Hay Day is an international freemium farming simulator video game developed by Supercell, a Finnish video game company. Hay Day was released on June 21, 2012 on iOS and on November 20, 2013 on Android.
"Hay Day" is a portmanteau of "hay" and "hey day", a very dated expression meaning a period of prosperity and happiness.
Gameplay and main features
Hay Day involves growing crops, cultivating trees and bushes, crafting products and raising animals and pets on a farm. Players can trade goods with non-playable characters (visitors) as well as other players to earn coins and experience points and progress in the game.
Leveling up is an important factor, as more items, crops, features, buildings are unlocked as the player progresses. Two extra playing areas --the fishing lake and the town-- also become available when players reach certain levels.
Decorations can be bought from the shop to spruce up a farm. Events regularly occur, giving players rarer or expensive items as rewards for winning challenges. Players can chat and help each other in neighborhoods and compete for prizes in derby races. The game also gets thematic seasonal changes.
Story
The games starts showing the player's character receiving a letter in their city home. The letter reads:
Greeting from your uncle! So how'd you like to be a farmer? I've decided to retire. The farm is yours if you want it!
The player takes their uncle up on the offer and moves to the countryside.
The player then meets Mr. Wicker, a talking scarecrow, which guides them through the first levels. As they progress they learn a bit more about their uncle's life at the farm:
- they meet Angus, an old friend of the player's uncle, when the player goes to the fishing lake for the first time. Angus guides them through the first steps and shows them their uncle's Fishing Book.
- later in the game, they get word that the city mayor has been very impressed with their work at the farm. As a reward the player gets to rebuild and expand the town their uncle and the mayor were working on.
Players also meet other non-playing characters and get the sense that their farms are part of a larger community through various features:
- Neighbors, called visitors in the game, come up to the player's farm. Town visitors come up to the player's town.
- Greg, one of the visitors and the local lumberjack, becomes their first friend.
- Alfred delivers mail and packages every day.
- Tom, an errand boy, lingers in front of their farm.
- Ernest and Rose, who can be hired as farm hands, live on the cliff above the farm.
- The city mayor regularly asks for their help or issue challenges via public letters displayed on the event board.
- Players can send items to particular places and the city in general through their trucks and riverboats.
The game currently has no linear plot and the player has free rein over their farm. There is no end-game scenario, as the game is constantly updated (although some argue that when you are given the Golden Tree and have completed all achievements the game has come to an end, in a way).
History
Main article: Version History
The game has never stopped being developed since its release. Its developers periodically add new items and new features to the game.
Languages
The game is available in Arabic, Chinese (simplified and traditional), Cyrillic, Danish, Dutch, English, Finnish, French, German, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Malay, Norwegian Bokmål, Portuguese, Spanish, Swedish, Thai, Vietnamese, and Turkish.