Coral Island
Game Title: Coral Island
Released: November 14, 2023
Game Length: Over 100 Hours
Grade: A-
Development
Release: A long time ago, there was news of a project that was supposed to replicate the Stardew Valley experience by building a little community by the ocean. The trailer wasn't too bad at the time and they received three times the amount rather quickly on Kickstarter. They hit all their extended goals and reached $1.6 million from their $70,000 goal back in February 2021. The game reached Early Access October 2022 and then released on Windows, PlayStation 5, and Xbox on November 14, 2023. The game was provided to those who donated $20 and eventually offered for $29.99 on release.
Roadmap: I waited three years hoping that all the features were implemented and problems would be gone. I was wrong. While the game itself is pretty solid, there are several aspects clearly missing. The expanded museum with all the $300 Founder statues are present and accounted for once you unlock an eerily similar experience in-game with the Pickstarter Campaign. The $1000 pet models with cats, dogs, foxes, and bunnies are all there at the Adoption Center. However, the 8 characters that were designed for the $3500 donators are still on the roadmap along with festival costumes the townsfolk should be wearing. Various buildings and attractions that are present on the island are still on the roadmap as well such as the hot air balloon, mini golf, and arcade center. There is a Recycling Center specifically marked on the map with no function. The golden ring doesn't seem to do anything either. Other things include an unequippable slot rumored to add flowers to your head and a missing fifth giant. There is an upcoming fix for those who look bald wearing a hat by extending their hair out a little bit.
Stretch Goals: Now let's look at a few of those things the stretch goals mention. Bug-catching has been incorporated and extremely fun. Each of the characters will be wearing appropriate outfits for each season and can be previewed, along with their face reactions, in the relationship tab. They still plan to release the game for Nintendo Switch this year. The diving segment has been properly expanded to take into consideration the Merfolk Kingdom but interactions are very limited until they can add other aspects like a festival or relationships. You can see the changes from the original concept art in the gallery section of the wiki. Other things still planned for this year is kids growing up, mod support, and multiplayer. Building a ship and island hopping was always planned to be worked on after release.
Accessibility: I've seen different kinds of posts from people who found that their kind of disability wasn't considered when developers created this game. Each time, someone mentions that they will incorporate some options into the game after it gets released. The roadmap did surprisingly include a dyslexic font and colorblind mode, but epilepsy is still a concern with the large warning you receive when first starting the game. There's other options like to "hit to aggro" to essentially turn off all combat if that bothers you. You can modify the style or speed of your movement too. You can see some of the options covered in this Youtube video. Trust me when I say that there will probably be something new to learn when browsing your settings.
First Phase
Choice: The fun thing about this game is that there really aren't too many goals that force your hand. You can spend as much time as you want catching bugs or talking with the townsfolk if that is what you enjoy doing. The only real difficulty comes from how quickly you want the timer to run within the menu settings between normal speed to half speed. Each season has their own set of critters, fish, and crop to collect. There are a number of festivals you can attend. There are a few things that I do recommend to complete within the first year if you do not plan to optimize your playthrough: (1) clear your entire farm of debris before winter, (2) the Animal Festival requires you to have a chicken in a coop, a cow in a barn, and an adopted pet on a cushion to participate, (3) upgrade your inventory to the maximum, and (4) you will appear completely out-of-place at the Beach Festival unless you buy a bathing suit to wear.
Adoption Center: There is a place over by town square where you can visit a shelter to adopt a pet. There is a number of pets available but you can currently only adopt one pet. Just like your bed, you will need a place for them to sleep in whether it is inside or out. You cannot exchange your pet. So whichever one you decide will be stuck with you. There is obviously a plan in motion to have you adopt a secondary mythical pet, but the developers have not quite fully implemented that feature into the game yet. My cat wandered outside whenever it wasn't raining and meowed whenever you walked by. Try not to pause the game, view your farm, or check your chests by your pet unless you want them to continuously call for your attention.
Progress: The Lake Temple becomes available pretty early and provides you rewards for not only each set you offer but also after completing a certain number of sets. Look towards at least fulfilling the offers for Spring, Summer, and Fall crop categories to obtain fast travel and unlock the other altars. The winter category is a bit more difficult to obtain since it requires the rare crop Snowdrop that comes from Rank C or donating 140 pieces to the Museum. Since there is a good chance you won't have anything available to grow during the first winter, take the time to setup a proper farm layout with all those fences and scarecrows you unlocked. While there are four tiers in the diving aspect of the game, I recommend at least reaching the second tier so that you can begin making sprinklers with bronze and silver kelp. At the bare minimum, complete the first tier of the mining aspect of the game so that you can begin Enchanting your equipment.
