Sugardew Island

I love cozy games. Life is really stressful, so if I have a game that allows me to curl up under a blanket on the couch and zone out for a little bit? I'm in. Toss in some farming and cute animals? I'm even MORE in.

So when Sugardew Island showed up on my proverbial doorstep, I snagged it in an instant. Judging the book by the cover? This is the perfect game for me.

As I began the player experience, I was introduced to the overarching concepts of the game. Allow me to paint the picture, to the best of my ability... Your character shows up on a nearly deserted island, overgrown with trees, weeds, and stones. It's in a little hut that you meet Tomate, the island trader and your one true ally in the game. Tomate walks you through the history of the island and how it came to be deserted. Within the island is a harmony tree, which has been overgrown with thorns. The only way to restore the island to it's previous glory is to bring harmony back to the tree. The way you do this is, of course, by growing produce and selling it in your store. A bit convoluted? Yes, but it gets the job done.

Starting out in the game, I struggled a bit with the mechanics. Toggling between the tools and trying to find my seeds was tricky and took some getting used to. For as much of an intro storyline we got at the start, there wasn't much in the way of actually teaching game mechanics, which I could have used more of. However, once I got the hang of it, it was smooth sailing. The players spends their time alternating between a few basic activities that are probably familiar to fans of the genre - farming, clearing land, gathering resources, and running a store to sell their goods.

I really began enjoying the game as I started to progress throughout the first few game days. By day 5, I had a good rhythm. By game day 15, I had my strategy figured out. See, one of the things I really struggled with at the start was energy management. This game doesn't track days in actual time, but rather by when you open and close the store - meaning, I could wake up, open the store, sell my goods, close the store, and it's nighttime. If I still have my energy reserve, I could work through the night until I slept. Something to keep in mind, however, is that your energy will deplete quickly as you try to clear land for your farm, and the only way to get more energy is by using your gold to purchase an expensive energy bar from Tomate, and especially at the start, it's a big investment to very little reward. 

Some things that I really enjoyed about Sugardew Island include the cute and whimsical visuals, the slow roll out of new crops, and eventually animals (I'm grateful for that understanding that I WOULD be otherwise overwhelmed), utilizing the weeds to create a fertilizer that reduced the need to water daily, and just the overall theming and aesthetics.

Some things that fell short for me were the general lack of tutorial (for example, the tutorial said to "feed the animals", but nothing about HOW to feed the animals. Don't worry, they all survived). I struggled a bit with the quest tree, which was confusing simply because the quests are on different "islands" and I thought I had to move locations at first or that I had to tackle one island at a time. I also had a tough time having to negotiate or convince patrons to buy my produce, and it took a while to lock in on the element people I was supposed to befriend by giving them produce (this just seemed unnecessary). 

Overall it was a pretty decent cozy game, however I'd be remiss if I didn't mention the one big flaw of the game - the game randomly freezes. The freezes are ultimately what led to my putting down the game and walking away for good (it takes a lot for me to get to this point, mind you). It happened as I went to the Harmony Tree to collect my rewards and select a new quest. The Hare comes out to talk to me, and as I walk away, the game locks up. I was able to back out and select a new quest and re-start, but at the cost of losing all of the progress on my previous quest. The first time I wasn't too upset, because it was just to bring 50 harmony points back to the tree, but the next time it froze cost me 150, and the third time it was 250. It was quite frustrating to put that much time and effort into a game just to have to re-start because of a glitch. Disappointing because I really was excited to see what would come next! But I eventually reached the level of frustration where I did not want to continue playing; this was not a one-time issue, but rather a repeating flaw in the flow oof the game that showed no signs of stopping.

With a few adjustments, I'd like to play this game again - but not at the risk of losing my quests and progress. The developers are aware of the situation, and there may be a patch that cleans up what is otherwise a pleasant and engaging game. Here's to hoping others don't have the same experience and can simply enjoy the game for what it is!