Naturally, like with everything, I also have a lot of unplayed games for the Nintendo Switch. Games show up for a couple of euros in the digital sale, and I go ahead and buy them. Then, whenever I'm on holiday, I start discovering at least one new game. I'm just one of those weirdos who can't play 5 games at once. Anyway, Cozy Grove had been sitting ready for a while, and during the summer holiday I finally started playing it. It's a life simulation game set on a spooky island that changes every day, where you help spirits.

The Spirit Scout

You get sent by an organisation to an island full of spirits, to help them as a Spirit Scout. You could basically think of yourself as a sort of ranger for the island. On the island you have your own campsite with a living campfire. Think of Calcifer from Howl's Moving Castle. At first, the campfire helps guide you along. The first thing that stood out to me, you don't need to provide yourself with food or any form of energy at all. Gradually, you can change your outfit, and expand and decorate your tent. On top of that, you wander around the island collecting various materials that help you further with the spirits.

Short visits to Cozy Grove

On holiday I can spend hours on the same game. The first time I played it, I was slightly offended that the campfire basically sent me away. Hahaha. Apparently the idea is you spend an average of 30 minutes a day on the island. After that time, the tasks you can do are finished, and no new tasks become available. Of course you can stick around, but then you have to fill the time with just fishing, digging for treasure, chipping at rocks, etc. Believe me, that gets boring after a while. As the days go by, you get tasks from spirits that you can't complete in a single day anymore, for example because you don't have enough eggs to make a certain dish.

The spirits

I've now been playing Cozy Grove for maybe a week, and off the top of my head I have about five spirits I can help daily. The more tasks you complete, the bigger the island gets, and the more spirits appear. That expansion doesn't happen every day though. In the meantime I've also found the local postman, who loses some form of mail every single day, which I then have to go find. These can be hidden under piles of leaves, just 'behind' things (like a tree, a bush, etc.), or an Imp (a tiny spirit-like creature) has run off with it. I've also discovered a baker, for whom you regularly go out to collect ingredients. There's also a spirit you can sell items to, but also buy items from. At the captain on the beach, for example, you can hand in everything you've collected to him once, so he adds it to his collection.

Should you play Cozy Grove?

So there are a few factors to keep in mind. You get roughly 30-60 minutes of gameplay per day, and time passes in real time. So it's a slow-paced game, and you need to be okay with that. The art style, the artwork, is genuinely fantastic. At first it does take some getting used to wandering around in a pale (unlit) world, which makes some items hard to see/find. Only once you've completed a spirit's task does their area get coloured in. This happens every day. I really love having a game I can play briefly every day, with, in my opinion, fun tasks, and every day the surprise of what's going to change. Another plus is that the language is simply Dutch. For me it wouldn't be a problem if it were, say, English, but this way Cozy Grove is also playable by younger kids.

Cozy Grove is available on multiple platforms.