An idea called heart plus

[Anthonygood]

Hello all. I have an idea called heart plus.

The idea is that when you get villagers (non romance candidates) to 8 hearts and you also completed the community center or joja storage - their hearts level up and they can get a level 3 system of 8 hearts.

I am thinking that there can be 4 levels. Normal, silver, gold , iridium. So each villager would have 24 extra hearts to build up after normal 8 hearts. In 4 sets of levels.

Why would this be a good idea ? Well in late game, the farm is all about money and you replace your animals and crops with high yields like pigs and ancient fruit or 12-14 day crops. People also stack jelly pickles truffled and wine.

What this heart system does, is it encourages you to plant less efficient vegetables and get milk cheese eggs maynaiose and cloth as well as fruits and small time items. This way you can gift villagers items that don't sell well and have a goal or purpose for late game.

Why is this system good ? It creates artificial longevity for the casual player and you can continue to gift gifts for up to 6 years or 7 years as you attempt to iridium star their max 32 hearts.

As for the rewards. Just make them mail more items and occasionally say hello in the city. You could also give a special item for each villager like example 4 star iridium gus could give you a unique table that can be placed outside your farm for a back yard porch item.

Maybe Robin can gift you a wooden clock that looks nice in your house at 4 star iridium hearts.

This system would encourage item hoarding and getting mixtures of items to keep pumping those hearts and gives something for players to do after they got their farm running perfectly.

What else. .. it makes birthdays useful for several years and it also gives you a goal. Something to work for years and keep gifting trying to get 32 hearts of iridium. Or 4 levels of 8 hearts.

Let me know what you guys think. Hope concern ape makes this happen.

(Ps I have 1100 hours on steam but I am a hyper casual and enjoy using creative energy to make save files complete. For me it's a goal and journey. Eventually I abandon farms and start overs when the creative energy hits )

Thanks all for reading. Let me know your ideas.

 

[Ereo]

I like it. I am usually friends with everyone after the first year (loved birthday gifts actually seem a bit overpowered to me), and then I have no real reason to talk to them any more.

I'd especially like it if their dialogue would change accordingly as well.

 

[estewanini]

I think it's a fine mechanic to introduce, your idea would hit many of the sore spots of late game, especially if it utilizes the CC to increase their heart level. Question: you didn't state this outright, but do you mean in your idea that we should do a quest every time they're ready to level up their hearts? (Hence the encouragement to hoard lower-level items?)

In the beginning I tried playing without any guides whatsoever, but then I got frustrated from wasting resources in an attempt to find every villager's liked/loved gifts and used the wiki. Now I think it's too easy to get villager's into max hearts, so in addition to this I'd also include more difficulty in gaining hearts the more you level them up. Don't know how much frustrating this would be since you need to do a bit of a grind, I can imagine that the pay off from this needs to be more satisfying than just a mailed item.

It probably would need a lot of writing involved, but it would be a cherry on top if there's an event after every heart level increase, or only one event for the last iridium heart completion.

Thanks for the share!

 

[Cthulhu]

In the beginning I tried playing without any guides whatsoever, but then I got frustrated from wasting resources in an attempt to find every villager's liked/loved gifts and used the wiki. Now I think it's too easy to get villager's into max hearts, so in addition to this I'd also include more difficulty in gaining hearts the more you level them up. Don't know how much frustrating this would be since you need to do a bit of a grind, I can imagine that the pay off from this needs to be more satisfying than just a mailed item.

It probably would need a lot of writing involved, but it would be a cherry on top if there's an event after every heart level increase, or only one event for the last iridium heart completion.

I played without guides too, which unfortunately meant finding a couple of gifts that were liked or loved and just spamming them. It's a shame, but there really isn't any benefit to continued experimentation with finding out what people like, game-wise. I'm always pleased when I figure out what people like; it's often something you can infer from their personality or dialogue, but sometimes you're led astray (I was SO sure Jas would be happy when I gave her a crayfish...).

Anyway, it shouldn't have to be a grind. There would already have to be a significant amount of writing and scripting to do; why not make the player do events to earn those higher heart levels? And the thirty-seventh time you give Abigail an amethyst, she should be markedly less excited about it. :P

 

[Boo1972]

I played without guides too, which unfortunately meant finding a couple of gifts that were liked or loved and just spamming them. It's a shame, but there really isn't any benefit to continued experimentation with finding out what people like, game-wise. I'm always pleased when I figure out what people like; it's often something you can infer from their personality or dialogue, but sometimes you're led astray (I was SO sure Jas would be happy when I gave her a crayfish...).

Anyway, it shouldn't have to be a grind. There would already have to be a significant amount of writing and scripting to do; why not make the player do events to earn those higher heart levels? And the thirty-seventh time you give Abigail an amethyst, she should be markedly less excited about it. :P

I also gave Jas a crayfish. Then I gave Penny artifacts. Quite the learning experience.

 

[estewanini]

It's a shame, but there really isn't any benefit to continued experimentation with finding out what people like, game-wise. I'm always pleased when I figure out what people like; it's often something you can infer from their personality or dialogue, but sometimes you're led astray (I was SO sure Jas would be happy when I gave her a crayfish...).

Oh I feel you. It's definitely a one step forward two steps back kinda thing, satisfying when you get it right but a lot more frustrating when you get it wrong. I made the mistake of assuming that whatever item a villager requested on the bulletin meant that they like/love those objects too, George didn't appreciate the joja cola I gave him after his request for it the day before :/

Anyway, it shouldn't have to be a grind. There would already have to be a significant amount of writing and scripting to do; why not make the player do events to earn those higher heart levels? And the thirty-seventh time you give Abigail an amethyst, she should be markedly less excited about it. :P

I could see it as a grind if it's not implemented correctly, though it'd be a good balance to the late game that it gets harder to gain hearts, as long as the level up heart events are worthwhile.

Maybe if you could somehow script it in a way that encourages players to give different liked/loved gifts consecutively then it'd be a reprieve to the repetitive dialog and gift grinding; say it's about Abigail of how she's had more than enough amethysts than she knows what to do with, plus the player didn't receive the same amount of hearts that they're used to are neat hints for them to change strats, then the next time the player wants to receive higher hearts they should give another item. Changes things a little while you work for it, it's also more immersive in the end.

 

[Cthulhu]

I could see it as a grind if it's not implemented correctly, though it'd be a good balance to the late game that it gets harder to gain hearts, as long as the level up heart events are worthwhile.

Maybe if you could somehow script it in a way that encourages players to give different liked/loved gifts consecutively then it'd be a reprieve to the repetitive dialog and gift grinding; say it's about Abigail of how she's had more than enough amethysts than she knows what to do with, plus the player didn't receive the same amount of hearts that they're used to are neat hints for them to change strats, then the next time the player wants to receive higher hearts they should give another item. Changes things a little while you work for it, it's also more immersive in the end.

Yes, exactly. Encourage the player to vary their gifts, pay a little more attention to what they're doing. And please, please more events that impact friendship.

I don't see that it would necessarily be a grind, either; as long as there was some new dialogue, I would think that people would be happy to have a reason to do something other than watch their optimized farm run itself during the late game. :P

 

[goboking]

To be honest, without new dialogue and more heart events, I don't see much point in extending hearts. Material rewards for a prolonged heart track would feel to me like incentive to run on a treadmill. But it would at least give the friendship gained from inviting people to the

Spoiler: late game spoiler

movie theater

a use, since hearts are typically capped with everyone by the time it is accessible.

 

[Ellajoy]

Yessss!!!!