Like most of the bigger things we see in life, it always started off small and took time to grow into what it is now. The same can be said about Serenity Forge, a once small but now much bigger game development studio in Boulder, Colorado. Based on their release history, they started out quite small with simple mobile and indie games, leveraging pixel art and other similar simple art styles in games like Mystic Melee or The King’s Bird as they evolved and grew over time.

Though over time they’ve had a hand in several game genres and a lot has changed since they started out in 2017, but the one thing that stayed the same is the passion they have for the work they do. On 21 April 2023, they proved that they still have that same love for gaming and game development that they had in 2014 with their release of Homestead Arcana, a wild adventure filled with whacky and wonderous twists but also an amazing story that you’ll just keep wanting more of.

Homestead Arcana isn’t odd and whacky all the time though, as you’ll soon come to learn, it’s also a very cozy and relaxed game. Both halves of Homestead Arcana are so perfectly balanced that it’s almost scary sometimes, even more so when you notice just how much time you’ll lose to just farming and tending to your plants or brewing potions for your next trip into the Miasma. However, you’ll lose even more time exploring the perilous Miasma while looking for recipes, seedlings, and parts of the story.

In Homestead Arcana, the world was once a green and lush place filled with so much nature and beauty. That is, until the Miasma, a deadly magical fog appeared out of nowhere and started consuming most of the land. This ended up driving the people to live on barren mountaintops and left them scraping by for resources, but one town in particular was spared from having to move, Little Rock. The ever-rising Miasma is still threatening the town and it sparked them to start the Homestead Arcana Program.

The Homestead Arcana Program was established to place young witches closer to the Miasma to cultivate plants and other resources to send back home, but while it advised against to into the Miasma, one witch one particular did it anyway. This is where you come in, and you’ll need to establish your small homestead on the border of the Miasma and survive the wilds inside the Miasma if you want to prosper, but also if you want to put an end to the Miasma permanently. However, this path is a dangerous one to follow.

Homestead Arcana starts off relatively simple with a character creator. Though it’s not as detailed as some would like, this game relies quite heavily on simplicity’s strength, leaving only the Body Type, Skin, Hair and Eye Colors along with a few different hairstyles to choose from at first. Though later on, once you’re a bit better settled, you’ll get to change your hairstyles and clothes as you see fit. As mentioned, you won’t start off with a full wardrobe, but you’ll likely end up finding more clothes as you complete requests and explore the lands.

What can be a bit disorienting at first is when Abhram, the shopkeeper, drops you off at the top of a mountain path. The reason behind this is because the first voice you’ll hear, aside from Abraham, actually belongs to your familiar, Huckleberry. He’ll be your guide to get started in Homestead Arcana as he guides you through the tutorial, but he’s also a great source of lore when having conversations with him. The tutorial is also your initiation rite into the Homestead Arcana Program, and you’ll need to keep this in mind as you progress as the story runs a lot deeper than it appears.

What adds to the wonderous world of Homestead Arcana are the plants you’ll encounter. Some might seem extremely odd, like a cabbage that grows on a small tree or the Dust Eater trees that suck up Miasma. Though everything has a role to play in Homestead Arcana. You’ll initially start off with a few basic seedlings you can plant around your homestead’s Dust Eater. While they might not seem like much, your garden will expand and flourish in no time at all.

The next thing you’ll need as a witch are spells, but instead of incantations or wands, you’ll need spell potions that allow you cast spells… Albeit temporarily. This mechanic is a bit strange in itself but it’s also a nice change of pace. This is where having a garden comes in handy as most of your spells are brewed using the various plants, fruits and vegetables around you. Some spells are simple to create, others require much rarer ingredients, and new spells are usually accompanied by a free bottle when you first discover them in the Miasma.

However, to cast anything you’ll need mana, you start off with a decent supply that slowly recharges over time but sooner or later, you’ll need more mana to maintain your spells for longer. Like with so many other things, you’ll find potions that increase your maximum mana and health in the Miasma. Though this does mean straying from the beaten path to explore roads, but to do this, you’ll need blasting powder.

