Starsand Island PS5 Hands-On Preview. There’s nothing more on trend than a life-sim; it’s a genre that can be enjoyed by yourself or with friends, and stands the test of time as a genre that can bend to whatever the player wants or needs. My hands-on time with Starsand Island was a welcome respite in a week full of intense experiences, and showed the foundation for what should be another solid experience for players hungry for comfort.
Drawing on inspirations from other places, Starsand Island drills down to the very core of what makes cozy games tick, and does so with plans for significant development and a long life ahead.
Starsand Island Hands-On Preview (PS5) – A Slice of The Good Life
Island Life, As You Know And Love
In its broadest strokes, Starsand Island should feel like a comfortable experience for anyone who has played a game like Harvest Moon or Stardew Valley; my time with the game began with creating a character and being quickly acquainted with my humble homestead on the island, which I was free to customise and edit to my liking.
This then led into a brief tutorial where I got a chance to explore the town and take in some of the sights, as well as a brief sample of the main “quest,” so to speak. Instead of being left completely to your own devices, you’re encouraged to invest time in the activities that you personally find rewarding, without any real time pressure.
In my brief demo, I got the chance to dabble in the farmhand career path and see the beginnings of that specific questline play out. I was informed that each “career” has its own unique approaches to progression, and all of them can be completed at your own pace.
A Focus on Creativity
One of the major focuses of my play session was exploring the creative aspects of Starsand Island, emphasising the granularity of just how far you can push it. The first thing I was shown is the standard house, before being whisked off to what appears to be the flagship feature of Starsand Island, being the houseboat.
This boat is a totally customisable space that opens up partway through the main quest. While I was shown a pre-fab build of what you can do with the houseboat, it seemed to be pretty loaded with possibilities.
With this in mind, I asked about the potential to share these creations with other players, and I was told that this would be something that would be in the final game, using ID features and multiplayer creation. These types of games live and die by their multiplayer offerings in an ever-expanding online space, so I was pleased to hear that this was in the pipeline.
Similarly, I was informed that there are several spaces to explore your creativity and actually change the landscape to your liking; open fields where you can create hills or creeks where you might want to build a moat. It’s all here and accounted for.
Ultimately, my preview of this game felt a bit closer to a whistlestop tour than a natural immersion into the world, but all the features that are here do feel par for the course. If you want pets, there are pets. If you want to fish, you can fish. I wasn’t able to get a sense for how relationships form between you and the rest of the characters on the island, and that’s one of the most important aspects to me.
Looking to the Future
Speaking on where Starsand Island goes in the future, I was let in on prospective plans to expand and grow the world beyond what it is right now, specifically with the boat in mind.
While the game certainly won’t be releasing light of content, I was informed of an exciting potential to explore cultures beyond just the archipelago in the game as it stands. Examples included new locations that would offer unique opportunities for career paths and abilities relevant to particular places.
There aren’t any specific detailed plans for a roadmap at this point, but it was encouraging to hear that the focus on customisation and exploration is something that will be supported for dedicated players in the near future.
My impressions from the small slice of Starsand Island was generally a positive one; it’s apparent that I only got a small sampler plate of what the final game will truly offer in terms of its content, but what I did play seems to be attempting to fill the void left behind by a certain other island-life simulator game that made more than a few waves a few years ago.
There’s still some time for Starsand to prove itself, but this session proved to me that the team have their fingers on the pulse when exploring what players of this genre want to see, and that’s what counts for most in these early stages.
Starsand Island releases in Q1 of 2026 for PlayStation 5.