Strange Horticulture, a game about selling plants, is one of the best games this year

polygon.com:

The plants in Strange Horticulture do all sorts of things: There’s one that can open anything that’s locked. Others can make someone brave, ease their pain, lure them to their death, or protect them from the cold. Fox Button — scientific name Canimum vulpes — is a plant that symbolizes friendship, its fluffy flowers supported by a stem with pairs of shiny leaves. Harlequin Blue, on the other hand, is often used as incense — incense that screams as it burns.

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These plants and plenty, plenty more line the shelves of a small shop tucked away in the dark streets of Undermere, a strange, rainy town that sits by a forest and a lake. In Strange Horticulture, I play as a person who’s just inherited the titular plant shop after a family member’s death. In this way, it’s a life simulation, figuring out life as a new shopkeeper, learning about plants and the community as each day passes.

But Strange Horticulture offers plenty more: A mysterious, occult story that unfolds around the very plants you sell, along with clever puzzles that encompass everything from identifying plants to solving riddles and reading a map.

Strange Horticulture unravels slowly, as each new patron is welcomed into the shop. With the ring of a bell, a person approaches the counter, where a black cat named Hellebore lounges. Not all patrons are looking for plants; there’s one character who simply delivers