Demo: Preserve is an interesting landscaping puzzle game controlled by cards

We were given a chance to look at Preserve a bit earlier than the demo release – it’s out now if you want to give it a try for free. Visually, it looks like a lot of games coming out right now. When I saw it, I thought it was going to be another Dorfromantik, but honestly, it’s different enough that if you didn’t like that game, you might want to give Preserve a chance.

The idea is that you’re given a piece of land made up of little hexagonal spaces to nourish and nurture into a thriving wildlife space. You do this by cards that are randomly given to you. The cards are all different ranging from water cards that make the land ready for plant life, creatures to put down on the greenery, or stones that make mountains out of higher elevated tiles. 

By playing three cards of the same type, you make a biome, biomes are required to place animals. It’s all about meeting requirements here and by doing so, you’re awarded points. You get points for watering, for creating biomes, for placing down three of the same type of animal, or even having three different types of animals in the same biome. 

Simplistic, yet strategic

All of these things rack up the points and once you fill up the required amount, you’re given more land to pop down. You can put the land on any side of your current build and when you place it down, you get more cards. 

The cards are absolutely random, so you have to think several moves ahead with what you’re given if you want to hit the next set of required points. 

The cards range from grasslands to mountains and swamplands to fields of flowers. The animals are just as varied, I saw Eagles that go in mountainous areas, bees for the flowers, and boars in the forests, just to name a few. As you may imagine, animals can’t be placed just anywhere, most animals have two biomes they can exist in. So, you have to make sure you’re keeping the animal cards in mind as you build.

When you open the game, you have a few options. You can play the classic game where you play the way I was talking about, building up lands and points to keep expanding. Or, you can go to the puzzle mode where you’re meant to hit a certain point range to win. There’s even a creative option so that you can build your own space any way you want so long as it doesn’t go beyond 40 tiles. 

If I’m honest, starting with the puzzle route is the way to go. When I tried the main game, even with a tutorial, I didn’t get very far. My brain wanted to put everything in its own spaces to build out in its own corners and ultimately this led me to become stumped and unable to meet the requirements to pass the level. 

Preserve says “Hi!” from Creative mode

By playing the puzzles, I learned far more through doing in real time about how points work. I feel like doing that first teaches you more about tiles and biomes. When I switched back after playing the puzzles, I was able to complete the first level in the main game without any problem. 

As far as graphics go, it’s a cute little top-down view of hexagons. The art is fine and I enjoy the aspect of using cards to make things happen on the board. The music is an interesting blend of wind instruments that makes a pretty tune but needs to be dropped down to 20% if you want to hear yourself think. In terms of atmospheric noise, it’s only really the sound of the wind blowing, but you know I enjoy nature sounds, so I was happy with it. 

All in all, I can see where this would be relaxing. You’re definitely looking at a more strategic and analytical style of play. Personally, I enjoyed the puzzle mode the best, but once I understood more about the dynamics of how cards work together, the rest fell in line.

If you want to try out Preserve for yourself, you can download the demo on the Steam page and if you like it, pop it onto your wishlist to help the developer out.

If this isn’t really your speed, you can check out our latest review we did of Garden Life: A Cozy Simulator.