Speaker 1: Hey, this is Annie and Samantha and welcome to stuff
Speaker 1: I ever told your prediction of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: And welcome to another Monday Mini where I take over
Speaker 2: and talk about cozy gaming. Yes, y'all is still around.
Speaker 2: People still love it. We need to we need to
Speaker 2: bring some experts on here. Actually, the creator of a
Speaker 2: cozy game has been doing a campaign because her game,
Speaker 2: I think was being released at the same time a
Speaker 2: huge studio was releasing their stuff, so it kind of
Speaker 2: like out coveraged her stuff to the point that she's
Speaker 2: really upset about it. But she's got a one point
Speaker 2: one million views and the game is named Potions Curious Tell,
Speaker 2: which I am interested in looking at getting and it's
Speaker 2: an indie game. I want to download it and I
Speaker 2: want to get it. She's talking about how EA has
Speaker 2: been releasing a lot of games at the same time
Speaker 2: that she had planned, and she's been talking about it
Speaker 2: for a minute, like I've seen this game. I've seen
Speaker 2: her do really cute ads TikTok videos to try to
Speaker 2: advertise it. She's done live action interpretations of what the
Speaker 2: game looks like. So it's like a witchy game to Potions,
Speaker 2: and I do want to try it, so I just
Speaker 2: want to shut that game out there. I don't know
Speaker 2: much about the developer. I don't know what about her.
Speaker 2: I think her name is Renee, and I don't know
Speaker 2: everything and the details behind it. I don't know about
Speaker 2: much about the game. I do, like I said, I
Speaker 2: want to look for it. It's available now, so I
Speaker 2: will be looking for it. But you know, it does
Speaker 2: make me sad when I see someone who's worked so
Speaker 2: hard at content like this and gaming like this, especially
Speaker 2: for an industry that is not welcoming to women or
Speaker 2: marginalized people. So you know, I'm going to look into
Speaker 2: it a little more. But just that put that on
Speaker 2: so sideline as a beginner, because I feel like I
Speaker 2: need to remind myself of going into.
Speaker 3: These games, you know what I mean?
Speaker 2: Mm hmm, yeah, okay, But today I'm pretty much just
Speaker 2: talking about cozy games, not necessarily phone games, because you know,
Speaker 2: I'm obsessed with phone games and I play that a lot.
Speaker 2: But I've picked back up the switch, y'all. I'm not
Speaker 2: gonna lie. My Island from Animal Crossing looks really bad.
Speaker 2: Flowers everywhere, all the weeds everywhere. I here's the thing,
Speaker 2: and I've confessed to this before. I've figured out two
Speaker 2: things about my dislikes in video gaming and gaming in general.
Speaker 2: You know, if it's too complicated and I have to
Speaker 2: compete and have to kill things, I'm not good at it.
Speaker 2: So I don't like that. If you don't give me objectives,
Speaker 2: I'm not good about creating. I am not a very
Speaker 2: creative person. Like there are things that I'm like, yes,
Speaker 2: this is what I want to do when it comes
Speaker 2: to speaking and writing that makes sense to me. When
Speaker 2: it comes to actual like art visual arts, I am
Speaker 2: not good. I really wish I was. I'll like some
Speaker 2: of the pictures that I do as a kid probably
Speaker 2: looked made me look like a manic uh serial killer.
Speaker 2: But it's okay because I'm not just say that's how
Speaker 2: bad they are or eccentric. They may seem to be
Speaker 2: all of that to say. So, now that I finish
Speaker 2: all the objectives with animal crossing, you know they tell
Speaker 2: you to do this, they tell you to fill the museums.
Speaker 2: So I've gotten all of the bones. All the bones
Speaker 2: are there, I'm done with that. I haven't gotten all
Speaker 2: the bugs, and I haven't gotten all of the uh
Speaker 2: like creatures see creatures because you know they're seasonal, and
Speaker 2: so since I'm not on it every day, like for
Speaker 2: a minute that I was, I can't get to them.
