May Cozy Game Round-up: We had some bangers, some let downs, and one happy surprise!

You’re no stranger to these cozy game round-ups by now — unless you’re new here, then hello! Every month, we do an index post that we like to call a round-up. This just makes it easy to consolidate the month and make sure you don’t miss anything.

We loved quite a few of these games and it’s no surprise that they were all indies. Our biggest upset was a AAA game, go figure.

Let us know what cozy game you’re playing currently, we’re always looking for something new.

Cozy Game Reviews

Rusty’s Retirement is a great idle game that was a lot of fun and is very cute in design. I wish there was more in the way of a tutorial since the fact that there are multiple farms is easy to forget. The only hint of them is the locked options when starting a new game and I just forgot about them.

If you’re going to pay $50, don’t spend it on Endless Ocean Luminous. The game felt empty and soulless. The tasks are repetitive and you’ll find little joy in it.

Little Kitty, Big City is nearly flawless. There are some graphics issues where you fall into places you aren’t supposed to be, but autosaving keeps it from being too much of a problem. If not for that, it would have been an easy 10. It’s precious, cozy, and free on Xbox Game Pass. Don’t sleep on it.

While Duck Detective: The Secret Salami is a fun game, it is on the shorter side. So, you’ll have to weigh the $9.99 price tag against the 1.5 hours of gameplay.

Cozy Space Survivors is a particularly good time at a bargain price. I enjoyed getting all the achievements on this one.

If you’re looking for lightweight, comfortable, stylish glasses that aren’t just another piece of plastic, consider the wooden GUNNAR Arbor Collection options. You won’t be disappointed.

Cozy Game Previews / Demos

“The Vampire Therapist preview isn’t super long. But, it does show Sam’s journey in the modern world to achieving his goal.  I really enjoyed this unique premise. The humor kept me laughing, the terms and vocabulary within the therapy sessions had me nodding from my own experience with therapy, and the characters are generally interesting and make you want to learn more about them and their world.” – Arthur

 I think that Tavern Manager Simulator has a lot of promise. However, if it doesn’t have automation upgrades in the full game, then it will sink like a rock.

Other

Coffee Caravan*: This one is a bit of a doozy. If you like games like Overcooked or PlateUp!, then this is going to be right up your alley. Unfortunately, this game was marketed as cozy to us and it’s just… not. We get to individually choose what makes a cozy game for us. But, for better or worse, cozy evokes a stereotype that it’s important not to skew when marketing your game.

Coffee Caravan is a roguelite that is fairly unforgiving. The time given to make the customers happy is low, the level tree is procedurally generated, and if you make just one customer unhappy, you go back to the beginning and lose all of your money. You do get to keep your appliances, but good luck in getting anything good. Because it’s randomized, the appliance store isn’t usually where you need it and the items inside the shop are random too.

The levels go from easy to hard willy-nilly depending on the randomization and adding in more coffee recipes just makes it that much harder. Personally, I didn’t think it was fair to give this one a review score because I was left frustrated and angry, which is not where I like to be as a cozy gamer.

Perhaps a tutorial mode beyond how to make coffee would have prepared me better. I definitely needed an explanation upfront that the map was procedurally generated and, if I make just one customer unhappy, I’d lose everything.

*Before I could get to the round-up, they introduced a “cozy” option into their settings which is great, but begs the question… did they know it wasn’t actually cozy when they pitched it as such to me?

Coral Island: Technically, I didn’t have to mention Coral Island because I wasn’t given a code with any sort of caveat. However, I like to have at least some commentary on cozy games when I can.

For me, I really wanted to love this game, but there was something missing and maybe it’s just an error on my part. But, I felt like I couldn’t manage my time very well. I did like the underwater diving for some reason, and I loved the cast of characters. All of them definitely felt fully formed.

I might pick it back up at some point. As it stands, I don’t feel like I could make enough progress quickly enough to make a dent in anything. But, that might just be the woes of always having to pick up the next game as a reviews writer.

I don’t have any negatives to report on it. I had some lag, but I think that was my computer, which was another reason I put it down. If you can grab it on sale, definitely try it out.