Developed by Noio Games and published by Coatsink Software, Cloud Gardens is a game I’ve had a hard time trying to talk about. I could always start by saying something along the lines of: “Cloud Gardens is an excellent game that everyone should play”, list out the various aspects of the game I enjoyed, and call it a day. This would be accurate, as I do think Cloud Gardens is an excellent game. The only problem is that this doesn’t begin to cover why I liked Cloud Gardens by a long shot. To begin, this game has a certain vibe that I like to describe as soothingly existential.
Before I get into what I mean by that, I suppose I should go over the game itself. Presentation-wise, it’s a solid game. The graphics have a polygonal look to them that gives the game a charming look, and the lofi soundtrack helps establish a calming tone. Playing Cloud Gardens after a long day and letting the ambient music wash over you as you grow and cultivate plants is the best way to relax. Additionally, the variety of plant life players can grow adds additional beauty to the game’s environments, transforming levels into canvasses for player creativity.
Which leads into the gameplay. Cloud Gardens can best be described as a puzzle game, albeit an unconventional one. In the bottom left corner of the screen is a percentage meter that fills up as players fill the stage with plant life and a set number of objects that will help the plants grow, and the goal of every level is to achieve 100% completion before running out of plants and objects. The gameplay loop then becomes a balancing act of cultivating plants, collecting seeds, and placing objects within the limited space.
Completing the game’s levels will unlock items to use in the game’s creative mode. In creative mode, players will be able to use these items to create their own environments to grow plants in. In this sense, the game’s more puzzle-like levels act as a sort of whetstone, with which players can sharpen their creative sensibilities for the creative mode. In a sense, the creative mode is the game’s best feature as it fully allows players to express themselves and grow plants to their heart’s content. And it should be mentioned that the act of growing plants is not only endlessly satisfying, but watching the flora overtake the game’s environments is a visual delight. Vines will cover old and decaying buildings as trees will dot once-dead landscapes, and it all looks beautiful and feels great to cultivate in a way that is difficult to describe with words alone.
I’ve already sung this game’s praises enough, but this is ignoring how Cloud Gardens connected with me on an emotional level. I, like many others in my generation, have thought a lot about the end of things. Current issues, both environmental and political, are constantly put into our faces through social media and the like. I’m just saying, it’s hard to ignore. So, when I first played Cloud Gardens and quickly realized that the game’s various environments were all of a post-apocalyptic earth, with rusty vehicles and run-down buildings acting as the only monuments to our existence and failures. It’s a sobering realization, but then I took note of the game’s tone. It isn’t somber or trying to shame humanity as a species. It isn’t trying to shout: “Humanity was a disease and a plague!” and a whole host of other things from the rooftops. It just presents its barren world with a sense of acceptance. But, it isn’t bleak acceptance. The primary act of the game is a hopeful one: cultivating life. The player brings new life and beauty to a broken world. Birds will often fly into levels and perch atop barren cityscapes. Cloud Gardens is a game that stresses that, while humanity may come and go, life as a whole will still continue on Earth, and there’s a certain comfort in that thought.
Cloud Gardens is a game I didn’t expect to emotionally connect with me. I will no doubt go back to it time and time again to cultivate plants in the post-apocalypse to unwind. It’s a game for the creative, allowing them to paint the world in a variety of colorful flora and make the best out of a broken world. It accomplishes nearly everything it sets out to do incredibly well. For that, I give it a 10/10.
For more information, visit: https://www.nintendo.com/store/products/cloud-gardens-switch/
I love games and love talking about games. Some of my favorites include action games (both 2D and 3D), metroidvanias, roguelikes, shooters, and Indies.
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