Speaker 2: Like we're back to the season I originally started with,
Speaker 2: which I've gotten all of those things, so now I
Speaker 2: could do the time jumping, which is a lot, or
Speaker 2: I just have to wait. So like with that, and
Speaker 2: then you're supposed to build the island and make it
Speaker 2: look pretty, I don't know how to do that. My
Speaker 2: friend shout out to Matt, he has the best island
Speaker 2: I have ever seen, like it is, so I did
Speaker 2: bust up his rocks and he got mad at me,
Speaker 2: as he should, because I didn't know how to get
Speaker 2: the material out without busting it because I didn't realize
Speaker 2: when you eat the fruit, it makes you super strong.
Speaker 2: I figured it out now, but like one of the
Speaker 2: best islands I've seen, and then when you you know,
Speaker 2: when you can go to sleep and go visit other islands,
Speaker 2: they put my island to shade.
Speaker 3: It's so bare.
Speaker 2: But I don't want it to be too built up.
Speaker 2: I wanted to be a retreated like island. But yeah,
Speaker 2: so my animal crossing is not great.
Speaker 3: Danny, you should see my island.
Speaker 2: I need to come visit. Did you build it up?
Speaker 2: Is it built up?
Speaker 3: Its built up? I got the five stars, I got
Speaker 3: the flowers.
Speaker 2: Yeah, five stars. You want to come build my island?
Speaker 3: It's Star Wars based island. Surprise.
Speaker 1: The only thing I have before I complete. I just
Speaker 1: have four, no, three, three art pieces left. I've done
Speaker 1: everything else you've done.
Speaker 2: I haven't gotten the art pieces either, now that you
Speaker 2: say that art pieces take forever, yeah, because you have
Speaker 2: to go buy the and then you have to, like
Speaker 2: I do the cheating and try to make sure they're real.
Speaker 2: So I go through the phone to find which ones
Speaker 2: because I've been I've been duped, You've been. I've been
Speaker 2: duped twice.
Speaker 3: It's not nice.
Speaker 2: It's not nice.
Speaker 3: You know if I ever told you this, but.
Speaker 1: One of your I never have had the heart to
Speaker 1: kick someone off my island. One of your people that
Speaker 1: you kicked off your islands.
Speaker 3: Came to me. How did you find that out?
Speaker 1: Because it said they came from there.
Speaker 2: Now I did kick them off. I think it's like
Speaker 2: they are asking. I just want to try. I just
Speaker 2: wanted a grand adventure, and I didn't know what that meant.
Speaker 2: I was like, yeah, go for it. Because that's that's
Speaker 2: the way you respond and like it's an encouraging thing.
Speaker 2: And I didn't realize what it would do.
Speaker 4: And she left.
Speaker 2: I'm like, oh, damn, I did kick off a wolf
Speaker 2: because he was mean to me.
Speaker 3: It was.
Speaker 2: Like just criticizing me.
Speaker 4: I was like, damn, what's wrong with you?
Speaker 2: I will not have that on my island, bad energy.
Speaker 3: Going, You've got some standard, You've got some standards.
Speaker 2: You can't be mean to me on my own island.
Speaker 2: How dare you? So?
Speaker 3: I did?
Speaker 2: I think I kicked out two people, and like one
Speaker 2: of those on purpose. One was on like, oh, I
Speaker 2: didn't know what this does type of moment.
Speaker 3: So it sounds like the one you didn't know what
Speaker 3: it does?
Speaker 2: Is it the dogs?
Speaker 3: No, it's a oh would that be sheep of some kind?
Speaker 2: I'm trying to remember.
Speaker 3: Maybe you've kicked out more people than you know.
Speaker 2: I didn't really.
Speaker 1: Well, that's what it said when she showed up, like this, Wow.
Speaker 2: They're telling on me. You know.
Speaker 3: That was the thing.
Speaker 2: Now that is like a whole shape factor.
Speaker 5: Okay, okay, okay, Well.
