Mineko’s Night Market is an adorable little life sim game that has you setting up a new home in a quaint Japanese-inspired town and living life to the fullest, crafting wares to sell at the weekly Night Market, helping townsfolk with requests, oh, and unravelling the mystery of the Sun Cat Nikko the town worships, of course.
Though the game starts fairly simple, you’ll soon find there is plenty to get to grips with, and you’ll want to maximise your time to ensure you’re making each day count. Here are our top tips to help you get started.
Use Up Your Stamina Every Day
Mineko’s Night Market starts a little slow, and you’ll be desperate to sleep the day away just to get to the next Night Market, but don’t.
Use up your stamina every day to collect hairballs and flowers because even though you might not be able to use the hairballs right away or you feel you have enough flowers, you will need so, so many eventually.
You want to collect as much as possible as you’ll benefit later on when you have a wider range of items to craft.
Hoard Resources Because Items Change With The Seasons
Similar to the last point, you want to store up all those resources. Don’t be tempted into selling raw resources like flowers, hairballs, and wood just to make some quick cash.
It’s far better to keep storing up the raw materials to use for crafting than sell these items for next to nothing. By all means, sell the fish you can’t do anything with. But don’t sell fish that can be turned into dye. You will want all the dye you can get.
Each season, the available flowers and fish change, so you’ll find yourself limited on what you can make with certain recipes.
Sell A Range Of Wares At The Night Market
While it’s tempting to churn out a bunch of the same high-value items to sell at the Night Market, you definitely don’t want to do this.
Your customers are random, and they all have specific tastes. Make sure you have a wide range of items to get a guaranteed sale from each customer, even if it’s not necessarily one of your best money-makers.
A little girl looking for something dog-themed will buy a cheaper Dog Bouquet, which is better than making no money off her when she doesn’t like the look of any of your fancy furniture. Cater to everyone!
Save Scum To Get The Boximal You Want
Boximals are adorable like collectibles in the world of Mineko’s Night Market, and as you progress through the game, you’ll be tasked to collect specific Boximals for certain townspeople.
You buy these for 50 gold from the vending machine in the Night Market, as well as being given some as rewards, but rather than waste your money trying to get the one you want — just reload your save file to try again.
I bought a few Boximals at a time, then in the morning (after the game had saved), I opened them all.
If none were the one I needed, I then quit out to the main menu and loaded back in to open them again.
Don’t Neglect Requests For The Townspeople
Nearly everyone in town will ask for specific items, and each time you deliver, you fill part of their friendship meter. Now, even if you don’t want to help them out of the kindness of your heart, you want to help them for the rewards.
You’ll need specific recipes as you progress, and the last thing you want is to find a craftable item you need locked behind a quest you have yet to complete. Don’t neglect the townspeople. Get them their much-needed stuff and reap the rewards.
Sometimes Buying Is More Efficient Than Gathering Yourself
As you get further into the game, you’ll quickly realise there’s not enough time in the day to gather everything you need. While Nikko will help with gathering, you need to optimise your crafting system by simply buying some things you need.
It’s more efficient to stock up on fish that give dye from the Night Market, or maybe even some flowers, too, rather than try your luck at gathering everything you need yourself.
Make Sure You Send Nikko To Gather Both Morning And Night
Once you’ve unlocked Nikko’s help with gathering, make sure you make the most of them! You can send them to forage twice a day: once in the morning and once in the evening — after you return from wherever you visited in the day, but not late at night should you decide to venture out twice.
Your items don’t store up, so if you want to maximise what Nikko is giving you, you need to check in with them twice a day.