7 Ideas For Mystery-Themed Farming Games

Plus sharing two mystery games in Steam's Farming Fest

Happy Mystery Monday!

With the Mystery Game Jam entering its final week, my schedule is very busy, so today's post will be another short one.

This week is also Steam's Farming Fest, so I was curious if there were any mystery-themed farming games.

The answer is... not really. Surprisingly, I found a lot more in Steam’s FPS Fest!

This is kind of a shame, since farming games tend to do really well, and a mystery-themed farming game would very easily differentiate itself from all other farming games out there.

So it stands to reason that creating a mystery-themed farming game could be a really untapped niche.

Here is one released farming game and one unreleased farming game, both of which are mystery-themed and seemed worthy of bringing to your attention:

Harvest Island

Harvest Island is a mysterious, dark-cozy story-rich adventure with horror and farming elements. Pray to the gods, never ask questions as you enjoy your blissful farming days. Don't wander off too far from the comfort of your home. It's safer to play around the farm than exploring this remote island.

Everholm

Lilly was spirited away to a mysterious island. As her memories fade, everyone seems to know her and her quest for her missing sister. It’s time to establish a homestead, meet your friendly Everfolks, then learn their secrets and solve the mystery of Everholm, in this open-ended minimalist RPG!

7 ideas for mystery-themed farming games

My own experience with farming games mostly consists of Harvest Moon and Stardew Valley. And while those are two very fun and popular games, they are only a tiny selection of what is out there. So I'm a little out of my element with this one.

But here are some of my thoughts on how you could cross mystery with farming:

1. You run your own farm and talk with the villagers, when suddenly one of those villagers goes missing and is later found dead. With a murderer lurking in the town, you must continue to grow your farm while pursuing the truth and unmasking the killer.

2. As an investigator, you are called to someone else's farm to investigate whether it meets agricultural standards, but these farmers are keeping a deep secret from you and everyone else.

3. You are a detective pretending to run a farm in order to infiltrate a rural community (possibly a cult) and expose its corruption.

4. Your legal client runs a farm and you must prepare a case to defend it against a megacorporation or government entity that wants to take over its plot of land.

5. Trapped in a barn or crop circle, you must find a way to escape it.

6. You wake up in a mysterious place with no idea how you arrived there and must farm to survive while uncovering the land’s secrets and finding a way home

7. Multiplayer farming game where everyone is working on the same farm, but a traitor is among you and must be stopped from sabotaging the farm.

Now that I've listed all these ideas, I kind of wish I went with one of these ideas for the Mystery Game Jam.

Oh well — there’s always next year!

---

Thanks for reading!

If you want to learn how to make your own mystery game…

Or if you want to discover the best mystery games before anyone else…

Join our 300+ member Mystery Gamedev community today!

And please consider sharing our newsletter with a friend — we appreciate it!