Review: Urban Jungle lets you have a green thumb, even if you have the touch of death

Urban Jungle joins the ranks of games like Unpacking and A Little to the Left. In fact, I’d almost call it a perfect blend of the two. Urban Jungle takes the idea of Unpacking and putting things in a particular space with the puzzles of A Little to the Left.

In Urban Jungle, you follow the story of someone who has loved plants since they were young. Each level will present you with a different environment from your childhood bedroom to your final family home. You’ll get bits of story between, but it’s mostly about managing your plants and suffusing your space with greenery. 

Urban Jungle: It’s what the plants crave

To be honest, I can’t imagine this review will be very long. Urban Jungle is a very straightforward game with just a few hours of content. I played about four hours to finish the story with a few extra achievements and I had an amazing time doing it.

Urban Jungle is a puzzle game at its core – it’ll tell you that it’s a decoration sim more than puzzler, but navigating the specific needs of plants at every stage makes it more puzzle-based in my opinion. Either way, puzzler or decoration sim, it’s a really fun game.

Your goal is to put as many plants as you can manage in a space to fill up a meter. This meter is just a set of points needed for the level to be complete. In order to get points, you have to place down plants. There are dozens of different plants and variants, so it’s an ever-evolving carousel of flora to choose from.

Each plant has a different point value depending on its rarity and how easy it is to place. For instance, succulents are generally 5 points and can be placed anywhere regardless of environment. However, plants may require sunlight, humidity, or both to thrive. These generally have a higher point value with the most tending to be especially large plants that are harder to place. 

While you can technically place plants anywhere you want, you lose points for not putting them where they flourish. And, the light and humidity source isn’t the only thing you have to worry about. These plants have preferences as to what other plants orbit them. Some flora love being around certain types of greenery but hate being around others. This is another thing that can affect the points. 

A lot of the plants loathe the Monstera for some reason…

As you can imagine, light and humidity are precious commodities, but you do have some freedom to change them around. Obviously, outside sources of light can’t be changed, but you can move the lamps and humidifiers around to help create the environments the plants crave. 

This is the majority of the game. You’ll get new plants, figure out where to place them for maximum point value and repeat. Interspersed through your game, you’ll have moments of interactivity with family or friends to get the vibe of what your life is like at this time. 

As you play, you’ll see your time at Grandma’s house as well as glimpses of several apartments, a dorm, your business, and so on. Each environment is giving you more of the story. And, while you do get multiple-choice options, I really don’t think they alter the story. It’s just a cute way to keep you engaged while you learn more about your character.

I had a really good time playing Urban Jungle and found it to be a really chill experience. I, also, appreciated that you had a few other tasks during each level to help break things up like finding an object or planting out a flower bed. 

Even though it’s got a lot of puzzle elements to it, you won’t have to worry about being stuck or frustrated. Personally, I felt that things were too samesy for Unpacking and sometimes the puzzles were a bit too hard in A Little to the Left, but Urban Jungle is the Goldilocks between them. Everything hit just right. 

If you want to spend a cozy, relaxing evening decorating with plants, you can get Urban Jungle for $11.99 on Steam. Otherwise, you can check out the review we did of A Little to the Left.