Technologies

Cozy Horror Game Grave Seasons Is Stardew Valley Plagued by a Serial Killer

At Summer Game Fest, we tried a goth farming simulator inspired by Dredge and Cult of the Lamb.

At Summer Game Fest, I tried a game that was bold enough to ask: Why doesn’t Stardew Valley have more murder? Grave Seasons, due out next year, is a cozy farming sim with a morbid edge: It’s about all the friends (and romantic partners) you make along the bloody way to stopping a serial killer.

A little bit into the short demo of Grave Seasons, I took to the fields to clean up the run-down farm I’d broken into and decided to adopt, only to find a severed hand. It’s fitting for an indie title published by Blumhouse Games, a division of Blumhouse Productions, which, with the gaming unit, began expanding beyond its work in horror films to publish titles like last year’s Fear the Spotlight.

Grave Seasons is a cozy horror game that seems like it will deftly mix the serene and gruesome, appealing to fans of Dredge and other calming games tinged with the sinister. Players take on the role of a prison escapee who breaks into, and adopts, a farm in the town of Ashenridge, only to find that it’s riddled with dark secrets.

But it wasn’t just occult labs in the basement and body parts unearthed from the fields that made the game feel delightfully grim. After I’d made some early friends, my demo ended with a shocking twist: One of my new pals, who asked me to join them for a midnight walk in the nearby woods, got ambushed by a hideous monster and brutally murdered. Even the game’s charming sprite graphics didn’t spare my eyes from the ick of dismemberment.

“We are huge fans of games that blend that sort of coziness mixed with a sense of unease,” said Emmett Nahil, narrative designer at studio Perfect Garbage, which developed Grave Seasons (Blumhouse is the publisher). Nahil cited games like Dredge, Into The Woods and Cult of the Lamb as inspirations.

In Grave Seasons, these murders happen seasonally, said lead programmer Nicky Armstrong. But you have enough time between sowing crops and cleaning up your farm to figure out what might be happening. You can try to befriend the many people you meet around town, and even discover who the killer is.

But if you’re playing Grave Seasons alongside real-life friends, don’t worry about them spoiling the killer’s identity for you — the game’s inspired design randomly assigns the murderer from a subset of the approximately 40 characters you encounter in the game. Like any good cozy farming game, you can romance many of them, including the hunky Hari that I met first in the demo. And in an even better twist, the person you’re romancing might end up being the killer, too.

Beyond video games, Nahil cited folk horror and monster films as inspirations that led to Grave Seasons’ unique tone.

“The original Wicker Man is actually a huge inspiration for me,” Nahil said. “We have some really cool events [in Grave Seasons] that tell you a bit more about the lore of the world. Obviously, creature features like early Hammer Horror are a huge one for me, where you get to see different monsters, different creatures, and there’s a sort of sense of pathos that goes along with those creatures.”

Another design quirk that sets Grave Seasons apart is starting the game with a protagonist on the lam from prison — a departure from Stardew Valley and other farming sims where it’s good vibes from the get-go. Instead, in this game players start with a sense of tension, since they can’t go to the cops about the serial killer prowling around town.

“It helps place the player in the idea that they are on their own and have to use their wits, and really focus on their skills to help the town and themselves — or hinder the town and help the killer,” Nahil said.

In other words, a playthrough of Grave Seasons can go several different ways depending on the randomized killer and the choices players make. That was a design choice for Perfect Garbage, which wanted to divert from the indefinite playtime of Stardew Valley or Harvest Moon games in order to tell a story.

“We really want you to experience the narrative that we’ve crafted and play the game to its conclusion … whether that is a positive or a negative conclusion,” Armstrong said. “We still want you to experience it to its end and have a really good time with one playthrough of the game, and then we’d love for you to play it again and experience a different story, a different killer, a different outcome.”

That storytelling applies to the killers, too. Whether romanceable or not, all characters have a backstory to discover as you befriend and get closer to them. The potential murderers have motivations and storylines that the player can dig into, which will change elements within the world that they might discover and ask around about.

