Developed by Come On Studio and published by tinyBuild, Hozy is a cozy renovation game that brings the work down to a single space. Most of the renovation titles usually go big, offering huge locations like castles, mansions, or train stations, but Come On Studio decided to go the other way, and I am glad to see that it worked like a charm. Coupled with a soothing soundtrack, Hozy offers simple gameplay mechanics in a relaxing setting. This is our review of the PC Steam release of Hozy, in which we clean up some gorgeous locations and spruce them up with brand-new furnishings.
In Hozy, your goal is to clean up and spruce up a variety of living spaces for different people in a neighborhood. Be that your own attic, an artist’s studio, or a musician’s lair, each location brings its own unique aesthetics and tasks to the table. Most of the time, you begin a level by cleaning it up. This might include picking up the trash or sweeping the floors with a mop. You have to select the right tools and then use them to carefully tidy up the place before you can start preparing the room for furniture and other interior fittings. If you want, you can also use a paintbrush and paint different walls to make rooms feel more aesthetic. The game gives you complete freedom in how you want to paint the rooms. In certain scenarios, you can also use a pencil-like brush to draw murals, paintings, or whatever you want on the walls as well.
Different locations will also require some basic construction work, like pulling out the old wooden floor and laying down a fresh one. Nothing in the game is too hard, and no matter what the task is, it is extremely easy to understand and perform. This adds to the stress-free gameplay feel that the developer wanted from Hozy. There is a different tool for every job, and you simply need to pick it up and perform the required task. Once you are done with the basic preparations of the room, you can complete the first phase of your job and move on to the next one, where the furniture and other fixtures arrive in packed boxes.
Once these boxes arrive, the real work begins. Each of these boxes is marked with what type of items are placed inside them. You can start opening items and start placing them down. Based on the items, you will move the previously placed items around a lot as you try to make sense of the setting. Every time you click on a box, you get one item that you can place anywhere in the location. The game’s placement mechanic is really good because you can place an item inside another item as well. You can place books inside shelves, hang bicycles on walls, and TVs on consoles.
You can rotate these items around to make their direction suitable for that specific spot. Nearly all locations come with a decent selection of paintings as well, which can be placed on walls. While placing down these items, you need to be careful as they must not interfere with other objects. Smaller objects must be in the right direction and angle if you are trying to place them inside another object. One problem that I faced quite often was the available space to put down the open items. Each location offers a limited space on the floor, and as you continue to open items, chances are that you will need to place them randomly at first before putting them in the right place.
A separate area for the shipping boxes and unboxed items would have remedied this space problem. Each location is beautifully detailed, and the items found in these boxes are themed around the location. It is always fun to open these boxes and see what item comes out next. The gameplay loop remains pretty much the same for all levels, with some minor changes in what needs to be done to prepare the room for the furnishings. Once the preparation is done, the rest of the gameplay is pretty much the same throughout the game.
Once all tasks are complete, you can take photos from different angles or move on to the next project. Upon its launch, Hozy offers nine unique spaces where you can jump in and redecorate them as many times as you want. You can restart these locations and try out different settings, repaint different colors, or change the entire space based on your mood, but there is not much to do once you have explored every bit in these nine levels. They offer a decent number of hours, but there is nothing to do in the game once you get bored with these nine levels. It will be interesting to see whether Hozy receives additional content in the future because I would love to jump back into it to try it out.
Hozy excels at little details and animations. Despite the minimalistic gameplay, Hozy makes up for it in terms of smooth effects that really set it apart from similar titles in its category. For example, cleaning a dirty window will allow sunlight to come inside the space, or opening a window will allow the breeze to come inside, and the curtains will start moving with it. Similarly, you can close windows to muffle nature sounds, and if you open them, the sounds become louder and clearer. You can turn on and off lights, interact with different items to operate them, like turning on a projector to see its effects on the walls, turning radios on or off, and even cameras to make shutter sounds. Hozy is filled with these little details that you can spend hours ogling.
With all that said, Hozy still needs some backend optimization, as the game has plenty of gameplay bugs. During my review playthrough, the game bugged out, and I had to restart it from the beginning. The camera controls are extremely tight and awkward. It makes looking around a chore, especially when trying to look up at walls or the roof, and there are some subtle framerate dips during different scenarios, such as when I turned on the projector in one location, along with some lights. None of these bugs really breaks the game, but they must be fixed to optimize the overall gameplay experience. The developer is currently recommending using a keyboard and mouse, so if you are trying on a Steam Deck, you are in for a rough ride.
What I like about Hozy is that it makes everyday tasks feel fun. Whether it is painting walls, unpacking boxes, setting up a room, or moving around furniture, everything feels good. Both the visuals and soundtrack make you feel like you are experiencing a AAA game, and with no narrative and fancy gameplay mechanics, the animations and little details here and there keep you occupied to a good extent. If you have been playing different renovation games like House Flipper 2 or Train Station Renovation, you will instantly feel cozier in Hozy because it lowers the scale to a single room or space, instead of offering a huge location.
Final Verdict:
Hozy’s slow-paced and relaxing gameplay, complemented with buttery smooth animations and an amazing soundtrack, makes it a solid choice for gamers looking for something peaceful. It allows you to take your time with levels as you explore your architectural skills by renovating and decorating a wide variety of rooms and spaces. At this point, there are some gameplay bugs in the game. The camera controls are awkward, and I would have loved it if it had more content. Still, Hozy is a great cozy game that will surely pull you in with its unique charm and gorgeous visuals. Highly recommended for players who like playing renovation simulators or puzzle games.
Final Score: 8.5/10
