This is a cute and fun game that fell short of blossoming for me.
First, I want to express what I really appreciate about this game, the overall design and attention to detail are clearly at front of mind for the developers. The game sucks you in and does a great job of providing a thoughtful and unique interface. While perhaps not the most intuitive layout it is quick to get the hang of and seamless to navigate. The soundtrack and the audio design overall are also fantastic and match the wonderful visual style expertly.
I was, however, disappointed in the simplicity of the game mechanics. The gardening simulator is very minimalist with only a planting a harvesting mechanic. Watering your flowers is only required once, and only if it's not raining. There appears to be a mechanic for the player to decide which flowers to plant based on how long they will take to grow, but without any information as to how long any of them take this is impossible to take advantage of without guessing. Additionally, the player only unlocks new flowers by playing through the story, and the gardening mechanic is more of an afterthought to gain enough money to purchase more plots for additional flowers. There is no Flower Shop related mechanic.
The story seems to unravel in "bursts" where you find yourself chatting back and forth with several characters for several real-life minutes. The game presents you with options for responses, but these options have no actual impact on the story, or even the conversation itself, and are rather an illusion of choice meant to make you feel more engaged. In short order, the conversations felt more tedious, as a means to end, than an engaging story for me. I found myself no longer paying much attention to them, as it felt like I was just reading someone else's text messages and simply wanted to unlock new flowers.
The collectibles mechanic provides a little novelty but has no impact on gameplay, it is simply a cute little item you can unlock once a day and not much else.
I hope this does not come off as harsh, and if you love narrative-heavy games this is probably worth your while. I just felt like $10 was steep for a game that does not feel like it quite comes together and leaves my interest wilting.
QOL Requests:
- Some kind of "plant book" with information such as the time they take to grow and the "base" profit when harvesting.
- "Notification" on your phone for when a new collectible is ready