The Miasma is already a dangerous place to begin with, but sometimes you’ll find corral-like rock formations blocking other paths. These can be blown up with some blasting powder, but that’s easier said than done. Your first round of blasting powder will come from Huckleberry but after that, you’ll need to make more. This is where things become tricky. Making more blasting powder requires sulfur, and you’ll only get that after fertilizing a lesser Dust Eater tree within the Miasma, but to that… You’ll need a special fertilizer.

Everything needs something else, this does seem tedious in Homestead Arcana, but the game takes you all over the land for it. The game can come off as an endless fetch quest but it also encourages you to explore as well. The special fertilizer is similar to an ever-growing since each new batch will require new ingredients, but they’ll also open up new paths in the Miasma for you to explore and discover more as to how to cleanse the Miasma permanently.

Now while it’s all good and fine that you can grow plants and make potions, but you’ll need a place to craft and brew everything you’ll need. Homestead Arcana makes use of a multitude of crafting structures that you’ll have to build to craft other buildings, refine food items, brew potions, or even make decorations. While being able to craft a massive myriad of items is fun, you’ll need resources to do it. Half the resources you’ll need, you can easily grow at your homestead and in massive quantities. The other half you’ll need to venture out, away from your homestead to get.

With so many reasons to explore the Miasma, it must be a paradise, right? Sadly, no. The Miasma, while beautiful in a very dark and contrasting way, has its own dangers. The first being that you can’t stay in there for too long, not without running the risk of possibly expiring. As mentioned, the Miasma is a poisonous fog of sorts. When you start out, you’ll have to very briefly brave the Miasma to get your reward for passing the initiation but it will slowly drain your health as well. Homestead Arcana encourages you to explore, and that’s also exactly what you need to do but with a little risk. That same risk will come with a reward in the form of a mask that will filter the Miasma for a short time, giving you more range to explore deeper into the Miasma.

Just as you think you’ve finally gotten everything to be had in Homestead Arcana, you’ll discover that your crafting structures can be upgraded. From your crafting bench to your cauldron, everything can be upgraded eventually. Though you'll need to check in regularly with Abraham as he'll be your main source for recipes to build those upgrades. However, no shop is ever complete without the ability to sell some of your own wares, and you’ll need a ton of silver to buy the odd crafting ingredient, recipes for upgrades, and oddly enough… To brew potions. It’s extremely odd that you need to throw currency into the cauldron to brew a potion, but then again, there are very few things in Homestead Arcana that you won’t find odd.

Serenity Forge went above and beyond in developing Homestead Arcana’s visual side. The 3D animation does look a bit underdone but that’s what brings out the beauty of this game. While you have the warm summer colors outside the Miasma, you’ll also have vibrant but contrasting colors in the Miasma clearly setting them apart from each other. It takes an odd level of imagination to come up with some of the more breathtaking plants you’ll see as well. With so much going on, it’s still quite surprising how incredibly immersed Homestead Arcana is when it comes to farming or just stopping to admire the sights.

What helps Homestead Arcana stand out even more so would be the voice acting. With Zeke Alton being the voice of Abraham and Yuri Lowenthal as the voice of Huckleberry, they both made their respective characters shine on the storytelling aspect of Homestead Arcana. They bring a whole new life to a game that’s already overflowing with it, and they played their parts to award-winning degrees. Another major aspect that will make you lose track of time is the music. With a mostly Southern flair and a relaxed theme, you’ll feel like you’ve only lost a few minutes with how immersive it becomes when you're back at your homestead, while in the Miasma, the music does take on a much darker approach that'll make you feel like there's peril around each corner.

Homestead Arcana is the next big step for Serenity Forge with a masterpiece of a game. From the well thought out sights, plant life, and even the occasional hostile animal to the incredible storytelling. You'll find yourself losing more time than any game should let you, but you won't regret a single second of it when you're out exploring and learning more about what happened before the Miasma took over. Homestead Arcana is, for the most part, a very relaxed game that you can play at your own pace, it can be a bit slow to get started, but it just keeps getting better once the ball is rolling.

Jay Claassen
Editor, NoobFeed