Speaker 2: So that is my animal crossing update because I'm really
Speaker 2: I'm really bad about trying to build up the land
Speaker 2: and island and creating things and pathways, like I have
Speaker 2: random things just hanging about. There's a locker in the
Speaker 2: middle of nowhere because I just give me things. I
Speaker 2: just want to get rid of it. There's a table
Speaker 2: with a book on it, like I was like, I
Speaker 2: don't know what to do with this, just why so
Speaker 2: we have that on my Island's.
Speaker 1: Funny because when I visited your island, I was like,
Speaker 1: I'll never be I still but memory I have of
Speaker 1: your island is better than my islands.
Speaker 2: No that's not true. I don't know why. But it
Speaker 2: is sparse and all a little bit sad. I like
Speaker 2: it that way.
Speaker 4: That's why.
Speaker 3: Well, I liked it too.
Speaker 2: Maybe I would be motivated one day, but like, it's
Speaker 2: just I'm bad. Like there's a game that I played
Speaker 2: on my phone that you also build your island and that,
Speaker 2: and it's just crowded and it makes no sense. But
Speaker 2: I have to have all this stuff on there so
Speaker 2: I can get points. It makes no sense, but it's okay.
Speaker 2: But here are some of the favorites that I have
Speaker 2: been playing recently, and one of them is called Lemon
Speaker 2: Cakes by Cozy b Games. Super Cute, super cute. So
Speaker 2: this is the description that they have about their game.
Speaker 2: It says, while the bakery might initially be broken, and
Speaker 2: it is broken, overgrown, and even haunted, don't worry. You'll
Speaker 2: be able to repair, furnish and decorate every room in
Speaker 2: the bakery. Gather honey from your beehive, raise a cow
Speaker 2: to collect fresh milk, and adopt a few chickens to
Speaker 2: add eggs to your rest. You'll also be able to
Speaker 2: grow trees and plants to harvest a variety of fruits,
Speaker 2: mix ingredients together to prepare all kinds of recipes, including
Speaker 2: baked pastries, candies, and frozen desserts. Be sure to serve
Speaker 2: your customers quickly and keep your window displays well stocked
Speaker 2: so you don't miss out on any order. Serve coffee
Speaker 2: to impatient customers to keep them around the bakery a
Speaker 2: bit longer, and build an adorable cat cafe to make
Speaker 2: everyone's day brighter. So I have been playing this game
Speaker 2: essentially every day. It's like you quickly wake up, you
Speaker 2: quickly bake things, put things in display, and try to
Speaker 2: keep up, and it's pretty hard. I definitely had my
Speaker 2: thumbs sore trying to keep up with all these, but
Speaker 2: there's really cute cats that you can pet. I do
Speaker 2: have some plants in a very broken greenhouse, but you
Speaker 2: know it's working. You have to, like you don't get
Speaker 2: a lot of money, or maybe I don't get a
Speaker 2: lot of money because I'm not good at it. This
Speaker 2: is about based on the sale of the day, so
Speaker 2: I don't like I've gotten four Like I've just gotten
Speaker 2: four recipes that are pretty well done, two ovens that work,
Speaker 2: and then like two ghosts that come to see me.
Speaker 2: One ghost is the former owner Bond Bond, I believe,
Speaker 2: and one ghost is a is an inspector and health inspector,
Speaker 2: and he often tells me to catch bugs, and I
Speaker 2: have to catch bugs, and I'm not really good at
Speaker 2: that either because my aim is off apparently like what
Speaker 2: I think I'm supposed to be aiming, I'm not supposed to.
Speaker 2: It's kind of hard, but it's really cute. It's really
Speaker 2: bright game. It has a daily objective for me to
Speaker 2: like give out, so it's kind of like could be monomonous,
Speaker 2: except you do get to buy cows to do like
Speaker 2: the milking and such, and then you have the fruits
Speaker 2: to add and then having the customers come through. It's
Speaker 2: quite cute, and the thing is just mindless enough with
Speaker 2: just the of activity that it's fun to play, So
Speaker 2: it's not as it's it's Overcooked without partners and as
Speaker 2: much stress I every time I've ever played Overcooked with
Speaker 2: my partner. Thank goodness, he knows he's trying to make
Speaker 2: me like games, so he would never be mean to me.
