Telephone
| Telephone | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Type | Collection |
| Location | Carpenter's Shop for 2,000g |
Robin builds a telephone for anyone tired of walking into town only to find a shop shut. It can be stood anywhere, indoors or out, and ringing a shopkeeper gives their opening hours for the day along with a look at what they have in stock. Robin reads out upgrade costs, Clint quotes tool prices and says whether a tool is ready, Pierre lists his shelves, Marnie gives livestock prices, Gus announces the dish of the day, and once Marlon's number is unlocked he will fetch lost items from the mines without the walk to the Guild. The phone also rings on its own, and the callers are the best part of owning it: a scam artist, a bear, a mouse and the mayor among them.
Overview
The practical value is in knowing before leaving the farm. Every shop in the valley keeps hours, takes days off and closes for festivals, and a wasted trip costs a morning. A call answers all of that in a few seconds. If the shopkeeper is unavailable an answering machine picks up instead, and those messages are informative in their own right: Robin's recording says when she is out at her aerobics club or away finishing a project, which is exactly the information a farmer needs before planning a barn.
Each number does a little more than report hours. Robin's line gives the cost of the next farmhouse upgrade, cabins included, and the prices of her buildings, so a building plan can be costed from the sofa. Clint's gives tool upgrade prices and tells the farmer whether a tool at the anvil is ready today or still needs days, though he will not quote ore prices over the phone. Pierre's shows the seed and produce shelves. Marnie's covers animal prices, though her supply counter has to be visited in person. Gus reads out the saloon's special, which is the only way to learn the dish of the day without a walk.
Marlon is the useful late addition. His number appears once the Adventurer's Guild's eradication goal for Magma Sprites and Magma Sparkers has been signed off, and from then on the item recovery service, which normally means walking to the Guild after passing out underground, is a phone call from the farmhouse.
Calls are free of social consequence. Ringing a merchant does not raise or lower friendship and does not count as the day's conversation, so a farmer cannot phone their way through the friendship list. It also means calling the same shop twice is free, as is calling a shopkeeper while standing inside their own shop, which they take without comment.
The incoming calls are pure character. A robotic voice offers a large Joja rebate and asks for a credit card number to be posted to an address in Zuzu City, which is the game's dry joke about telephone fraud. Vincent rings up to ask, shyly, whether there are any piggies on the farm. Pierre calls to remind the farmer that his store carries the finest seeds and produce anywhere. The hat mouse squeaks a request for coins. One call is a recording in a language nobody can place. Mayor Lewis phones to ask how the farm is doing, and the list of replies includes telling him that his secret is known, at which point the line mysteriously cuts out.
The best of them has to be earned. Once Bear's Knowledge has been obtained, the bear from the Secret Woods will telephone to say, between sniffs and grunts, that he still has some of that good sauce and that it is making him very happy, and to thank his friend before hanging up.
Notes
The phone is a quality-of-life purchase rather than a money-maker, and it is worth buying at the point where the farm starts running several projects at once. A day spent planning buildings, tool upgrades and shopping lists goes much faster with every price available in one place.
Where it goes hardly matters mechanically, but inside the farmhouse is the sensible spot. The phone is used first thing in the morning, before the day's route is decided, and a handset by the door is checked far more often than one nailed up behind the barn.
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