Whenever my eyes see the phrase “it's like Stardew Valley, but…” sparks pop off in my brain, imagining futures farming in the zombie apocalypse or courting my favourite pixel caveman. The next one of those instead focuses on the game’s lovely fishing mini-game and is basically Stardew Valley but Wordle, the other bite-sized juggernaut that’s inspired countless others.
Pufferdle gives you free daily fishing challenges that you can play in-browser at pufferdle.com. Just like the game proper, you hold/release the mouse to raise/drop a small bar in sync with the fish that’s swimming vertically at frantic speeds. What comes next is a Wordle-like puzzle where you need to deduce which fish you’ve just hooked based on the difficulty and several traits (Season, Weather, Location, Time) that narrow down possibilities as you submit close guesses.
Pufferdle comes from fellow farming fan sircactupus (great name, by the way) who shared their work on the game’s forums. “Trying to guess what fish I’m currently reeling in based on its difficulty is a core part of my Stardew Valley fishing experience,” sircactupus explained, “so turning it into a Wordle felt like a natural progression.” Playing Pufferdle feels strangely close to the actual game’s fishing, but that’s because sircatupus copied the mini-game's code into JavaScript and repurposed all the game’s assets. No problem, though, as creator Eric “ConcernedApe” Barone gave the browser-based game his blessing in the forums.
I’m a sucker for good fishing mini-games, a loser for Stardew Valley stuff, and a lapsed Wordle-like fan. But Pufferdle could definitely snuggle into my morning routine, at least while we wait for the farming sim’s next update. Looking for other Wordle clones
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