Speaker 2: But because I'm like, I'm done, I'm over this.
Speaker 1: Once when I was I was hanging out with you both,
Speaker 1: it came up that you might play it, and I was.
Speaker 3: Like, wow, because that's that's a game that can't get Really.
Speaker 2: I got so mad about the other game. What was it?
Speaker 2: The robot robots one Florence.
Speaker 3: Oh, Portal Portal. Yeah, Florence.
Speaker 2: This is the name of that robot that's mean to me?
Speaker 3: Why?
Speaker 2: Why are robots? Why are these games mean to me?
Speaker 3: Annie? Oh? Wow, that's a great question.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 3: I think you need that.
Speaker 1: You need a villain or someone to to.
Speaker 2: Be to someone else, not me. But yeah, so that's
Speaker 2: one game that I'm playing. Portal is not that game.
Speaker 2: I will never play with Wortal again. I'm still angry
Speaker 2: about it. I hated with the passion you know what
Speaker 2: I've discovered between this game and a Short Hike, which
Speaker 2: I highly recommend to me and I did play on
Speaker 2: the on the Steam deck. It's games that where I
Speaker 2: can fall off that I really hate because I'm really
Speaker 2: bad at it. So for the beginning of the Short
Speaker 2: Hike goes fine, find these things you have to jump here,
Speaker 2: I'm like, I'm pretty bad about figuring out how to
Speaker 2: jump because I don't understand the dual usage, the multi
Speaker 2: usage of all the buttons, and I'm like, why am
Speaker 2: I doing all these things that if there's a chance
Speaker 2: that I can fall off of a thing, I'm gonna
Speaker 2: fall off of that thing, and it's gonna take me
Speaker 2: forever to get to that objective to not follow that thing,
Speaker 2: and I'll figure it out. I don't like that because
Speaker 2: it makes me very angry and impatient and so ill
Speaker 2: off of it more, which we've seen in our Mario
Speaker 2: party ate that that game, well, yes, Mario Carto, Annie, sorry,
Speaker 2: you know where that one objective you have to co
Speaker 2: cross the way.
Speaker 3: To exactly what you're talking about.
Speaker 2: Every time I fall off, and I hate it so much,
Speaker 2: and like my partner and you because you're used to
Speaker 2: like just being able to go fast go and I'm
Speaker 2: like inching, like not even inching, like just tiny steps
Speaker 2: a time to try not to fall off, and I
Speaker 2: still fall off.
Speaker 1: Yeah I have I have another friend who has made
Speaker 1: this exact same complaint about jumping and the falling off,
Speaker 1: So you're not alone.
Speaker 4: I'm not good at it.
Speaker 2: But another game that I do like that I don't
Speaker 2: fall off, thank you, is a Cozy Grove by spry Fox,
Speaker 2: which I feel like I may have talked about before.
Speaker 2: It's actually one of my favorite games. I did start
Speaker 2: playing it at the same time that I played started
Speaker 2: Animal Crossing, so it's similar in that level of like
Speaker 2: you have to get the fish you can get, but
Speaker 2: the collection is different, so there's no museum. And this
Speaker 2: is how they describe the game. Spry Fox says, Welcome
Speaker 2: to Cozy Grove, a life sim game about camping on
Speaker 2: a haunted, ever changing island as a spirit scout. You'll
Speaker 2: wonder the island's forced each day, finding new hidden secrets
Speaker 2: and helping soothe the local ghosts. With a little time
Speaker 2: and a lot of crafting, you'll bring color and joy
Speaker 2: back to Cozy Grove. So the ghosts are all bears,
Speaker 2: but they're like themed bears, so like they'll dress up
Speaker 2: as other things. So I think one looks like a pelican,
Speaker 2: but it's still a bear. That makes sense. So one
Speaker 2: looks like a daisy, but it's still a bear. But
Speaker 2: you know, I was trying to recommend cozy games to
Speaker 2: my partners co worker for their kids, and this game
Speaker 2: came up in my head because it's super cute, Like
Speaker 2: the whole scenery is really cute, the music's fun. I don't.