But in closing, I asked Armstrong and Nahil perhaps the most important question: Which of the game’s 40 or so characters would they date?

“Oh, my boy Hari is right there in the demo, yeah,” said Armstrong.

“He’s not in the demo, but Noah, honestly,” Nahil said. “Our buff fisherman is my romance of choice.”

That’s amusing to know, but it also shows that the game contains multitudes. Many other farming sims have the cozy part down, but Grave Seasons seems like it’ll let the discomfort of morbid effects and murder be a counterweight tension that complexifies the comforting monotony of farming. Amid alternating between growing life and fearing for your own, why wouldn’t you find someone to date?

Grave Seasons is scheduled to come out on PC, PS5, Xbox Series X/S and Nintendo Switch in 2026.

Technologies

Trump Maintains US‑Iran Negotiations Continue Amid Tehran’s Denials of Duplicity

President Trump insists that US‑Iran talks are ongoing despite Tehran’s denial of any negotiation plans, while warning that only a deal or total surrender will allow passage through the Strait of Hormuz. Conflicting statements from both sides have heightened uncertainty as the conflict enters its sixth month.

On Monday, President Donald Trump asserted that negotiations between the United States and Iran are still taking place, even after Tehran stated it has no intention of engaging in direct talks with Washington.

In a fiery Truth Social post, Trump labeled Iran’s leaders “unbelievably duplicitous,” claiming they are lying about ongoing peace talks “whether Iran wants to admit it or not.” He repeated his assertion that the United States completely controls the Strait of Hormuz, despite maritime traffic through the crucial route lingering at only a small fraction of pre‑conflict levels.

He wrote, “Nothing reaches Iran unless we allow it, and nothing will pass unless a deal—or total surrender—is achieved.”

Earlier that day, Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmail Baghaei told reporters there is no imminent plan for U.S.–Iran negotiations, contradicting Trump’s earlier comment that talks would resume Monday afternoon. Baghaei added that Iran’s only current discussions are with Oman concerning the Strait of Hormuz.

The conflicting statements have heightened uncertainty over the peace‑talk process and the broader conflict, now in its sixth month.

Trump’s assertion about new negotiations came a day after he said on Truth Social that he had agreed to cancel a massive strike against Iran “subject to being able to rapidly make a DEAL.” He said in the same post that Iran and other Middle Eastern countries had asked him to hold off on that attack because “the perimeters of a deal has been agreed to.”

Trump has claimed dozens of times throughout the more‑than‑five‑month‑long war that a deal is at hand. No permanent deal has been signed, and a temporary ceasefire reached in June has fallen apart.

Trump has also repeatedly threatened to launch devastating strikes against Iran before backing off. After the latest example, oil prices on Monday fell and stocks surged.

BMI, a research unit of Fitch Solutions, said in a note Monday that a broader diplomatic understanding on reopening the Strait of Hormuz is still achievable this quarter, while raising the probability of its escalation scenario to 35% from 25%, citing mounting military, diplomatic and economic signs of rising U.S.-Iran tensions.

“Diplomatic progress is likely to be punctuated by periodic military flare-ups, while miscalculation by either side could trigger a renewed escalation,” BMI analysts wrote in a note. The firm said the key issue to watch is the future governance of the strait, as the Iran-Oman talks — potentially backed by Gulf states, China and the U.S. — point to efforts to build a post-conflict shipping framework.

Shipping risks persist even as diplomacy appears to be advancing. The United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations Centre said it received a report of an incident 20 nautical miles (23 miles) northeast of Khasab, Oman — at the mouth of the strait — with a tanker’s master reporting an explosion in close proximity to the vessel at about 20:37 UTC Sunday (4:37 pm ET). The vessel and crew were safe and authorities are investigating, UKMTO said, advising ships to transit with caution.

The proposal Trump announced over the weekend calls for the U.S. and Iran to return to negotiations and continue ironing out some of the thorny issues that had derailed diplomatic efforts, according to The Associated Press, citing a regional official involved in the mediation efforts.

