Cutesy Stardew-like life sim with millions of players just hit Steam, but the PC version is a letdown and it's awful news for Steam Deck

If you frequent the cozy game space, there’s little chance you won’t have heard of Heartopia by now. While sandbox players have been foaming over Hytale this week, building houses brick-by-brick, the life game lovers looking for their next Stardew Valley-style fixation have been erecting homes with flat walls, swimming pools, and adorable coffee machines. And though Heartopia is crushing it on mobile, skyrocketing to the top of the app store charts and reaching over five million players, the Steam audience is struggling to take to its pastel-palette charm for some increasingly common mobile-to-PC reasons.

A PC release of Heartopia has been on the cards for a while. Anyone with an interest in the growing number of supposed The Sims assassins will have seen it coming from a mile away. But when news broke of the mobile client landing first, the accompanying Steam announcement made little mention of when we’d see it on the slightly bigger screen.

“The team is fully focused on optimizing the PC experience, and we’ll keep you updated with the latest progress right here in the Steam community,” is how the Steam release was positioned on January 8. Then, without warning, it dropped on Valve’s marketplace as if by magic, ready to welcome many millions more players to Whale Island – a very on-the-nose branding of its play space if you’re at all versed in F2P game terminology.

Even with crossplay support, pairing PC and Mobile players together and allowing those who started on mobile to quickly hop over to the big screen experience, Heartopia isn’t exactly topping the Steam charts like it did on Google and Apple’s platforms. And while amassing close to 1,000 reviews in a couple of days is something 99% of Steam publishers would likely view as a massive success, the ‘mixed’ nature of the feedback isn’t a great look out of the gate.

So, what’s the problem? “The PC version feels like an afterthought,” is a damning statement for the top review to make. Anyone with any experience of a F2P mobile title will know exactly what this means – a relatively effortless port that does little to adapt the game’s mobile-focused control scheme for mouse and keyboard setups.

Oh, and there’s no controller support. Comfortable Steam Deck play is all but out of the question. You either hunch over your desk, wrap your palms around your comparatively tiny phone, or sit this one out. When you’re likely to work through the night hammering out the intricate details of a virtual home, either option is far from cozy.

Now, the Heartopia developers have been quick to reply to the less favorable reviews on Steam, but the responses are a little… generic. “Thank you for your feedback,” says Ringo, now hopefully read out in the musician’s iconic tone in your mind. “We will continue to make improvements going forward.” Improvements to what, exactly? Well, that particular review outlined a lot of what the player would like to see tweaked, so who’s to say? The pessimist in me thinks monetization, but that’s a low blow that stems from many years of seeing how mobile-focused F2P tend to circle the drain.

The fact that Heartopia still asks for access to every device on your network, a common request of a lot of mobile games, certainly doesn’t do must to dispel the concerns that the PC port may just be the mobile game packaged in an emulation layer. Ringo again chimes in to insist that the Heartopia client “does not collect, store, or upload any personal information or device data.” But even with an apology over “our lack of clear communication regarding this feature,” he doesn’t explain what it does, why, or whether it’ll ever be stripped out for peace of mind. My question is, did Ringo get blisters on his fingers while writing those review responses? Sorry, I’ll stop.

But it’s not all doom and gloom for Heartopia on PC. Such is the nature of its ‘mixed’ overall standing. In fact, 69% of the Heartopia reviews on Steam are positive, with others calling it “such a lovely and relaxing game.” Even still, plenty of the positive reviews criticise the camera controls, so there’s clearly some frustrations bubbling up among those who can, for now, enjoy it for what it is.

Heartopia is available right now through Steam for free. If you think some wacky camera controls are worth pushing through, you can download it here. And if you’re good with custom controls, consider pitching in with a controller configuration for others to borrow.