Happy Little Farm is an adorable cartoon farming incremental... until it isn't

No matter what I do, I cannot seem to escape incrementals at the moment. Even when I'm not looking for them, they seem to infiltrate my list of to-be-played demos on Steam like they were always destined to be there. Happy Little Farm is one of those incremental games that sneaked its way into my Steam library, and I'm so glad it did. 

Happy Little Farm by Enter the Game Studios is both charming and adorable in equal measure. It's all about taking care of cute little creatures that drop coins, transferring those coins to your rundown farmhouse, and paying off a debt that you didn't contribute to in the first place. You buy upgrades, as expected in an incremental game, and experience life on the farm with your creatures and workers. 

Except that's a complete lie, but I went into this completely blind, and that's the experience I was expecting to have. Instead, I think I might be traumatized. 

Oh yay, windowed mode!

As someone in a long-distance relationship that results in being on Discord video call nine times out of ten, and also someone cursed with only a single screen, I love finding out a game supports windowed mode. So when Happy Little Farm told me explicitly that this was the case, I rejoiced. I could play and see my fiancé at the same time, and that can only be a good thing, right?

Well, yes, but also no. 

As it turns out, if you play Happy Little Farm in anything other than windowed mode, you are sorely missing out on at least half of what makes this incremental roguelike absolutely brilliant. Because the game makes a habit of straying from the window in horrifying ways. 

Did I mention that this adorable, papercraft-style little game is a horror? 

Eldritch horrors should not be cute 

Picture the scene: I'm happily playing Happy Little Farm with my fiancé on the side of the screen while I collect coins and buy upgrades to get more coins. I'm living my best incremental life; all is well. Then, with no warning, a slimy tentacle dangling a very dead woman scrolls in from the top of my screen, far above the game window, and I scream. I'm not sure what my fiancé thought was happening, but he knew I was not okay. 

To be clear, the scream was more out of shock than of fear. Happy Little Farm isn't a horror that will keep you awake at night, but it is very much a case of the game escaping its confinement and breaching the fourth wall. I've always loved games that mess with my computer in small ways; I just wasn't expecting something so cute to join the ranks among the best of them. 

The tentacle isn't just a weird aesthetic move, either. If you happen to get swiped by the dangling corpse while it waves across the screen, your character will die, and you'll lose any money you may otherwise have made that day. It's not the only thing trying to kill you, either. The wilderness surrounding the farm is filled with weirdly cute eldritch horrors just waiting to rip your cartoon head off with no warning. 

A particularly smug flower

As you progress through the days, collect your money, and try to avoid death, you're constantly in the presence of a smug yet useful flower. This flower seems to fluctuate between spewing ominous sentences and offering genuinely helpful advice, which presents a problem if you start tuning out and ignoring his little dialogue box, as I did. 

The enemies aren't alone in the whole appearing-outside-the-window thing. During the demo of Happy Little Farm, objects appear outside of the game window at the bottom. I'm ashamed to admit that I spent way too long trying to trick my mouse into leaving the window before realizing I could just… move the window itself, putting the items within reach of the character. 

In my defense, it had been a very long day of classes and coursework, so my logic skills were severely diminished by the time I finally got to play. Which probably explains the scream over the tentacle, too, now I think about it. 

What? It totally does. 

Happy Little Farm does not have a set release date just yet, but it clearly has a demo, and you should go and play it on Steam right now. Sorry for the spoilers.