Cozy Grove is a social simulator that is a cross between Animal Crossing and Where’s Wally? In this game we play the role of a boy scout character trapped on an island, whose inhabitants are friendly ghost bears who seem to always lose things. This is an adorable game with a good art style and innovative use of colors. However, the initial routine repeats itself as there are only a few different activities to do each day.
First, let’s discuss performance. Cozy Grove is causing problems on Nintendo Switch: every time we complete a mission the frame rate drops significantly, even as we walk around the island. It can be played, but it can be annoying. It should definitely work better as it doesn’t have a lot of graphics intensity. It works practically the same in the portable version of the console.
The game is slow, but that’s the intent. It starts with a simple non-binary character editor and then gives us a mission where we have to find something. We’re going to have to do a lot of procurement missions. In fact, the dynamics of the game are based on these type of missions as each bear we unlock asks us to look for something that we can do when it suits us. Find this lost book, bring me three rare fish, find the carrot that villain (little ghost) stole from me … something like that. Unfortunately, it will repeat itself very soon. However, if you want to have a twenty to forty minute routine every day, this game can give you hours of content.
Before you say, “Well, Animal Crossing: New Horizons is the same!” Personally, I feel like something is missing. It doesn’t feel like the island is our home, with static bears and a palette of gray colors. It seems that the bears’ indolence is made to know where to find them each day in order to get missions, but it did affect the immersion I had while playing as things never change.
The grayscale will be colored in after the missions are completed, but the next day it will return to its original state. We can only harvest certain colored resources, so it is easier to find the objects. While I love how creative this concept is, it turns out to be a failure and makes the game a chore.
Another problem I find with the game is that the collectibles are very boring. There are hundreds of them, but none are unique (except maybe some rare fish) and the process of putting them in the wildlife museum equivalent is a nightmare. We can only place one at a time and then have to restart the entire dialogue, which artificially lengthens the playing time and becomes difficult. However, the decorative objects are quite good and beautiful, we can find everything from furniture to pots with plants, but they don’t have any objects to interact with, which is a shame.
Cozy Grove’s art style is the highlight as it is a hand-drawn style like Don’t Starve with a similar isometric perspective. When the surfaces are colored, the contrast with black and white is impressive, and “painting” the island, for example by placing lamps to distribute the light, is cool. Unfortunately, colors can also slow the game down, but not enough to affect the game too much. The sound design also provides and reinforces the feeling of being in a tent. Mind you, the main melody gets as boring as a long game, so I’d prefer a few more songs.
Overall, Cozy Grove is worth playing. It’s a nice alternative to Animal Crossing, although I think it doesn’t match its level of immersion (which was actually never very high). Even so, his artistic style and original use of color may be enough to pique his interest, but unfortunately, his repetitive startup routine has become too difficult for me.
