Strange Horticulture
May. 16th, 2023 08:33 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alobearI've been playing Strange Horticulture for the last few days and overall really enjoyed it.
It starts out fairly simply - you have a shop that stocks plants with various properties. Customers come in and ask for a specific plant, which you then have to identify on your shelf, with the help of a book that has information about some of the plants in your stock (and some you don't have).
Things build up gradually - you also have a map you can use to pinpoint places in the area to visit, where you can often find more plants for your collection. The postman delivers cryptic letters that provide clues to locations or plants you might want to investigate.
There's also a bigger plot, involving witches, hunters, psychics, librarians, violent murders, rituals and elixirs, along with other mysterious people who turn up at various points.
For the most part, I was able to work out the puzzles (though I admit I did look up a few things along the way, mostly because I'm lazy and impatient, not because of any fault in the game) and I enjoyed the way the story progressed.
There are eight possible endings to the game - the one I got wasn't the worst by a long way, but did result from a couple of 'mistakes' I made along the way (quote marks because there's no definitive 'right' ending to get to). I'm not sure there's a whole lot of replayability in the game, since the decision points are very few and far between, so there would be a lot of repeated play in order to get to a different ending. But I might want to go through it all again at some point in the future, once I've forgotten most of the details.
My only real problem with it was that there were a couple of occasions where I actively didn't want to give a customer what they were asking for (an elderly gentleman asked for an elixir that would stop his wife dying, at the expense of her soul!) and there was no way to turn them away empty-handed. But that was a very minor issue and I would definitely recommend this game to anyone looking for a gentle challenge with an involving (and quite creepy) story, where the few decisions you do get to make will have a big impact on the outcome.
It starts out fairly simply - you have a shop that stocks plants with various properties. Customers come in and ask for a specific plant, which you then have to identify on your shelf, with the help of a book that has information about some of the plants in your stock (and some you don't have).
Things build up gradually - you also have a map you can use to pinpoint places in the area to visit, where you can often find more plants for your collection. The postman delivers cryptic letters that provide clues to locations or plants you might want to investigate.
There's also a bigger plot, involving witches, hunters, psychics, librarians, violent murders, rituals and elixirs, along with other mysterious people who turn up at various points.
For the most part, I was able to work out the puzzles (though I admit I did look up a few things along the way, mostly because I'm lazy and impatient, not because of any fault in the game) and I enjoyed the way the story progressed.
There are eight possible endings to the game - the one I got wasn't the worst by a long way, but did result from a couple of 'mistakes' I made along the way (quote marks because there's no definitive 'right' ending to get to). I'm not sure there's a whole lot of replayability in the game, since the decision points are very few and far between, so there would be a lot of repeated play in order to get to a different ending. But I might want to go through it all again at some point in the future, once I've forgotten most of the details.
My only real problem with it was that there were a couple of occasions where I actively didn't want to give a customer what they were asking for (an elderly gentleman asked for an elixir that would stop his wife dying, at the expense of her soul!) and there was no way to turn them away empty-handed. But that was a very minor issue and I would definitely recommend this game to anyone looking for a gentle challenge with an involving (and quite creepy) story, where the few decisions you do get to make will have a big impact on the outcome.
no subject
Date: 2023-05-16 08:55 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2023-05-16 09:21 am (UTC)Do you have any recommendations?
I'm always looking for my next good game!
no subject
Date: 2023-05-16 07:27 pm (UTC)Uh... have you tried Wytchwood? Fairy-tale theming with a great art aesthetic. The core gameplay loop is a bit repetitive (gather thing to make a thing and then gather other things to make a new thing with that thing, etc.) but in the right mood it's very soothing, like knitting garter stitch XD