Gameplay
Gardening: The game provides a wide-range of crops to choose from. Some can be harvested once or multiple times. Some will wither away once the season ends or grow in more than one season. There are even crops that will impair your movement with long sticks. The thing that distinguishes them the most is the type of plant. Each plant has a secondary, and sometimes third process that increases their value as an artisan product. Fruits and vegetables can be placed in mason jars and kegs. Some grains can be placed inside a mill. A couple of new concepts were introduced such as how flowers can be placed in beehives instead of growing flowers around the structure. Another very important distinction is how Fruit Plants can wither out of their season like any other crop when Fruit Trees don't die. The one exception is how nothing withers inside a Greenhouse. Don't forget that the coconut trees around the island can also be harvested near the end of each season for a different type of fruit.
Festivals: The game does a fantastic job reminding you when there is a festival. You can buy a calendar for your house or access the task board to see birthdays and events for the current season. The date is also advertised on a stand by the Town Center. Decorations may slowly appear around town reflecting the festival theme. People will talk about an upcoming festival (as well as after the event ends) and a game notice will appear when you wake up the day of a festival. New markers will appear on the map and a balloon at each of the entry points will inform you of the schedule. Each one is rather unique and supplies you a pamphlet to show you all the activities available. Mini-games have practice sessions and can be repeated for all the rewards unless they are part of a tournament. The Tree Planting Festival will only be available for three separate years. The scoring of the Harvest Festival is rather complex and gets harder each year. The only festival that doesn't stop time and is available for multiple days is the Winter Fair.
Enchantments: One thing you can't overlook is bartering your hidden items to enchant
your weapons. Each gem opened from a geode, fossil, or artifact from a
coffer contains a tiered value that you can contribute to the process.
Upgrading your weapon will slowly open up to 3 enchanting slots. You can donate any amount that equals 100 (5 of the most basic items) for a random
enchantment. Depending on what you get, you can choose to replace one of the current ones with the selected enchantment or obtaining the same one will automatically increase the level. To
upgrade a specific one, the required value increases despite still having a maximum of five donated items.
Second Phase
House: Unless you want to splurge on decorations, investing in a bigger house isn't really necessary at the beginning unless you want to cook. Your house already supplies you with a wardrobe to store all your clothes and a house storage to hold all your decorations. Making meals isn't that glamorous unless you are gaining enough recipes from your relationships with the townsfolk. The carpenter will add a second room with a full-blown kitchen. The problem is that you don't automatically obtain any tools, not even an oven. You must visit Socket and Pan to buy all the cooking utensils. You'll obtain a fridge that can hold your food, but there is no need to transfer all your ingredients. Cooking automatically displays all valid ingredients from the chests on your farm. A couple of meals will be produced after performing a rather simplified timed event mini-game. If at any time you want to change the cosmetic overlay of your buildings, you can pay a small fee to the carpenter.
Upgrades: Something that can become a big problem is the number of times you find yourself in the predicament of spending all your cash on something new while trying to save your money to buy more seeds. Going on a spending spree in town might not be the best option until you can get a solid foundation on your farm. This includes making sure your buildings are upgraded to carry different kinds of animals. However, upgrading your character's level doesn't require such funds. You can obtain up to 5 perks per attribute once you reach level 10 in the category. One perk can be obtained by spending 500 merit points on the special potions found in the Mayor's Office. Ultimately, your upgrades consist of (1) your primary tools from the blacksmith to handle bigger things with additional enchantment slots, (2) increasing the rarity of produce from the lab, and (3) increasing the capability of a couple auxiliary tools from the fishing shop.
Mechanics
Townsfolk: There are quite a few conversations you can have with the people in the town. Not only are there a large number of relationships, but there are romance options available. They have a wide variety of things to talk about and will extend that dialogue if you wish to chat with them further. Certain activities must be completed before you can marry someone such as presenting them with a locket and upgrading your house to incorporate a room they can move into. The fourth house upgrade will allow you to have up to two children. Forming relationships with people will open up the way of providing cutscenes at the appropriate location and time. This is also the best way to learn cooking recipes. While some might mention of learning how to cook from a channel on the television set, one wasn't available in my playthrough. If you feel daring, you can try manually discovering the recipe yourself. Dialogue and events will naturally increase everyone's relationship status with you but routinely presenting gifts is the best way. The game doesn't update a person's likes or dislikes when a statement is made. It only displays which gifts you offered.
Mining: There are four chambers each with their own tier of ore to gather. Continue destroying rocks until you find a hole that you can fall through to the next level or use a rope decoration to form one yourself. Every five levels will update the elevator until you reach level 30 which requires ten levels to reach the final floor. You will very rarely find a geode, small chance of finding a mineral vein on the ground you can follow through with your pickaxe, and a decent chance of running into a few mineral nodes guarded by a monster on each floor. Monsters in general are very easy to counter despite the number of scents and weapons you can purchase. Each one has their own unique style of attack. There is a task board that will occasionally ask for you to kill monsters or retrieve supplies at the nearby guild.
