Tales of the Shire is a classic twist on the farming simulator, taking players to the hills where the Hobbits from The Lord of the Rings dwell. With a whole new slew of adventures awaiting right around the corner, this guide aims to delve into all of the nooks and crannies within this slightly rundown village to get both the new farmer on the block and the people of Bywater back on their feet and recognized as a legitimate town by the City Accessors.
Whether you’re a veteran pro farmer or new to the cozy life simulator, here’s how to get started in Tales of the Shire, what to focus on first, and how best to spend your first few days in summer so you’re not wasting a single day.
How to Get Started With Gardening and Cooking
As a cozy farming simulator, Tales of the Shire highlights a focus on gardening and cooking, so that you can create delicious meals for the other villagers from the vegetables and fruits you’ve grown. The best way to get started is to collect all of the needed tools from the corresponding quests.
Unlock Tools
To get started on the farm, you’ll need to unlock most of the tools to care for your plants day to day properly. There are four in total that you can access from your Tool Wheel: the Fishing Rod, the Water Can, the Shovel, and the Lantern.
Fishing Rod – Complete the “Find the Rule Book” Mission with Old Noakes
Watering Can – Start the “Farming” Mission for Farmer Cotton
Shovel – Complete the “Farming Mission for Farmer Cotton
Lantern – Reach Level 2 in the Foraging Club
Grow Your First Vegetable
During your runaround looking for the Rule book of Bywater, Farmer Cotton will have a quest ready for you to start your own farm. After interacting with him, he’ll give you the necessary tools to plant your first seeds, Brown Tater Seeds.
Take these back to your house to plant them in the Soil Plots around the back door of your house. By hitting [Tab] or the [Y Button] to open your Inventory, switch to the Seed Bag tab, and select the Brown Tater Seeds. This will prompt you to place a sprout on the soil that will allow you to plant the Brown Tater anywhere as long as you’re mindful of the barriers.
You’re not limited to planting one seed per plot. If you’re careful, you can plant three to four seeds in the same plot to maximize space and take advantage of the compatible crops to produce a harvest with a higher rating.
Once the seeds are planted, press and hold [H] or the [Options] button on the controller to exit the Landscaping Menu.
With your sprouts planted, be sure to check in every day to make sure they are watered. There’s a small pond between the plots where you can refill your Water Can when it runs dry. As long as you care for them, you’ll receive Brown Taters within 3 days.
Buy Seeds From Farmer Cotton
Once you’ve grown your own Brown Taters and turn them into Farmer Cotton for appraisal, his shop will open up and display the different types of plants you can harvest over the summer. Each plant will have a different growth period and may yield multiple harvests, so that you can collect from the same plant more than once.
Whether you want to stockpile ingredients for cooking or grow vegetables to sell back to Farmer Cotton, you’re going to want to get started on getting as many seeds as you can so that you always have something growing in your garden.
Gardening is a great way of expanding your ingredients to cook a more diverse range of dishes. While foraging can provide many unique ingredients depending on where you go, they are only one part of the many recipes available in Tales of the Shire.
What to Focus On In Between Story Quests
After getting a head start on your garden at home, the best areas to focus on while advancing the story through fulfilling tasks around Bywater are getting familiar with the area and the local forageables. Mushrooms, Herbs, and Berries make up the bulk of the dishes in Tales of the Shire, and even if they aren’t going into the pan, they can still benefit you by selling them in bulk to Farmer Cotton for some extra coin when buying Seeds.
Foraging For Ingredients
Forageable items refresh daily, so it’s always worth going around the map to collect as many items as you can in between quests. Doing so can also reveal Fishing spots that’ll open up new species for you to catch.
Getting familiar with the map also helps with Daisy’s Riddles, which’ll test players’ knowledge on how well they know the area.
Lost Packages
Occasionally, players may come across little brown packages that have been dropped around Bywater. Not to be confused with the stack of packages that often sit outside the player’s mailbox, these separate packages are actually belongings of the Bywater villagers.
Depending on which one you pick put they’ll come with a subtle hint about who they might have belonged to. Upon returning them to their rightful owner, you may be gifted with just a little reward for your efforts. The option to gift the Lost Package will only appear when the player interacts with the owner, so players don’t have to worry about accidentally giving away the wrong package to someone it doesn’t belong to.
Side Quests
Aside from the Main Quest, players will be prompted either through mail, interacting with a character who has an Exclamation Box over their head, or by spotting a cluster of Blue Sparkles to start Side Quests. While the Main Quest will spawn Gold Sparkles, players may see Blue Sparkles begin to turn up around the map, the more they explore.
These sections can indicate a couple of different interactions. Some areas are related to Side Quests, where a scene between two or more villagers will begin to play out with the player acting as a spectator. Other instances will trigger the player to reflect upon a piece of lore, such as when they observe the East Stone Bridge or the occasional Picnic Gathering Spot. These spots can be unlocked by completing certain Side Quests, such as the island just outside of Bywater Village’s Square, an area that is unlocked after the player helps to find Daisy’s lost plush toy.
Where to Find All Shops
Not all ingredients can be found in your garden nor out in Bywater to be foraged, so players may have to visit a few extra shops, around the Village Square, up the northern path to Sandyman, or deep within the forest.
Farmer Cotton: Located in the Bywater Village Square, Farmer Cotton is where players buy Seeds for the season.
Hobson Hornblower: Located in Bywater Village Square next to Farmer Cotton, players can buy seasoning and other exclusive items.
Young Tom Cotton: Located in Bywater Village Square, right next to the entrance, players can buy meats and farm produce like eggs and dairy.
The Burrowses’ Shop & Home: One of the shops in Bywater Village Square, indicated by the sign with a circle of leaves. Nora sells clothing on one side of the shop, and Fosco sells furnishing decorations on the other side.
Sandyman’s Shop & Home: Located northwest of Bywater Village. Sandyman sells all types of wheat products like Flour, Barley, and more, providing the basics of many dishes in Tales of the Shire.
Willow’s Workshop: Located southeast of the Cotton Farm, in the forest. Sells furniture like tables, chairs, bookshelves, and more.
How to Spend Your First Few Days
The best way to get a leg up in Tales of the Shire is to spend your first few days completing quests, foraging, fishing, and keeping your garden maintained at the house. Like any other farming simulator, it’s going to take a while until you’re earning enough money to be planting more seeds, whether it’s for flowers or vegetables. The Shops in Bywater’s Village Square also extend to a Clothing Shop with Nora and a Decorations Shop with Fosco, but you’ll need plenty of coins before you’re ready to shop till you drop.
By completing most of the main quests along the way, you can speed up to where you unlock the Club Roster Boards, where missions will be posted so that you can level up your experience in Foraging, Cooking, Fishing, and Gardening. Doing so can give you access to more advanced techniques in those areas as well as some quality of life benefits.
Unlocking the Club Missions is a great goal to aim for in the first few days. Since a majority of the gameplay in Tales of the Shire revolves around cooking and becoming better friends with the villagers, being able to level up your garden and kitchen by foraging and cooking becomes an added benefit, especially once you become familiar with the map and where all the forageable items are in Bywater.
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