One of The Most Pawsome Games of 2022

Once a gamer always a gamer, but as I age up I am wanting a more relaxed, chill vibe — welcome Garden Paws, created by Bitten Toast Games. It’s like Stardew Valley meets the Sylvanian Families.

“You have inherited your grandparent's farm as they set off to travel the world. Work with Frank at the local construction shop to finish off the final touches on your new home. Aid Frank and Mayor Wilson in building up the town so it can reach its full potential.

To build up the town you need coins, what better way to earn those than by running a shop! Explore the islands and their caves to collect everything from flowers to poop to sell in your shop. Over time and with each building built, new townsfolk sail to the island with new items for purchase and quests to complete.” — The official Garden Paws blub.

It has a little bit of everything from simulation and adventure to mild-level combat! There is so much this game has to offer and it’s currently being regularly updated to include even more awesome features.

You can explore the islands, caves, and mining to gardening, farming, fishing, running a shop, taming and breeding animals, to building a town, which once you have completed will unlock a castle!

Along the way, there are plenty of quests to keep you busy, whilst you explore the vast world of Garden Paws. This has to be one of my fave games in recent years, especially in terms of super cuteness.

The game is out now on stream. Originally on PC, last year it got its Nintendo Switch release. You have a single or multi-players option and the ability to connect to your Twitch account to enable interactive features and in-game chat whilst streaming.

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Hello world — character creation 🐼

You can pick from dozens of different species and humanoid-looking characters from cats, dogs, bears, and birds to foxes, badgers, hedgehogs chipmunks, or even dragons!

Afterward, you can update your ‘skin’ by purchasing them in the shop, finding one in the many treasure chest dotted around the islands or creating your own sparkly versions!

Customisation does not stop there as once you start playing there are hundreds of accessories, backpacks, and clothes you can buy, find or give as part of some of the quests.

One of the most awesome accessories your character can own is the Glider! After completing a certain quest early in the game, you will get a free glider. This was my favorite way of getting around the islands, until later on in the game when I unlocked Kozita island and discovered — dragons!

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Building the town

Welcome to Florens!

Florens starts a small village only with a few characters. It’s up to you to build up the town with the help of Frank, the local builder, and his upgrade table. In the town, you will find stalls that sell a whole range of items from seeds to cloth and foods, plus inventory expansions.

The more quests you do the more items will become available for you to buy. You get a whole day (0600–2359), which equals about 18 minutes of gameplay.

Unlike Stardew there are no punishments for not making it home in time. You simply wake up in your bed — which is great news when I first started playing this game I got lost, A LOT!

Gardening

Initially, you will need to rake the soil or make some planters to grow crops, later on, you will be able to make plots that have sprinklers! The best thing about gardening is you can sell the plants you grow (and collect) in the shops. In the early stages of the game, this is a great way to start earning money. You can collect animal poop to make fertilizer! A little unknown fact that I discovered by accident — don’t ask. You can wear poop as a hat! You can also sell poop for pennies, but I’d recommend collecting some up as you never know who is going to ask for it.

A word of warning seasons does seem to impact the length of time that plants take to grow. In this case, I recommend during the winter months focusing more on the caves and mining!

Farming

After a few quests, you’ll be given your first chicken coop and some chicks for free. Feed a chick for around 6 days straight and they will grow and lay eggs. Adult farm animals do not need to be fed. This will free you up to do other things such as crafting, exploring, shopping or selling!

The chicks and other animals you come across along the way will leave you with eggs, milk and feathers, wool and fur. It will be a good idea to collect these up early on in the game. Look out for the golden eggs and golden poop!

Taming wild animals & legendary creatures

Smaller animals will need specific habitats for you to make before you start trying to tame them. Early on you’ll have access to cats, rabbits, and a dog. You will need to feed them (or pat them) for several days until they are tame — miss a day and the bar reduces by one!

Later on, in the game, you will be able to tame foxes, deer, ferrets, skunks, beetles, chipmunks, and even bears! Plus lots more animals and legendary creatures will become available as you progress in the game. All animals will have their benefits some more than others depending on how you want to play the game.

Shopkeeping

On your farm, you have a little shop that you can open from 12 pm to 6 pm daily. If you have Twitch and stream you will be able to integrate this feature to allow followers to get involved — I love this feature!

The cute little characters that visit your shop will buy absolutely anything you put on your tables, including poop! I’d recommend hiring an assistant to leave you free to do other things — although they will take a percentage of each item sold.

Gone fishing!

It’s nice and relaxing and dried fish can sell for good money — considering you unlock the blueprint for the drying rack. and effort for very little payoff It is however necessary for one quest so far, and to tame cats and foxes. You need fish bait to catch anything at all which can only be found in certain plants that will yield Insects if you are lucky.

Exploring the mines and dungeons

Mining can be both fun and profitable as you can use your pickaxe on rocks that are found everywhere, or unlock caves to find geodes and coal. Rocks can be used for building materials. When you find geodes, you need to use them on the anvil to get rocks, copper, silver, or gold. Be sure to upgrade your tools as soon as you can by visiting the Blacksmith.

When you're done in the mines check out the dungeon. The entrance is close to your home, near the pound. You get to battle the strange creatures that lurk below and have access to loot items you will not find anyone else in the game.

Seasons & Celebrations

Every season has either special items, quests, or contests. Easter hosts the great Easter egg hunt, where there are 10 eggs hidden around Florens. Find the eggs and take them to Esther, the bunny character, where you get the option to smash them for surprises!

The rarer decorative eggs will have more expensive items inside and some tickets! You can redeem tickets for additional seasonal items. During Halloween, you get to explore a spooky island that’s home to a maze, crypt, and climbable tree as well as purchase new items.

Come the winter season you will be granted access to Winter Island which also has some hidden surprises for you to discover. Each season lasts for 30 days. That’s a whopping 540 minutes of Gameplay.

Sky and stargazing

I just love the skies in this game, beautiful sunsets and sunrises along with stargazing, if you look in the right place you might just spot (and catch) a shooting star. Take the shooting star to the anvil to get a special surprise.

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In summary…

I’ve been playing for Garden Paws for nearly 2 years now, having fully upgraded the town, unlocked the castle and the beanstalk, and visited Kozita island I am still discovering new things! If you want a nice, relaxed game that also caters to your creative juices I urge you to play Garden Paws and discover for yourself everything it has to offer!