Winter Burrow is the latest game to bear the cozy genre moniker, which makes sense at first glance. However, the adorable title, which casts players as a mouse straight out of a children’s book, is, not so secretly, a survival game in the vein of Don’t Starve.
“Unexpectedly heartwrenching,” we call it in our Winter Burrow Indie Spotlight. As such, Winter Burrow tasks players with many of the same goals found in the grueling survival title Don’t Starve, such as foraging for resources like wood and ingredients, while throwing its own cute spin on the formula. You are able to bring these ingredients back to your home, which has been abandoned by the protagonist mouse’s aunt, and bake them into pies. You can also knit sweaters, which just sounds delightfully cozy.
Outside of the warmth of home, the player must brave the cold of winter and avoid getting ravaged by the elements, as well as any surrounding wildlife, which largely appears to consist of bugs bigger than the mouse. Gross.
Despite the world of difference between Winter Burrow’s aesthetics and actual gameplay, the game seems to be winning people over, having earned a Very Positive rating on Steam within days of release.
In one concise user review, a Steam user aptly sums things up by calling Winter Burrow “short but cute.” Other reviews make note of the game’s relatively short runtime, either complimenting or bemoaning the fact that it can be completed in about 10 hours unlike the “forever games” which Winter Burrow takes inspiration from.
Most reviews, though, praise the game’s sights and sounds, and at least one user specifically calls out that the game’s illustrated style reminds them of Redwall, the series of children’s fantasy books that follow, in part, anthropomorphic mice and similar woodland creatures.
Winter Burrow is going for $20, though it is currently enjoying a 10% launch discount on Nintendo Switch and Steam.
Don’t Starve but now you’re a cute little mouse is the pitch for the hit Steam Next Fest demo that’s about to give me another survival game obsession.
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