Cozy Caravan

This is such a fantastic game. I've been playing it since it was in Early Access, and it has been SO fun to watch the growth of this game thanks to the dev team. They were (and still are!) regularly updating the game and keeping us in the loop about coming features and updates, which has always been so great to see. As you can guess, with 86 hours in the game, I did finish the main story, which was such a cute and sweet storyline. There can be some grinding required to complete story quests, mostly due to having to travel across the map to get certain things or talk to certain people, but I always saw that as the point of the game. It's meant to be a slow-paced, cozy game about traveling around in your caravan. However, they did JUST come out with an update to expediate some of that traveling, which I'm sure will be nice for people still working on the story. Speaking of their most recent update: I thought I was done with the game after I finished the story. There are some post-game things you could do, but it wasn't a ton, and I'm not a completionist, so I figured I'd play it all over again if I wanted to live in that world once more. But then the new update came, which introduced an ENTIRE NEW MAP!! From what I can tell, there isn't a HUGE storyline (like the main story) tied to this map, but there are so many new quests, characters, crafting items, etc. that I'm incredibly happy to keep playing again and sink in more hours. And I'm also very glad I never did restart the story. On top of the main quests, the cooking/crafting mechanic is one of my favorites. It really feels like you're cooking from scratch, and the clothes you wear often feel well-earned when you made them yourself. You can use what you craft for so many things: selling at the weekend markets, eating to restore your (plentiful) stamina or restoring Rigby's stamina, quests, etc. The main currency (coins) to upgrade your caravan, unlock clothing packs, and customize your caravan can be earned in so many ways, so you can truly play the game in the way you want. Personally, I'm not always in the mood to open the market on the weekends, and it's not even required, so sometimes I just don't do it! You can certainly earn plenty of coins that way, but you can also earn currency by just waving to everyone you walk by (literally!), and playing minigames like the food service minigames in many different towns, which I never pass up. So even though I don't use the main mechanic to earn coins too often, I still earn plenty in other ways regardless, so it doesn't feel specifically geared towards needing to do that. The stop motion animation style is so cute (but they do have an option to turn that off if people aren't a fan), and the soundtrack is the BEST. I love lofi, and this is very much like that. I actually saved their album on Spotify and listen to it when I'm working sometimes. The final song used in the storyline really ties everything in the soundtrack together and adds to the wholesome feeling of the ending, so I also just love the full theme song. They are still regularly adding content updates - quite often in regards to customizing your character, which I adore - so I'm still excited to see where else this game could go. As someone that's been playing since the very start, I'm emotionally attached to this game (and Bubba and Rigby) at this point and will love to watch what the dev team does next - in this game, or the next!

A little game with a big heart. This is honestly probably the game of the year for me. It's kept me good company during stressful times and brought me so much joy. I adore the fact that you get the in game currency by being friendly and helping people out and I absolutely love exploring the map and talking to people. As someone who has a loved one living in Australia I also really appreciate all the little Australian-isms in the game because they remind me of spending time with someone I love. You can tell so much love and thought has gone into making this game and I intend to keep coming back to it with every update. It's the perfect game for someone like me who just needs some peace and coziness in their life sometimes.