Story of Seasons: Grand Bazaar Handheld Preview – Nintendo Switch 2, Switch 1, & Steam Deck Impressions
Ahead of its launch, I've been playing Marvelous USA's Story of Seasons: Grand Bazaar on Switch, Switch 2, and Steam to discuss how the early hours of the game feel across handhelds. Note that while I usually go in-depth with comparisons and testing things like load times and performance, I will be covering that closer to the game's launch. For now, I wanted to just cover the game itself and how each version feels so far. I will cover some platform-specific features though.
My first taste of Story of Seasons was the 3DS entry with the same name so I missed out on all prior games in the Story of Seasons / Harvest Moon series. This is one of the reasons I'm glad Marvelous is slowly bringing back older entries through remakes and re-imaginings. In fact, the Switch versions of Story of Seasons: Friends of Mineral Town and Story of Seasons: A Wonderful Life were how I experienced those games as well. Having never played Harvest Moon: Grand Bazaar on DS, Story of Seasons: Grand Bazaar has been a relaxing and colorful joy to play so far. Even early on, I'm impressed with the structure, customization, and freedom you get during each in-game day.
Story of Seasons: Grand Bazaar also has a lot of fully voiced scenes so far with a combination of 3D models and portraits. You can disable the portraits to just have 3D models, but I left them both on to see how I feel. Beyond that, everything in Story of Seasons: Grand Bazaar feels more alive thanks to the animation work, chat camera when talking to residents, and improved character designs. You can disable the first-person chat camera, but I left it on since it reminds me of talking to NPCs in Bethesda Game Studios games. I mentioned the freedom you get in Story of Seasons: Grand Bazaar, and this also applies to general exploration with less invisible walls in Zephyr Town. Story of Seasons: Grand Bazaar has a fixed camera across locations so the only real change to first-person so far happens during cut-scenes.
In a lot of ways, Story of Seasons: Grand Bazaar is the best-looking and feeling game in the series on Switch platforms and I'm curious to see how both systems hold up in the later portions of the game.
Story of Seasons: Grand Bazaar - Nintendo Switch 2 Edition impressions
Story of Seasons: Grand Bazaar - Nintendo Switch 2 Edition was actually the first version of the game I booted up when I got my game codes. If you've not played the Story of Seasons games on Switch before, the technical aspects vary quite a bit with Story of Seasons: Pioneers of Olive Town being the worst of the lot. I was curious to see how Story of Seasons: Grand Bazaar - Nintendo Switch 2 Edition would look and feel on Switch 2, and it looks and plays great handheld so far with a 60fps target. The visuals are crisp and the load times are better than I expected. I can already see this becoming a Fantasy Life i: The Girl Who Steals Time-like time sink on Switch 2.
When I docked my Nintendo Switch on my 1440p monitor, I noticed some minor performance issues with hitching during movement. This is the first concern I have with the port. While Story of Seasons: Grand Bazaar - Nintendo Switch 2 Edition feels smooth in handheld mode and looks great, there is some hitching when playing docked and moving around outdoors. I tested this when playing with the Switch 2 set to 4K, 1440p, and 1080p across my monitor and TV. I hope this is something the team is able to address for launch because it is a small blemish on an otherwise polished release based on the opening hours. The second concern I have is the mouse controls. I don't usually use mouse controls in games like this, but since they were one of the Switch 2 Edition's new features, I thought I'd give them a shot. I feel like they aren't implemented as well as I expected. It still feels like I'm playing with traditional controller inputs rather than being able to drag or click to move with a mouse. I will revisit these closer to launch.
Story of Seasons: Grand Bazaar PC port features and Steam Deck impressions
Story of Seasons: Grand Bazaar on PC has uncapped frame rate support, up to 4K resolution, and a few settings you can adjust across display and graphics. Note that since this is a month prior to launch, it is possible the settings and performance isn't final, but I'm impressed with the PC version so far. The display settings let you adjust display mode (windowed, borderless, and fullscreen), resolution (768p, 1080p, 1440p, and 4K), toggle v-sync, and adjust frame rate target (30, 60, 120, 144, 165, unlimited). On the graphics side, you can toggle: anti-aliasing, depth of field, ambient occlusion, and reflections. Shadow quality can be adjusted across low, standard, and high options.
When it comes to controls, Story of Seasons: Grand Bazaar on PC has support for PlayStation and Xbox button prompts. When I played on my Steam Deck itself, it displayed Xbox button prompts, but using my DualSense controller had PlayStation prompts when I disabled Steam Input. I haven't tried Story of Seasons: Grand Bazaar on my ROG Ally yet, but the Steam Deck experience so far tells me it will likely get Steam Deck Verified by launch. It brings up the on-screen keyboard for any text entry correctly, has Steam Cloud support, and works out of the box with no Proton tweaking required. It defaulted to 768p and does not support 16:10 aspect ratio though.
Given how light the game is to run, I ended up setting the game to run at 1080p on the Steam Deck's screen using the game properties so I could downsample and have better visuals at a locked 60fps. You can aim for 90fps as well if you run the game at 768p. Since this is all based on the opening hours, I don't consider this my Steam Deck recommended settings for Story of Seasons: Grand Bazaar though. I'll be doing more testing closer to launch to see how the game holds up. For now, it is looking like a great portable experience on Valve's handheld with crisp visuals and a stable frame rate across the board.
Story of Seasons: Grand Bazaar Nintendo Switch 1 impressions
When I covered Rune Factory: Guardians of Azuma across Switch and Switch 2, I noted how the original Switch version was very well-optimized for the hardware. It was a huge step up over the technical mess we had with Rune Factory 5 on Switch. Story of Seasons: Grand Bazaar, like Guardians of Azuma, is well-optimized for Switch 1 all things considered. It looks a bit soft both docked and handheld, but holds its frame rate target well in the opening hours. If you're ok with a 30fps target, Story of Seasons: Grand Bazaar on Switch is a good experience so far. Since the Switch 2 and Switch versions share save data, I'm looking forward to playing more over the coming weeks and seeing how it holds up in the visually busier seasons. As of now, any worry I had for Story of Seasons: Grand Bazaar on the original Switch is gone based on the opening hours.
Stay tuned for my full comparison and technical review of the game closer to launch going into how Story of Seasons: Grand Bazaar runs on ROG Ally, Switch vs Switch 2 thoughts, and what the best portable version of Story of Seasons: Grand Bazaar is.
Story of Seasons: Grand Bazaar launches on August 27 for Nintendo Switch, Nintendo Switch 2, and PC (Steam).