Stardew Valley was made mostly by one dude in his basement. Roots of Pacha is being made by two brothers in San Diego. That'll make it twice as good, right?
It's a little unfair to simply call Roots of Pacha a Stardew clone. For starters, both Roots of Pacha and Stardew are love letters to Harvest Moon. The only difference is that Roots of Pacha also takes inspiration from the children's story "The Clan of the Cave Bear," and it has a slightly more JRPG hairstyle for the main character.
Oh, and the other difference is that Roots of Pacha takes place 20,000 years in the past.
But both games are definitely in the same genre, which is to say farming slash life simulation. While Stardew eventually back-doored its way into a hack-and-slash dungeon crawler, it looks like Roots of Pacha is going to stick to the script of exploration, construction, and agriculture, with a little bit of world-building thrown in there too.
"Help your once nomadic clan settle in a promised and fertile land," reads the description of Roots of Pacha over on Kickstarter. "By connecting with nature you’ll develop Ideas to evolve, enrich your culture, relationships, and discover the mysteries of Pacha, mother nature."
As with all farming simulators, there will be fields to till, seeds to plant, and crops to harvest. There's also going to be animal domestication, but because Roots of Pacha takes place during prehistoric times, those animals are sometimes wooly mammoths. Which is just great.
Build metal tools in your forge, use those tools to build a hut, decorate its interior with custom tapestries, then abandon said hut and head out in search of new vegetables, herbs, or exotic meats.
Roots of Pacha's Kickstarter just started on Monday and it reached its goal of $35,000 in less than 24 hours. Now they're moving on to stretch goals, where at $40,000 they'll expand the game's marriage options with new locations and "styles," at $55,000 they'll expand the game's fishing with more rafts and canoes, and at $70,000 they'll add a tundra region with more plants and animals.
Given the fact the game hit $35k in just a day, $70k seems well within the realm of possibility.
Roots of Pacha will release on Steam and Nintendo Switch sometime in 2022, with PlayStation and Xbox versions to follow. Pledge $45 on Kickstarter for beta access, or you can pledge $75 to get in on Roots of Pacha's alpha test.