Diving: The underwater diving portion mostly consists of you cleaning up garbage with your scythe. There are a number of ocean sea critters you can grab with your butterfly net, scavengeable clams, and four tiers of kelp to collect. The main focus is to find a small device that will activate a pillar. You must clear a path from its charge to push back the black ooze. Almost every aspect of the Merfolk Kingdom is currently missing from the game. Similar to the creatures above, you cannot converse with any of the sea critters you free despite receiving a reward from them. The stores within the kingdom or forming relationships with its people are not currently implemented. The music platforms you find within the regions don't provide you with anything either.
Third Phase
Flexibility: By this time, you must have completed the mining and diving portions of the game. It only takes you a full month digging through all four mines (if you spend each day reaching a checkpoint). Your reward is a table that lets you move things around your farm for a small fee dependent on the number of tiles. Clearing out the garbage in the ocean might take you a full year depending on your determination, how fast you set the day timer, and the level of your scythe. Afterwards, the game provides you quite a few new avenues as a form of endgame. The so-called locked areas located at each of the waypoints will only disappoint you as the only thing inside are piles of garbage. After healing the coral reef, you will be given the opportunity to turn into a mermaid yourself. You can dash and change the top and bottom portions of your physique (from two different vendors).
Automation: The research lab will provide you with various game-changers after spending an exorbitant amount of currency. Each piece of equipment must be unlocked in order of the row they are contained in. These items will allow you to "store" seeds and fertilizer into a dispenser and have them automatically poured out for you. You can purchase a computer to buy all sorts of stuff anytime you want without checking store hours or leaving the comforts of your farm. The singular ultimate scarecrow can be cosmetically equipped with any other type of scarecrow. The auto-chests dispenses stored items into any machines planted next to them and safely holds the products they make with no action required from the user. Place more than one chest in a column to develop a connecting conveyor belt. Just make sure to be very careful not to disturb the belt by moving the chests or the items within while they are being processed. The windmill must still be manually loaded by hand.
Computer: While a big aspect of the digital machine is the online store, being able to see when and where things spawn on the map will save you a lot of heartache. All fish, insects, and ocean critters are displayed with the exact time frames and specific locations. They also show whether they have been donated to the museum. Although the schedule only shows for that specific day, the list will adapt to the type of season or weather.
Cosmetics
Decorations: There is a store in town that offers a wide-range of decorations available for your farm and home. Items might not currently populate the display tables inside but you can still buy as many as you want from the front desk as long as you have the funds and inventory during store hours. Examples of each theme is shown to help you find the right type of items. All items are available from the online store on the computer as well but are only categorized by what goes inside or outside. The vast number of decorations can be placed in four different directions depending on which way you are facing. Anything can be collected by your pickaxe (other than chests with items inside or structures) or you can use the Architect Desk for 50c a tile. For the time being, the developers are still trying to work through the problems generated by these systems. There is a memory leak when trying to move large decorations to the point of crashing the game. This isn't good when the only time your progress is saved is sleeping in your bed. I've had this happen about ten times. It seems rather tricky to pull items from the house storage into your home. Additional tiling for your floor must be bought as each item disappears once applied and only displays "one room size" for your house. You have a total of three sections you can decorate: your initial room, the area by your kitchen, and the entryway on the second floor. Not a single item can be placed inside your potential mate's room or prearranged children rooms. There are purchasable items from additional themes not found in town that have a default value and turn invisible when placed down.
Wardrobe: The coolest part of your wardrobe is how you can have four different customized outfits. You don't have to wear anything at all or wear full one-piece outfits that cover your entire body. There are different colored shirts, sweaters, shorts, pants, and shoes to choose from. Hats are available but currently cut all your hair off the side of your head. A small number of backpacks adds a bit of flavor. Most of these will be available from the store in town but there are some exclusive during the festivals or special vendors.
Summary
Review: Coral Island is an ambitious project developed by a passionate team that respects the opinions of their audience by showing off future roadmaps on their website and daily updates through Discord. Changes were made to reduce the stress of exploring the mines, engaging in combat, complications for cooking, and unusual ways to collect miscellaneous objects. There are plenty of nice features to preoccupy your time and a number of things to explore that warrants any fan of the farm genre. However, the blatant number of things obviously missing, that hold no functionality, with technical issues, and half-developed will frustrate anyone who engages with their systems. While fundamentally the game is mostly finished, an official release was premature. As other reviews note, holding off for another year to see more polish would be a wise course of action.