How do you progress in Pioneers of story of seasons Olive town?

Here are some tips and tricks to make your farming life more easy! Basically the Makers play a very big role in this game (similar to My Time at Portia if you’re familiar with the game). You won’t be able to progress without using them, unlike previous SoS entires where they had a more optional role.

• Be! Organized!👏

This is something I learned the hard way in My Time at Portia where I would just randomly cram everything into Boxes without much though… which lead to a lot of unnesessary searching and organizing later on. So right from the start, make several Boxes and categorize what you will put in them (1 Box for Flowers,1 for Foraging etc.). Obviously this can and will change over time as you start getting more resources. At the beginning I put Lumber/Stones/Ores etc. into one Box because I had their Makers next to each other, but now that I have access to several kinds of wood and Ores I’ve seperated them.

This also goes for the set up of your Farm. Moving things around in this game is honestly a pain so you should try to plan ahead as much as possible.

When removing a Box everything you stored inside will be dropped to the ground. Be prepared with enough Inventory space and time.

! You can store your tools in the Tool Bag for additional space. This is a useful trick in general.

There are 3 Areas to use. The one you start with which is the smallest, ones to the left which unlocks via a Bridge and is a bit bigger. Plus North by clearing some rubble which is the biggest.

• Keep your enemies close and your resources even closer: when unlocking these Areas I’d recommend to use Money rather than resources. Usually you’ll need your resources to build stuff and progress (Lumber and Ingots are holy) especially later on when it takes longer to process the Products you’ll do good to hold on to them. I’ll add more on how to make money down below.

Back to organizing. Personally I think that putting your Makers into Area 2 (once unlocked) is a good idea because you’ll be running though there often so you can just pop in and check on your Makers, replenish if needed etc. The rest is up to personal preference I’d say. I don’t like growing crops too much so I’ve put them on the first Area while my Animals are on the third. 

• Use the terrain to your advantage. Basically keep a balance between zones you actively use and just letting nature grow/items spawn. Especially at the beginning when you need a lot of materials I’d recommend to let nature run wild to get a lot of resources. As you progress and don’t need as much of the (lower grade) resources anymore (or you have enough money to simply buy them) you can start putting down paths and decorations so that you don’t have to clean up the area each day. 

For example: you’ll need a lot of iron initially so I wouldn’t put down a path in front of the second mine because some rocks spawn there. But once you got the third mine unlocked and can basically get all your resources from there there’s nothing wrong with setting up a path in that spot, which will prevent the rocks from spawning.

! Pay attention to what spawns where. Higher level materials have less area they’re available on. So if you put down your Barn and Coop in that zone you’ll be blocking their space to grow = less resources. Initially I’d recommend sticking to one part of your area (near the beginning) and leaving the rest open for nature to grow so that you can gather Lumber etc. For example: once I unlocked Area 3 I put my Barn and Coop near the beginning so that they won’t interfere with the Tree growth.

You can see the subtle difference between the Trees below. Basically when it comes to lumber and ores the highest ranking materials are always on the left side of each Area. The only exception to this is the highest ranking Wood (Mirage) by the Hydroculture Plant.

! Survey your Areas regularly. New Crops, Animals etc. will pop up from time to time, so be sure to have a look around. When there is a new crop/flower just ship it, the seeds will be available next day.

• Prioritize your Hammer and Axe. As you can see these are the most important ones. For the first half I’d say the Axe is more important, but once you get to Area 3 (and need Gold) you should switch your focus to the Hammer. Below you can see that only my Axe/Hammer are golden. The Watering can is Silver while the Sickle and Bucket are Iron. The Hoe I hadn’t upgraded at this point at all.
  

! You will unlock the small sprinklers early. While certainly helpful I wouldn’t resort to using just them, as the use of your watering can will raise your Fieldwork skill. Again I’d say that balance between using both is important as seen above.

• Always have your Makers running. Though in this case you should also pay special attention Lumber and Ore you will need everything at some point, trust me. You’ll unlock different Makers by raising your skills.
  

The setup that got my through a lot of the story. Not pretty but efficient.

! To maximize the use of your time put in resources that take a long time over night (so they will be ready next morning) and those with a shorter time during the day so you can replenish when needed. Of course this can be thrown out the window when you need a lot of something that takes longer to process.

• Ship one keep one. A lot of items will become available in their respective Store once shipped. From what I can tell this doesn’t apply to processed goods (for example you can buy Durable Log but no the processed version which is Durable Lumber). There are some exceptions though, Dye can be shipped and will then become available for purchase at the Flower Shop. If you want to test out whether something will become available once shipped simply save the night before and put the item into the shipment box. If you wake up and get a Message that says “____ Shop has expanded it’s product lineup!” it worked, otherwise you can reload and keep the Item. On the other hand it’s also a good idea to keep at least one of each item, or at least those that don’t show up as commonly (like Olive Crystals from Puddles etc.)
  

! Don’t ship/gift all of the foragable Flowers though. I know it’s tempting, especially at the beginning. But you will be needing 3 each of Moondrop, Pink Cat, Magic Red and Magic Blue Flowers for the Honey Maker.

• Sprites and the Sprite Shop. As you’re working on your farm you will see these smalls Sprites pop up from time to time. Eventually you’ll be able to travel to the Earth Sprite Village, which gives you access to more resources. At the beginning there are only 3 Earth Sprites you can get items from. but once you’ve gathered 100 small Spirits you’ll unlock an option to add additional Spirits (Field, Journey, Care, Fishing and Food). The (Field) Sprite/s is/are especially great because he/they can give you access to resources you may not be able to acuire just yet. Same goes for the Shop, the items at the bottom of the menu change daily so be sure to keep and eye on them. You don’t have to collect resources from the respective Sprites each day though, the items do stack over time.
• Mining = $ $ $ . You will be hitting up those mines for Ores anyways, might as well make the most of it. The Mine gives you access to raw Material (raw Diamond in particular) which can be turned into pure Jewels with the Jewel Maker (unlocks at Mining Skill Lv. 6) and make for great money.
• Town Hall Requests. We’ve already established that Lumber and Ingots are basically holy. Each time you get a request there will be 3 choices on how you can fulfill them. Obviously use the one which uses the resources you can produce fastest and don’t need for building Makers/upgrading tools etc.
  

• Title Rewards. While at the Town Hall it’s a good idea to check the Mailbox right to the Request Board. This is where you can accept rewards after raising you skill levels. They range from coins that can be sold for money to seeds, resources and even Makers. Be sure to drop by often.
  

This should help you get a gist of what’s important. I hope you found this guide helpful! If there are questions feels free to ask :)