I've only played Carrotcake's cute forest exploration/gardening game for a few hours, The Garden Pathbut I'm already impressed. I have the gene that makes games of this nature connect on a deep synaptic level: on my Switch alone I've played well over 2500 hours of the original Welcoming Grove (itself a kind of “Animal Crossing with crafting and more story”), and similar to the one in Animal Crossing: New Horizons. There's something deeply appealing about this style of play for me as a sort of warm-up for my day (and a nice place to check in and relax during the workday), and so far, The Garden Path he's scratching that itch well.
It's much more Welcoming Grove of anything else in the cozy sim realm, but with a quite different tone and much more emphasis on gardening than other types of crafting. We have the chill requests requested on behalf of cute characters, lots of plant life checks, foraging, fishing (though there is a different minigame going on to actually catch them), and here, gardening. But there is one particularly wonderful design decision that caught my eye the moment I encountered it: the way the game rewards your progress. Instead of a cute diary or notebook like the aforementioned games, your achievements are marked by stars in the sky.
The Garden Path to the Stars
The first time I made a cup of tea over a forest fire (a lovely system that has some gameplay value), the camera panned to the sky and showed me my first star, awarded for making that first cup of tea. The stars are connected into constellations, giving them a cottagecore vibe that fits well with the game’s aesthetic and evoking the best part of camping or spending time outside on a summer night: gazing up at the cosmos. Other similar games have hinted at the higher universe: reflections in the sky and star fragments, objects with an astronomical feel, and so on. But I really want to look up and stargaze when I’m in these peaceful worlds, and this gives me the ability to do that.
It also evokes a certain bright and perhaps forgotten aspect of Super Mario 64where earning a star (in a less literal sense) was accompanied by a sometimes vague hint on how to get another one (or a few more, depending on how you approach the game). The Garden Path uses the system to suggest other stellar hits, in a way that feels satisfying and even a little mysterious, like a lightly signposted puzzle adventure game. It's charming, it's effective, and it keeps me invested in the wonderful world of this game.
Time will tell if The Garden Path will creep into my heart with the same intensity Welcoming GroveBut as I write this, I feel the urge to go and take a look at my garden and the stars above it.