Farming simulation games have followed the same basic template for a decade, but a new wave of titles is beginning to break that mould, according to Polygon. Since Stardew Valley reignited the genre in 2016, a flood of similar games emerged during the pandemic-era cozy games boom, but despite superficial differences—settings, themes or aesthetics—most retained the same core structure: rebuilding a farm, befriending a village of characters, and expanding through crafting, mining and fishing.

Developers now appear to be moving away from replicating "this flavour of farming" towards hybrid concepts described as "farming, and"—combining the genre with horror, supernatural storytelling or dungeon-crawling town-building. The trend was highlighted by Son M., a founder of studio Perfect Garbage, who said developers increasingly want to subvert cozy game conventions; their own upcoming title, Grave Seasons, exemplifies this shift, though it has been delayed from its original August release date.