It’s a grower.
Strange Horticulture takes on some big challenges. It’s a carefully authored story that wants to be driven by interaction, and it’s a single-scene play space that wants to create immersion in a whole world. It’s such a tricky line to walk between structured gameplay that’s interactive but dry and a carefully managed story that limits interaction. But with Strange Horticulture, Bad Viking pulls it off. It creates deep immersion in a well-rounded world while starting from a simple place. The filling-out of the world as we played came from our own discoveries, and we were drawn powerfully into the emerging intrigue of the plot.
In Strange Horticulture, Bad Viking has created a mystery story set in a bizarro-style English Lake District, where real-life place names nestle amid castles, stone circles and religious cults. The player runs an apothecary dealing in specialist plants with medicinal, mind-altering, magical and even mechanical effects. Each day, a series of customers arrive at your counter in need of horticultural help. By cross-referencing what’s on your plant shelf with what’s in your plant-cyclopaedia, you identify the salves, syrups and embrocations that are needed. There’s a loop of learning and labelling plants to receive more plants and more info pages that immediately sucks you in.
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