too many hours into this game over the weekend, so that your Mistrian adventure will start off smoothly.
Dear God, upgrade your bag
Yeah, you don’t have nearly enough bag space. You’re going to run up against that problem very quickly. I highly, highly, highly recommend splurging your first 1000 gold on a Basic Pouch at the general store to give yourself ten more spaces. That extra ten will solve a lot of problems for a long time, just trust me. There is another bag upgrade that unlocks later, but it’s not nearly as urgent as that first one. I know it seems expensive early on, but please trust me and do not suffer through hours of Fields of Mistria with no bag space.
Leave stuff lying around
That said, if you have 0 inventory space and see a cool bug or something, go ahead and catch it anyway. You’ll leave it on the ground, where it will stay until you can come back and collect it later. If you don’t catch it when you have the chance, it will disappear, but catching it ensures you don’t miss anything. A little ways into the game, you’ll also unlock a Lost and Found service that’ll gather up everything you left around town and dump it in a convenient box for you.
Talk to everyone
And I mean everyone, every time you see them! Most sim games like Fields of Mistria let you raise affection with characters a very small amount, once per day, and have NPCs give you single, repetitive lines of dialogue. But Mistria‘s inhabitants have tons to say. Any time you see a speech bubble above someone’s head, there’s something new they want to talk about, and talking to them repeatedly will raise their affection for you faster than you’d expect. It pays to be a chatterbox.
You can jump
Yup, you can. Check your settings to see what button this is mapped to for your control set-up, but don’t forget you can jump! Jumping is helpful in that it lets you get over obstacles, and is also useful in combat to perform jump attacks. It’s easy to forget that jumping is an option available to you, but boy is it handy in a tight spot. You can also jump into the water, which is fine because…
You can swim
It’s not immediately obvious when you start playing Fields of Mistria, but you can swim safely from the get-go! You have to walk right up next to a body of water and use your jump button to splash your way in, and then use the jump button again to get out. Swimming is fun because you can access otherwise unreachable areas. There are also dive spots, indicated by little circles of bubbles in the water, that you can swim up to and interact with to find some treasure. Swimming doesn’t cost any energy and there’s no downside to doing it, except that you can scare away fish if you get too close to them.
Enjoy the free soup
You can visit the Inn once per day to eat a bowl of free soup. Just interact with the pot on the fire in the back of the main room. You’ll regain a little health and stamina each time. It’s not a lot, but it can be a huge help on days where you accidentally overdo it.
Check item descriptions
If you’re interested in filling out the museum (and you should be), don’t feel like you have to run back and forth to the museum every time you want to check if an item you have can be donated. When you look at an item’s description, if it can be donated, there will be a little museum-shaped icon near the top. Next to that icon is a small box. If you have already donated that item, there will be a little green checkmark in the box. If not, it will be empty, and you should save that item for a donation.
Go for that town rank
Early on, you’ll be introduced to the town ranking system, and asked to increase the town’s rank through building renown. While you’re going to be overwhelmed with quests and activities and tasks in the first few hours, the simplest way to get things done, make money, and see everything there is to see is to work on that town rank. Do the quests that appear on the board each day, and through them you’ll get a lot of money and tools that will make the rest of the game easier. This is also important because farming takes a lot longer to ramp up in Fields of Mistria than you may be used to. Seeds are expensive! But doing quests will help you pay for them, and you may even get some for free from grateful neighbors.
Make some chests
As soon as you’re taught how to craft, make yourself several storage chests. You need more storage, even if you think you don’t. This is self-explanatory, especially because I also recommend that you…
Save all crafting materials
Early on, you’ll end up with lots of stuff in your possession that you’re unsure what to do with. A lot of it will have descriptions that say it can be used for crafting. My advice is to hang onto anything that suggests it might be a crafting material, especially if it’s rare or limited to just one season. You don’t want to end up in autumn needing spring-only items to cook with. As time goes on, you’ll have a better idea of what can be done away with, but for now it’s best to avoid selling things willy-nilly.
Get a better sword
One of your earliest crafts, apart from chests, should be a copper sword. Your starting sword sucks ass and does almost no damage. Get a better one before you attempt the Mines.
Fishing and ranching are waiting for you
While Fields of Mistria will gently introduce you to systems like crafting, bug catching, and farming, there are a few systems it doesn’t tell you about and leaves you to find on your own. One is fishing. All you need is a rod, which you can either buy from the shop on the beach, or craft yourself (I recommend the latter). Once you have a rod, you’ll get a little fishing tutorial and off you go, but the game won’t simply hand this to you unprompted. You have to seek out the rod yourself.
The same goes for ranching, if you want to have an animal farm. This is a bit more involved. You’ll first need to visit Ryis’ shop and purchase a blueprint for the building you want: coop for chickens, barn for cows. Then, you need to clear space on your farm and set it up. Then you need to provide the required materials in the donation box for the building. Once you have all that, the building will be complete, but you still have to go next door to Sweetwater Farm and visit Hayden, where you can choose Adoption at the counter to adopt the animal of your choice. That’s a lot of work!
You’ll also want to be prepared to feed whatever animal it is; you can get feed from chopping down grass on your farm, but animals will eat all sorts of other things, too. Ranching is a big responsibility, so make sure you’re ready for it.
Relax
Above all, relax. Fields of Mistria is a very chill game, and there’s no hurry to get anything in particular done. You can fart around on your farm as long as you like, spend all day socializing, or whatever, with no consequence. If you feel you need to rush to finish everything season-specific in that season, that’s a valid way to play, but I highly recommend just taking your time and enjoying the ride. The seasons will always come again, and Mistria will always be waiting for you.