Speaker 2: I feel they have like objectives per game, and you
Speaker 2: have to get like the spirit logs to give to
Speaker 2: your campfire and it tells you like where to go essentially.
Speaker 2: But the stories about these bears that died, they're intense.
Speaker 2: Like one of the stories had talked about how he
Speaker 2: was being blamed for his family's death and like that's
Speaker 2: always haunted him, and I was like, what the hell. So,
Speaker 2: like I took a moment and I was like, do
Speaker 2: I recommend that to kiss?
Speaker 4: Is this for like? Is this?
Speaker 2: I know some games are just for adults. Is this
Speaker 2: game for adults only? Like it doesn't the coloring, the
Speaker 2: animation wouldn't imply that to me. But at the same time,
Speaker 2: these storylines of some of these bears aren't really intense
Speaker 2: and sad.
Speaker 3: Oh.
Speaker 1: I won't go into my whole tension about this, but
Speaker 1: I feel like a lot of stuff we enjoy as
Speaker 1: kids does involve death, and when you look back at
Speaker 1: it as an adult, you're like whoa. But when you're
Speaker 1: a kid, you're just sort of like.
Speaker 2: OK, because you can skip over these stories. But as
Speaker 2: I was like reading some of them, I'm like, dang
Speaker 2: when Bear got killed for his treasure and I was like,
Speaker 2: that seems really intense. But I guess you're right, like
Speaker 2: a lot of our animated films and like, I'm still
Speaker 2: traumatized by Land Before Time and I'll still will not
Speaker 2: watch that or Bambi. How dare you?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 1: I'm also interested that you've two of the games you've
Speaker 1: listened have got haunted.
Speaker 2: I don't know if that's a theme with cozy games. Uh,
Speaker 2: I don't, because I feel like there's a lot of
Speaker 2: games that are like haunted or this thing or like
Speaker 2: dark dark past that you need to unravel.
Speaker 3: Huh. I guess you would have more knowledge than.
Speaker 2: That, or you know, trying to find people, find things,
Speaker 2: uncovered mysteries.
Speaker 1: Yeah, this is we should come back and talk about
Speaker 1: this later then, because now you've got me really interested,
Speaker 1: because a lot of the ones you've suggested to me,
Speaker 1: now that they think about it, do have pretty like
Speaker 1: adult mystery murder.
Speaker 2: You've like put like asterisks of like this might be
Speaker 2: we need to come back to that. Okay, But another
Speaker 2: game which is kind of that same level, and we've
Speaker 2: already played the first one, which is the Coffee Talk
Speaker 2: uh episode one. I have gotten into Coffee Talk. Episode
Speaker 2: two just started, so it's called Coffee Talk Episode two,
Speaker 2: Hibiscus and Butterfly. So I'm only in like chapter one
Speaker 2: or two. Still great, the animation is wonderful. I just
Speaker 2: started the dialogue. So we had that big mystery unravel
Speaker 2: in the first one. I'm guessing there's something similar to
Speaker 2: that on this one.
Speaker 4: This time.
Speaker 2: The it's already kind of eerie. There was a thunderstorm happening.
Speaker 2: There's a dude who is an influencer that has an
Speaker 2: agent that's coming on. And then this siren I think
Speaker 2: is what she is, comes in and she is not
Speaker 2: a happy person thus far, like something is to hap happened.
