Jul 19, 2023
Songs of Glimmerwick is a charming story-driven RPG where you play as a young witch. You’ll be attending the renowned university of magic in the land of Glimmerwick. Complete narrative quests that focus on unique characters and an intriguing story. Attend classes to learn new magic, have fun at bustling festivals, keep an ear out for some juicy drama. Don’t forget to listen out for some mysterious rumors. Learn new skills like talking to frogs, plant crops, and even cast spells using the power of music!
Coming soon to Steam!
- Jul 19, 2023
Craft, Build, Farm, and Explore
ALOFT is an open-world sandbox game where you must survive living on islands set around a giant, eternal hurricane. You’ll build your base, set sail through the skies to discover new islands, and fight to eliminate the fungi corruption threatening to take over. Uncover the secrets of the past civilization, and learn about their demise by reaching new heights.
Build your base however it suits you. Block the harsh winds or allow them to pass through your structures, lay down some ziplines to get across the island faster, farm crops, and raise animals. Craft useful machinery like the windmill to automate your farm and free up your time. And when you tire of that, take to the skies of ALOFT with your handy glider to explore other islands.
Otherwise, craft a bunch of sails and oars to use your own island as a vehicle! You’ll have absolute freedom when it comes to making your sails. Control the height and width of the masts, as well as the sails, and rotate or expand them as needed. ALOFT allows you to create a host of sails suited for your gameplay, and even for decorative purposes.
Now, I know combat isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, or their idea of cozy, but I think ALOFT gets a pass. You will need to fight off corrupt fungi, but that leaves you in a place to revitalize the surrounding world. The fungi will grow on top of corrupted flora and affect the animals in the vicinity. As you fight back the corruption, you’ll unlock new animal companions, livestock, crops, and resources. There’s something wholesome and cozy about saving ecosystems, I think.Coming 2024
Unfortunately, there’s no specific date listed for the release of ALOFT, but it will be here next year! You can find it on Steam where you can add it to your Wishlist, as well as try out a demo!
Steam recommends this game for those who like Ark Survival Evolved and Terraria. It also reminds me of I Am Future.
- Jul 13, 2023
Welcome to Sugar Shack, located at the center of a world that’s stuck in an eternal spring. There, you’ve become the owner of a cute little restaurant where you’ll sell some sweet treats to the townspeople. Tap trees to collect maple syrup, harvest berries, and even grow some crops to use as ingredients in your goods.
As you play, you’ll receive hex tiles to place in order to expand the town. Place each tile how you want to create a fully customized town layout. Each tile interacts with the ones around it with positive or negative effects, so place them wisely. Play Sugar Shack solo or with up to 4 players to collaborate and split the chores. Each player even gets their own room they can decorate to their personal tastes.
You can find Sugar Shack on Steam, though it has no release date yet.
Give Puff Pals a look, too, for a cute village sim experience.
- Jul 13, 2023
I know many people don’t think fighting in games makes for a cozy experience, and I generally agree. However, Cuisineer is an exception! I got a chance to play the demo during Steam’s Next Fest, and I didn’t know I needed a roguelike restaurant management game in my life until then.
In Cuisineer, you play as Pom, a young adventurer turned restaurateur. You’ve just returned to your hometown of Paell to manage your parents’ restaurant only to find it closed and in deep debt. To pay off the debt, you need to re-open and make money. And to do that, you have to go delve into dungeons to collect ingredients.
Explore dungeons in a variety of different biomes. Fight giant chickens, artillery shrimp, fire-breathing peppers, and other creatures. Then collect the ingredients, take them home, and cook up over 100 different recipes to revive the restaurant. Even buy upgrades to expand the restaurant, as well as new furniture and decor to liven up the place, too!
You can find Cuisineer on Steam, though it has no release date listed.
For more cooking fun, check out my review of Yum Yum Cookstar.
- Jul 13, 2023
I wrote about Gourdlets back in November when I first discovered the game. It’s an absolutely adorable little city builder game with no challenges, no quests, no resource management. You just unleash your creativity and build little cityscapes!
Since November, developer AuntyGames has added some great new features to the game. You can now enter buildings and decorate them! Build cozy homes for your Gourdlets and sweet little cafes for them to frequent. This adds another level of customization for players to create the cityscapes of their dreams.
