Cozy Grove review: calming, eerie vibes
Our Verdict
Cozy Grove will definitely scratch the itch for anyone looking for a new life-sim. Although the gameplay can feel slightly limiting, it will keep you coming back each day for more.
After the debut of Animal Crossing: New Horizons a little over a year ago, I've been looking for a fresh, captivating life-sim to satisfy my appetite for a few months. My life has now been changed by Cozy Grove on Apple Arcade.
In Cozy Grove, you take on the role of a Spirit Scout sent to a deserted, eerie island with the task of calming the ghosts of the area—who coincidentally, are lovely animals. The island is all sepia tones when you first arrive, but as you explore and do daily duties for the spirits, the environment brightens and becomes joyful again.
To enhance your experience, I strongly advise lowering the sound effects level before beginning; if you don't, every move you make will be too loud for you to relax into. Secondly, the experience is much enhanced by the support for controllers, which counteract the rather awkward way to navigate the screen via tapping.
With a sinister twist, Cozy Grove is a delightful hand-drawn game where you do mundane but curiously fulfilling activities similar to those in Animal Crossing. To acquire supplies for creating and giving, the chores include fishing, hole-digging, fruit picking, and much more.
Even while Cozy Grove's in-game activities resemble those of Animal Crossing, the game manages to feel distinctive because to its artwork, overall atmosphere, calming music (especially when the SFX level is down), and a narrative that is much more serious than you would anticipate from a lighthearted life simulation.
The creepy plot is the twist that really makes it stand out and gives the game a distinct vibe. I had fun doing different fetch quests for the eccentric spirits and learning more about the island by chatting with them. You may visit Cozy Grove whenever you have some free time to talk to the islanders and get a new job since it operates in real-time.
The majority of the ghosts want you to look for a misplaced object or gather a certain quantity of materials in order to create something new. Even though the island isn't very big, some of these jobs seem a little repetitious, and it may be oddly hard to locate some of the concealed objects on the map. Although you may avoid this by paying a little in-game charge, every time I gave up money for a clue, I did felt like I was cheating.
You get to know each spirit better the more tasks you do. It's a real pleasure to come back every day to learn a little bit more about the unique spirits' characteristics and to contribute to the island's rebirth of color.
Sadly, there aren't as many tasks to do every day. It took me approximately thirty minutes to get a fair number of commodities from the little island after gathering everything needed for each spirit. This is ideal for someone who doesn't have much time to spend playing games every day, but I would really want a few more tasks to do on a day when I have a few hours to spare.
Cozy Grove is unquestionably the game for you if you're looking for anything to take the place of Animal Crossing. Its distinct and charming atmosphere, along with its adorably cute characters, will leave you wanting more.