Video Game Review: Strange Horticulture

Strange Horticulture is a video game developed by Bad Viking and published by Iceberg Interactive. It's an interactive story where you play a character who's recently inherited their uncle's plant shop. As you help patrons by giving them the flowers they ask for, you gain pages in your botany book that help with the identification. Letters and other interactions lead you to locations on a map where you can find new plants for the shop. Meanwhile, a horrible murder has taken place and people involved with it come to you for various forms of aid.

The game is a lot of fun. I love plants and herbals, so putting the book together and reading about the plants was great. The story has several points where you can choose between 2 plants to give someone, a decision that impacts future options and the ending of the game. There is some mention of the occult, and you have the ability to personally kill one person. I've gotten 3 of the 8 endings so far. The game also has some mapping puzzles to solve, which keeps things interesting. A few of the puzzles were challenging until I figured out their trick. The visuals are gorgeous, including the petable cat that sits and sleeps on the counter. It's a point and click game, so there's no time based stress involved. The controls are easy to figure out and it takes about 6-8 hours to play through the first time.

I highly recommend the game if you like plants, the occult, and simple puzzles.