Having played a demo of Tales of the Shire in September last year, I knew what I was getting into. I’ve already shared my take on how I thought it was a great example of wasting a perfect opportunity, but even then I still remained hopeful that something would change before launch. Especially since the game has faced a few delays, too. But stepping back into Bywater now that Tales of the Shire has fully released reveals it to be the same clunky, boring experience that it was the first time I played, and I think most of that is down to the character interactions. Or should I say the lack of them.
The characters you meet within any life simulator play a pretty big role in your overall experience. Although it doesn’t feel that way when you start out, since a lot of your time is spent exploring the map and being introduced to things like cooking, farming or gardening. But it’s inevitable that these characters will form a sort of backbone for the game eventually. They’ll give you tasks and challenges, send you letters and gifts, and just bring a world more to life. However, in Tales of the Shire, the lack of depth in its characters is one of the reasons the game feels so tedious and empty.
Don’t get me wrong, there is an attempt to create a cast of fellow hobbits you work alongside in Bywater. There are also a surprising number of NPCs that simply walk around and occasionally have a speech bubble pop up above their heads saying some throwaway statement about one of the other characters. But none of them are fleshed out.
In a way, it feels almost like you stumble into Bywater mid-conversation. Everyone already has their own dynamic with one another and you have to quickly piece together why there are certain feuds yourself with the small amount of information they drip feed you throughout each season. One thing that feels particularly detrimental is the fact that outside of cutscenes, shopping/trading, and quests, you can’t just have a daily conversation. If you walk up to a hobbit and initiate a conversation, the only option you’re given is to end the conversation. There’s no way to ask them how their day is, or anything that might help you understand them outside of the brief cutscenes you see during a quest.
This makes it impossible to get any sense of character for them. Paired with the fact you can’t go into their homes, it makes every character you meet feel incredibly shallow. Sure, you do get an idea of which hobbits are grumpy, which ones might be easier to get on with, and which ones are happy that you’ve moved to Bywater. But generally, your knowledge of these characters won’t go much further than that. The hobbits are such an iconic fantasy folk, full of lore and stories, so it’s a shame so little personality and enthusiasm have been injected into Tales of the Shire’s crew.
It doesn’t help that every character looks like they’ve hopped right out of The Hobbit game from 2002 and have no distinguishable features. Each time I skipped my way around Bywater, I must’ve seen about three hobbits that looked exactly like me. Even the smaller hobbits just look like the adults have been scaled down rather than giving them unique, brighter or bigger features to emphasise their age. It just looks mismatched and unsettling.
In fact, the character design and character creator as a whole feels lacklustre, which is disappointing since so many people would love to make a hobbit OC, I’m sure. I know Tales of the Shire has gone for an incredibly stylised take on its characters in particular, but it could’ve been ever so slightly more detailed, or at least provided more ways to make your hobbit look distinct.
I wouldn’t be surprised if the character design was enough to put people off playing Tales of the Shire, and that’s before they’ve experienced its repetitive gameplay loop and generally empty environment. Even though I didn’t like my first experience, I still went into the game’s release with an open mind. I knew the look of the characters wouldn’t have changed, but I was hopeful that individual stories and interactions would be bulked out ever so slightly. Which has left me feeling like, once again, a fantastic opportunity to bring the dream of so many to life has entirely missed the mark.