The official said the proposal also includes a reopening of the Hormuz Strait and halting attacks across the region, including by Iranian-backed militias in Iraq on the Arab Gulf countries and Jordan.

The U.S., for its part, will end its naval blockade on Iran and allow Tehran to export its oil, the official said, adding that no deal has been reached, although the mediation efforts remained underway.

Trump’s weekend reversal has lowered the temperature after days of escalating attacks across the Gulf. Kuwait said Saturday that Iranian forces launched a wave of drones within its airspace, with its military destroying multiple aircraft after Iran targeted critical infrastructure in the country’s north.

A parallel track with Muscat is also advancing. Iranian diplomats said Tehran was close to reaching a new arrangement with Oman to manage shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, a deal critical to preventing the war from escalating further, according to the Financial Times.

Iranian officials said negotiations over future management of the Hormuz Strait with Oman, which sits on the opposite shore of the waterway, are in their final stages. The agreed shipping route would be different from those used before, according to Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson, Baghaei, adding that the new route was separate from the issue of the strait’s reopening or continued closure.

Technologies

Oil Prices Slide as Trump Halts Planned Iran Strike

Oil prices dropped after Trump cancelled a planned strike on Iran, with WTI down about 5% and Brent near 5% lower. He said the move followed requests from Tehran and regional allies for a pause while a deal shaping the Strait of Hormuz and Iran’s nuclear program is negotiated.

Oil prices fell on Monday after President Donald Trump announced he had cancelled a planned strike on Iran. WTI futures dropped roughly 5% to $80.34 a barrel, while Brent slipped about 4.7% to $83.77 a barrel.

Trump said early Sunday he called off the strike after Iran and several Middle Eastern nations asked him to hold off, noting that the outlines of a deal had been agreed upon. He added that the prospective accord would entail the immediate, full opening of the Strait of Hormuz and an end to Iran’s nuclear ambitions, according to his Truth Social post.

The president had been considering another round of strikes as diplomatic hopes waned since the conflict began on February 28. He said the U.S. and Iran would meet for talks on Monday, but Iran denied any scheduled negotiations with Washington, citing PressTV. Iran’s foreign‑ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei clarified that Tehran was only discussing shipping routes through the Strait of Hormuz with Oman. In a follow‑up Truth Social message, Trump insisted that, regardless of Iran’s acknowledgment, the United States is indeed discussing a solution to a long‑standing problem created by Iran.

Technologies

Oil Prices Drop as Trump Cancels Planned Attack on Iran

Oil prices fell sharply after President Trump announced the cancellation of a planned strike on Iran, citing a new deal that would open the Hormuz Strait and end Iran’s nuclear threat.

Oil prices fell sharply on Monday after President Donald Trump announced that he had called off a planned strike on Iran.

West Texas Intermediate futures, the U.S. benchmark, slipped roughly 5% to close at $80.34 per barrel, while Brent crude, the international benchmark, declined 4.7% to settle at $83.77 a barrel.

Trump made the announcement early Sunday, saying he had canceled the strike following requests from Tehran and other Middle Eastern countries.

In a Truth Social post, he wrote: “We have just been asked by Iran, and other Middle Eastern Countries, to hold off any attack in that the perimeters of a deal has been agreed to.”

The president indicated that the proposed agreement would include the immediate, complete, and total opening of the Hormuz Strait, as well as an end to Iran’s nuclear threat.

Trump had been weighing additional strikes amid diminishing prospects for a diplomatic resolution to the conflict that began on Feb. 28. He stated that the U.S. and Iran would hold negotiations on Monday.

Tehran denied that talks were planned with Washington, according to state news outlet PressTV.

Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei said Tehran was only holding talks with Oman regarding the routes ships can use through the Strait of Hormuz.

In a subsequent Truth Social post, Trump added that whether “Iran wants to admit it or not, we are, in fact, talking of a solution to a problem that they have caused for decades.”