Between the excellent Fantasy Life and Rune Factory, the Switch 2 is pretty covered for life sims at launch.

And the good thing about both games is they really expand and play with the conventions of the genre by implementing a healthy dose of combat, story, quests, and character development.

Rune Factory: Guardians of Azuma definitely leans more towards nature’s charms, though, where Fantasy Life has more of a sense of humor. In Rune Factory, you’ll find yourself healing trees, living off the land, helping villagers and giving them somewhere to live and trying to heal the land from the wider corruption that spreads through it.

Rune Factory brilliantly paces itself in the opening stages, really allowing players to get a good solid foothold in its vast foundations by peppering more and more side quests in, but making sure they aren’t too overwhelming or confusing to follow.

In fact, I have often found these life sim games to be kind of overwhelming between finding places to build your creations, making sure there’s enough decoration around, habitable living space, that you’re making sure to maintain your crops and are selling enough produce to turn a profit. Rune Factory really does make you feel quite comfortable with its systems though.

You start out with the basics, planting turnip seeds, farming fields, building paths, but can eventually build up a Blacksmith so you can forge and upgrade armor, and Soy houses that produce daily sauce that can be sold or used to cook food. Speaking of, you can pick up all kinds of ingredients that can be used to produce quality meals that give health benefits but also other kinds of boosts.

Eventually, you’ll build up bonds with other characters by giving them gifts and taking them out on dates, as well as team up with them in battle to take on unexpected bosses and giants of the land. All while following the game’s story which sees you try to restore the four seasons and thus you’ll experience biomes that are best depicted by the setting.

And the loop becomes so compelling and tricky to put down. Once in, this is a game you can lose hours and hours to, and not feel the slightest bit guilty about it.

You’ll want to maximise the potential of each day, but even if you don’t, your allies will motivate you when you put your head down to sleep that you might need to build more houses, better defenses, you need to sell more to improve your profits. There’s no time for slowing down.

But equally, the game doesn’t feel like it puts you under a ton of pressure either. Days are well paced through the day and night cycles, so you’re not sat around twiddling your thumbs waiting but you’re also not having to try and rush through everything. You feel like there’s enough time to go out, go exploring, see as much of the land as you can, gathering resources and quelling foes, but still time to come back and relax, unwind with friends and fulfil a few chores.

That is probably something to take into account for players, though. There is quite a lot of fighting to be had and some battles can be tricky, so this isn’t going to be an entirely light, easy going experience and that might be off-putting if you’re hoping more Animal Crossing less Final Fantasy. It’s an even balance of both.

Everything is well written, the themes in the game are moving and there’s layers to unpack within its mechanics as you recruit and befriend. And it all looks so beautiful, the cherry blossoms, the bright skies, water shimmering and beautiful backdrops.

I love assigning roles to my villagers, keeping them occupied and watching a steady stream of resources keep piling in so that if I did decide to have a bit of an off-day and do more adventuring, I would at least still have enough to fulfil my needs.

Having villagers really does make the game feel less of a grind, I feel. Having things happen in the background and being able to directly manage that when you need to just works so incredibly well.

And without giving too much away, the game really opens up once you reach a certain point in the first area and can go exploring to other regions that offer different environmental challenges, tougher enemies and of course new items which can be spent and built across all your little towns.

There’s few games that feel quite so enjoyable to play where you’re just mindlessly chopping trees, sweeping leaves and plucking plants. But you’ll find yourself getting very lost in the vibes.

Despite all the battles you’ll have, there’s a coziness to the game as you try to turn withered trees into fully grown oaks, farm cherry blossoms and meticuloulsy place your building or cosmetic item in such a way that you can earn more points for your land and increase the value of it and your relationships.

Rune Factory: Guardians of Azuma is a delight, actually. There’s hours of content here, but it also doesn’t feel too overwhelming that you won’t want to finish it. There’s lots of fun decisions to be made, and the grid system for levelling up works quite nicely, as you gradually add to your strength and experience, but can also use that XP to focus on other aspects, like asking a friend out for a bite to eat or being able to increase the healing effects of your drum dances.

You can improve your cooking so your dishes have more benefits or increase their level and can even have materials refunded when crafting if you level up enough. Having options like this is wonderful and XP can come from anywhere, whether it’s completing challenges, defeating enemies, fulfiling side quests, progressing your main mission, finding a random XP scroll.

Villages can also level up and that increases their populations, decorations, and craftables. And this also ties into the wider XP as you purify a region or increase your scenic scores.

There’s even a calendar to pay attention to as friends and allies have birthdays, so you can gift them something to really boost that friendship bond even further. Or have a gift bestowed on your birthday, throwing in a little edge of Fire Emblem into the mix.

Rune Factory has a lot to unpack but it also paces everything gracefully and in a way that compels you to keep playing. Despite the occassional random stutter when transferring between areas on Switch 2, I had a blast on this and it’s the perfect game to dip into, whether you’re lying in bed or want a glorious full TV experience.

Verdict

Rune Factory: Guardians of Azuma is such a wonderfully pure, energising game that has good, ecological messages and a cozy vibe, while also giving you plenty of action and layers of mechanics to sink your teeth into. With the management system of the villagers allowing automation to happen in the background, a rich story and cast with vast worlds to explore, there’s hours of enjoyable content here, whether you’re on the go or sat on your sofa. It’s found the perfect home on Switch 2. 

Pros

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Rune Factory: Guardians of Azuma is out now on PC and Switch 1/2

Played on Nintendo Switch 2

Code kindly provided by MARVELOUS for review purposes