Speaker 2: I think she's I think that's the whole thing about
Speaker 2: like cyberbullying. I was like, oh, okay, okay, they've introduced
Speaker 2: pea flowers or pea flower tea, and I've already messed
Speaker 2: up a drink. I was already told but I did
Speaker 2: not get the drink right. It was not good, and
Speaker 2: I was like, okay.
Speaker 1: So for listeners who don't know, we have talked about
Speaker 1: this in previous episodes, but essentially coffee talk is like
Speaker 1: you're making drinks while people tell you, and there's like
Speaker 1: vampires and wear wolves and yes, and you're just making
Speaker 1: drinks and you're trying to get the drinks right while
Speaker 1: they talk to you.
Speaker 3: So huh, right, messed up a drink.
Speaker 2: So I feel like I'm going to go back. But
Speaker 2: also it's supposed to like cover present day Seattle. It's
Speaker 2: around my birthday actually, and I think the last one
Speaker 2: was around my birthday too, and uh like twenty twenty three.
Speaker 2: And then this is a very like obvious take on like, uh,
Speaker 2: racism and prejudice in general, except we have yes, different species,
Speaker 2: so we have like again, last time, we had vampires,
Speaker 2: we had ware wolves, we had aliens. On one real
Speaker 2: alien dude like who was trying to pretend to be
Speaker 2: human so he could mate we all need to go
Speaker 2: back on our last episode because this does not make
Speaker 2: sense outside of But yeah, so I've started that and
Speaker 2: it's definitely like has like eighties nineties vibe of animation
Speaker 2: and the way it speaks to you. It's like typed
Speaker 2: out and such. It's really fun. It's very relaxing to me.
Speaker 2: This is one of those games that I can sit
Speaker 2: in my bed getting ready to go to bed and
Speaker 2: play and not be over the top about it. But
Speaker 2: it has definitely come up as one of my favorites,
Speaker 2: and I'm really glad they did have a second rendition.
Speaker 2: I'm hoping that it continues because when it ends, it's
Speaker 2: not one of those replayable games. I mean it is
Speaker 2: because you can try to figure out the drinks, but
Speaker 2: you're not discovering anything new, essentially. But I think it's
Speaker 2: interesting that these games are developing and it's still coming out.
Speaker 2: But like I said, because Coffee Talk one was so successful,
Speaker 2: they came out with the second one again. I'm hoping
Speaker 2: that it will continue on and I'm still looking for
Speaker 2: other games to try again. I want to try that
Speaker 2: one we talked about at the beginning of the episode
Speaker 2: because we want to talk about indie creators, and I'm
Speaker 2: hoping that we find more indie creators and especially those
Speaker 2: from the marginalized communities being a part of this and
Speaker 2: that they aren't going to be overshadowed by the big companies,
Speaker 2: although inevitably it does happen, but that maybe we can
Speaker 2: shine more light on that. So with that, as you
Speaker 2: can tell, now you kind of have a better feel
Speaker 2: and I have a better feel of what I prefer
Speaker 2: in cozy games. Is there suggestions or people out there
Speaker 2: or games out there that I need to be finding
Speaker 2: and playing and loving and putting on my lists.
Speaker 1: Yes, you know listeners. We love those suggestions. I have
Speaker 1: a bunch of board games that I'm dying to play
Speaker 1: that I got based on listeners suggestions, So we really
Speaker 1: do take them into account. If you have suggestions for
Speaker 1: Samantha or me, or both of us, please let us know.
Speaker 1: You can email us at Stuff Media, Momstuff at iHeartMedia
Speaker 1: dot com. You can find us on Twitter at mom
Speaker 1: Stuff podcast, or on Instagram and TikTok at stuff. I've
Speaker 1: never told you we have a tea public store and
Speaker 1: we have a book where we do talk about video games.
Speaker 1: You can get it wherever you get your books. Thanks
Speaker 1: as always to our super producer Christina, our executive producer Maya,
Speaker 1: and our contributor Joey. Thank you and thanks to you
Speaker 1: for listening stuff I Never told you. Disrection by Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: For more podcast from my Heart Radio, you can check
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