Oriental Valley

Oriental Valley opens with a familiar farming-sim beat — a young traveller, Xiao Jiang, stumbles into a countryside village and settles into learning the rhythms of rural life — before quietly revealing itself to be something considerably stranger. Railway lines eventually open up bamboo seas, deserts, and old towns that feel less like a grounded countryside and more like a fever dream wearing a farming sim's clothes. That's a genuinely distinctive premise, and this review's small but detailed sample is unusually split on whether the execution lives up to it.

A visual style and sense of humour reviewers genuinely love

The praise that does land in this sample is specific rather than polite. "It's super pretty, the over saturated colours and presentation style is very aesthetically pleasing," one reviewer writes, a sentiment echoed across nearly every review regardless of overall recommendation. The writing draws its own distinct fanbase: "the dialogue in this game is so out of pocket comical," one reviewer writes, while another frames the whole experience as "a hilariously fun parody of normal farming sims... instead of playing someone trying to get away from the big city to live a peaceful farming life, you're playing someone desperately trying to get out." That's a genuinely clever subversion of the genre's usual premise, and reviewers who click with that tone describe real, sustained enjoyment — several logging well over 2,000 minutes.

The NPC design that splits the room in half

The most consistently repeated point of disagreement in this review's sample concerns the game's supporting cast, most of whom are rendered as featureless, near-identical mannequin-like figures. Some reviewers embrace this fully: "I've seen people complained about the NPC looking characters, but honestly I think its hilarious. It made this game its own charm," one writes. Others read the exact same design choice as a warning sign: "most characters are simply blank mannequins with no unique features and they always say the same thing," one reviewer writes, treating it as evidence of unfinished content rather than intentional style. Both readings are describing the same objective fact about the game — this isn't a factual dispute, it's a genuine difference in how identically-executed content lands depending on what tone a given player expects from the genre.

A translation that doesn't fully cover the game

Beyond the NPC debate, a specific and repeated complaint concerns localisation completeness. "It isn't fully translated, some quests ask for one thing but actually require another (a fishing quest asks for chubs but actually means bighead carp)," one detailed reviewer writes, and another separately confirms "the artefact museum is missing most translations and camera is still completely in Chinese." These are concrete, specific translation gaps rather than vague quality complaints, and they compound the broader sense several reviewers describe of a game that shipped before it was fully ready for an English-speaking audience.

A support record this review found genuinely sparse

This review's own check of the game's official update history found only six documented posts, the most recent being a "Version1.4" update roughly three weeks after the 25 April 2024 launch — and nothing further documented since. That's a notably thin support record for a full-price release, and it lines up directly with reviewers who describe the game as feeling like an early-access build that was never followed up on. This review can't independently confirm whether further, undocumented patches exist outside Steam's own events feed, but based on what is verifiable, ongoing development attention appears to have been minimal.

What the achievement data confirms about engagement

Steam's own completion figures back up a real concern about how far players actually get. The single most-earned achievement sits at just 30.1% — an unusually low ceiling even for an easy, early-game milestone by this lane's standards — with the rarest achievements down at 2.7%. That's consistent with a game that a large share of buyers try briefly and then set aside, whether due to the translation gaps, the unclear objectives several reviewers describe, or simply not connecting with its unconventional tone.

A meaningful gap between English and broader reception

It's worth being transparent about a genuine divergence this review uncovered while researching: across all languages, Oriental Valley sits at 83.3% positive, a "Very Positive" rating, while its English-only sample sits at just 63.2%, "Mixed." That's a substantial gap, and it's consistent with several of the specific complaints raised throughout this review — an incomplete English translation would understandably land much harder on an English-speaking audience than on players experiencing the game in a language it was actually fully localised for. This review's overall score reflects the English-language experience specifically, since that's the audience it's written for, but readers fluent in the game's original language should weigh the considerably warmer broader reception directly against the translation-specific complaints raised here.

A specific defense worth including directly

Not every long-session reviewer treats the game's rough edges as disqualifying. One writes candidly: "It is a delightful game, but it is incomplete... The English translation is bad and there are bugs, but I'm still smitten with its goofy style." That's a useful, honest middle ground distinct from either the harsher critical reviews or the more uncomplicated enthusiasm elsewhere in the sample — a genuine acknowledgment that the game's flaws are real, paired with a sincere case that its specific charm is worth pushing through them for the right kind of player.

Final verdict

Oriental Valley has a genuinely distinctive visual identity and a comedic sensibility that wins real, specific devotion from players who click with its surreal tone — but its notably sparse post-launch support, incomplete translation, and a divisive NPC design that reads to a real share of players as simply unfinished all keep this from being an easy recommendation. Worth a discounted purchase specifically for players drawn to its unusual style and humour; go in aware this may be closer to the game's final state than its full-release price tag implies.