In the era of farmlife sims exploding on PC, new games really have to bring something special to catch my attention. The pitch for Tales of Seikyu includes kissing demon people and yeah, that'll do it for me. Honestly though, just about every part of this upcoming life sim has caught my eye: the animal transformations, the Japanese rural fantasy setting, and ranching capybaras too.

Farmlife sim fans know the drill, otherwise. Tales of Seikyu begins when you buy a small property in the countryside where you'll farm various crops throughout the seasons, care for animals, decorate your home, craft and sell the byproducts of your farm, and befriend or marry villagers.

And those villagers look fantastic. The developer ACE Entertainment says that Seikyu island has more than 40 residents, among them a wild cast of humans, bird people, anthropomorphic otters, and of course cat people too. It's the beautiful bird lady that shocked me though. How is this sun hat-wearing, florally adorned bird woman so lovely? Marriage candidates aside, there are other unlikely townies like cranes and kappas with a lovely aesthetic that it's hard not to call Studio Ghibli-inspired. 

I want to gush about having such a wide selection of crops that includes yams and bok choy or my extreme interest in having a capybara farm, but there's even more than that on Tales of Seikyu's list of plans. The yokai shapeshifting system lets you turn into a bird to fly around the world or hop into the water as a slime creature catching fish with its vacuum mouth, or a boar that tills soil on the farm. There's an action combat system for sword fighting against some bigger yokai monsters that I suspect is going to draw a few Breath of the Wild comparisons. The system for placing new barns, fences, and other decor looks pretty permissive as well.

Tales of Seikyu caught my eye with its Kickstarter campaign initially, which I'm happy to report it has now smashed. The life sim has been funded well past its asking amount and committed to stretch goals like a second protagonist choice, a pet store, and five new yokai. Though it did just wrap the crowdfunding campaign, Tales of Seikyu looks decently well along and has plans to launch sometime in 2024. You can wishlist it on Steam until then.