Fences are now more intuitive to build, too. It’s easier to form corners and make enclosures with them. So, if you had been wanting to create tiny zoos or farm pastures, now it’s much easier! What’s also easier is placing land tiles. Gourdlets has a paint bucket tool that lets you create islands without the hassle of all the individual clicking. And my favorite addition is farming! Place tilled dirt tiles, plant seeds, and the Gourdlets will water them and pull weeds. They’ll even pick the mature crops!
You can find Gourdlets on Itch.io, as well as Steam!
- Jul 13, 2023
Raise Animals, Have a Family, and Decorate
Wish Upon a Llama is an immersive open-ended RPG where you take on the role of a rancher. You’ll raise a variety of adorable animals like llamas, geese, bunnies, sheep, fish and more. Plus, meet the unique townspeople like the determined engineer and the chill gamer. Each one has their own interesting story to tell. You can even challenge them to jump rope, cleaning the town, trivia, spelling bees and more!
Spend time discovering the over 50 different special breeds through caring for and breeding your livestock. Wish Upon a Llama features animals with a number of different traits to collect. There are different colors, patterns, personalities and more. Babies will inherit traits from both parents, so breed specific pairs together to receive animals that look and act how you want.
When you want a break from caring for your animals, go explore the town. As you contribute to the town’s fundraising efforts, you’ll gain access to new areas. Vacation islands, lush forests, bustling cities, and picturesque beaches will all be available for you to enjoy. You can even start a family and have an active hand in raising your children! Guide them as they grow, go to school, and make their own friends. Wish Upon a Llama even allows you to unleash your creativity by decorating your home and surrounding lands!
Coming Soon
I’ve been following Wish Upon a Llama via their Instagram for a while now, impatiently waiting for more news on this adorable game. They just recently released their Steam page, and there is no release date available. However, you can add it to your Steam Wishlist to keep an eye on it!
For more cozy farming, check out Harvest Moon Winds of Anthos!
- Jul 12, 2023
Gather Resources and Craft Tracks
Grab some friends and hop into a chaotic multiplayer co-op game of gathering resources and crafting railroad tracks to travel across the world in Unrailed! Encounter different inhabitants as you journey across more than five biomes in an endless procedurally generated world. Master challenges as you encounter them to keep your train moving.
Unrailed! is a co-op game, so working together is of course important, but make sure to polish your communication skills! There’s only one of each tool necessary for gathering resources, so you and your friends will need to coordinate in order to succeed. You’ll also need to upgrade your train to prepare for the challenges you’ll face. Get an atomic engine, upgrade your crafting car, or upgrade one of the many other options.
Available Now!
You can find Unrailed! on Steam, Epic Games, Xbox, PlayStation, and Nintendo Switch.
Want more chaotic co-ops? Checkout Overcooked, Moving Out, Farm Your Friends, and Witchtastic.
- Jul 12, 2023
I recently wrote about Go-Go Town here, and I’ve been eagerly awaiting its release since discovering it. It’s absolutely adorable with its sweet-looking character designs and delightful building designs. Couple that with the town revitalization and management, it looks to be the perfect cozy game.
And it is!
I’ve had a chance to playtest Go-Go Town, much to my delight. Not all features are available in this playtest. It’s more like a limited demo, but what is in the playtest has me hooked already. You’re dropped into this run-down town as the new mayor, and taught a few things on how to play, then it’s up to you to restore this beautiful little place.
You run around, or hop on a bike, or even drive a little pickup truck, collecting materials needed to build new buildings. Eventually you can unlock tools to make rebuilding in Go-Go Town even easier. Chainsaws for cutting wood, drills for collecting stones, and crab pots for passive fishing will help free up your time so you can build new homes, fun shops and restaurants, and attract even more residents faster. And as you get residents to move in, you can assign them to different jobs to make production even easier. Go-Go Town even has a farm plot where you’ll grow crops, care for animals, and use all the items you harvest there to stock your shops with fresh, homegrown ingredients.
I have loved the cuteness of the game, as well as the coziness of it. It’s been fun rebuilding a whole town how I want it. I can’t wait to see what more comes to this game, too!
You can find Go-Go Town on Steam, where you can Wishlist it to keep an eye out. Unfortunately, there is no release date at this time.
Want more building? Take a look at Tiny Glade!
