When it comes to cozy life sim RPGs, there are few activities that get me into the groove more than some good, robust animal husbandry. That’s just what Palia fans are going to be getting with the Fall Fantasy: Of Barns and Briars update that just went live, introducing the new Ranching skill to the game, first as a single-player system and then later with multiplayer features integrated.
Ahead of Ranching’s arrival, I had opportunity to ask some questions of Maxwell Zierath, Palia’s Director of Production, about the skill’s general mechanics, how it came together, and a few hints at what’s possibly in the cards for its future. Before you start petting your ormuus and feeding your pekis, read on!
MassivelyOP: Obviously you know that the ranching feature has been one that fans have been clamoring for (including me). Do you think the team has made this new skill line as satisfying and engrossing as possible?
Singularity Six’s Maxwell Zierath: The team has had a lot of fun playing the Ranching skill internally leading up to launch, and we certainly put a lot of effort into making it a compelling experience for players. Our goal was to deliver a system that enabled deep emotional connections with the animals and had a long tail of engagement possible for players to invest their time into. Not only is this the first new skill added to Palia since we went into Open Beta, it’s the first skill that’s been developed without multiple external playtests providing feedback. So we’re super excited to see what players think of it, and expect to make changes in response to what players love and don’t love about the system.
As you no doubt know, animal husbandry is part and parcel for games like this. What sorts of things will make Palia’s stand out the most?
One thing we pride ourselves on in Palia is the immersion we’ve been able to deliver with high production values, and Ranching is no exception. Our animals live on your Ranch, they walk around and you interact directly with them. They’ll respond to your actions and let you know if they’re unhappy. We believe players will appreciate that as they build a bond with their own animals.
The other area we think players will appreciate is the depth we’re putting into the system. There’s a very high level of variety possible with each animal to truly find your own lovable pal. With our trait system, we’re enabling 10s of millions of unique gameplay and visual combinations on animals that will provide a long tail for players to sink their teeth into (figuratively, not literally!).
Give us a brief overview of how ranching works. Do you have to feed your animals? Do they die or are there immortal pekis? What prerequisites are needed to place a ranch, and can one be placed right on housing plots?
Once you’ve gotten your glider, Delilah will come visit your plot and introduce you to your very own ranch. At your ranch you’ll be able to raise up to 30 animals of different types as they grow from Babies, to Adults, and eventually become Venerable. Caring for your animals takes time, and you’ll want to regularly check in with them to give them your love, keep their bellies full, and collect any items they produce. Each animal has a set of traits that can influence their gameplay or visual appearance, which will allow you to truly find an animal that is uniquely yours. There’s enough variety here that we’re delivering 10s of millions of unique gameplay and visual combinations to give a sense of what’s possible.
How many different iterations did the ranching skill go through before S6 settled on the current implementation?
That’s tough to answer because we had our eyes on Ranching for a very long time, and have taken multiple stabs at the design over the years. We really started to put our attention on it earlier this year and through development made many adjustments to the experience. Some elements took more iterations than others, but the goals have always been clear and consistent. We want our players to raise Animals that they can nurture, adore, and be proud of.
Are there any insights you can provide about how animal traits work and their benefits? Will these blend to make animals that yield more materials or require less food, for instance?
Traits can provide either gameplay or cosmetic changes to each of your animals. The effects range from influencing how fast your animal ages, to how much food they can eat, to unique patterns that show up on their coats. Each trait has a rarity associated with it, and the combination of these trait rarities impact what type of rewards you can get when you donate your animal. We even have a few legendary traits that are going to be big surprises to those that get them.
You mentioned additional traits would be in the works. Any ideas on what directions those might go?
There’s a whole bunch of ways we see expanding the system over time and fun ways we can tweak the experience by providing unique traits. Most often we’re thinking about unique ways to change up how a player might engage with an animal species, but there’s also some opportunities to expand traits for all animals. One that didn’t quite make it, for instance, is a trait that allows you to overfeed an animal, meaning you don’t have to check in on it as often.
The initial announcement said a total of 30 animals are available on farms. Do you think this might raise over time?
Never say never! We initially planned a much lower number of animals, but felt it wasn’t enough to deliver the depth and immersion that we felt was necessary for the skill. We hope that 30 will strike a good balance between being able to know (and love) all of your animals, providing a healthy amount of things to do each time you visit your ranch, while also providing enough that players can have a variety of animals with different traits. I will warn – having 30 animals quickly becomes a lot to check up on care for!
What sorts of products can we look forward to as a result of ranching’s arrival? Presumably there will be eggs, milk, and butter, for instance, but are there any surprises you could share?
With our Fall Fantasy: Of Barns and Briars update, players will be able to acquire and raise Peki’s, Trufflets, Ormuu, and Bumbles. Each of them produce items unique to species. Respectively those will be: Eggs, Mushrooms (of various kinds), Milk, and Honey. Over time we are planning to add many more animal species into Ranching, each providing different items. Not all of them will be as grounded as the initial offerings, and players will get to see the first example of that in our patch following Of Barns and Briars.
What kind of feedback and player insight are you hoping to receive from Palia fans with this feature’s rollout?
The one area that is really hard to judge internally is longer term progression and balance. We did a month-long playtest internally that drove a lot of balance changes leading up to the version players will be playing on Wednesday, but the system provides such a broad range of possibilities that it’s hard to know what will happen once the doors open to everyone! We’re super interested to see how quickly players are able to progress the skill as well as how profitable players are able to become with their animals.
With more potential abundance in certain items, will this also mean we can look forward to more recipes? I saw a bee in the roadmap video, so maybe we can make some mead and cider, maybe? I know I’d like those for instance. Wink wink.
While we’re not bringing new recipes for these items in this patch, we’re always on the lookout for ideas on this front.
I appreciate that this might be a long way off, but what does multiplayer ranching look like in your mind? Or has the team at S6 gotten that far?
We’ve been thinking about multiplayer from the very beginning, so it’s embedded into the overall design of the system. At a baseline, players should expect it to function similarly to other skills like gardening. When we open multiplayer up, your friends will be able to come visit your ranch and help you pet and feed your animals.
Does multiplayer ranching possibly open the door for more added multiplayer-specific features and benefits for existing skill lines? So far ranching and cooking seem to be the ones that may have multiple people working at once baked into its design.
We’re always talking and thinking about ways to strengthen social opportunities with skills and make them more multiplayer. Some of our more recent events like the Piksii Blossom Bounce and Kilima Flower Bloom have ways with which players can use different skills, like Gardening (with the watering can) or Hunting, to help other players out. We think these kinds of things are what makes Palia unique as an experience.
Will there be farm animal events added in the future, perhaps? Maybe a sort of town fair where we have prize animals to show off and earn rewards?
This is definitely something we’re interested in hearing from the community as they get their hands on Ranching.
Another “far into the future” question, but I have to ask: What kinds of other animal types are there possible plans for? Sheep? Horses? Chapaas?
One of the core goals of the Ranching skill was to enable us to add many more animals into it over time, so throw us all the ideas! We mentioned this in a previous Palia Path video – we plan to have a variety introduced, ranging from grounded animals like Ormus (cows) to much more fantastical options which players will get a first taste of soon!
