This generation has really seen the emergence of a more casually-oriented type of gamer who isn’t as interested in the intensity and craziness traditional players have craved. To coincide with this new demographic we’ve also seen cozy games come into their own as a more legitimate space with an ever-expanding number of options to choose from. While puzzle games have always been a staple of more relaxed and thoughtful play, farm sims of various kinds have also been a hit. It appears that Amelia’s Garden was designed with the convergence of those interests in mind, and at a generally budget-friendly price.

In terms of setup, there isn’t much to know. Amelia has a patio full of broken pots, and your task is to help her get them all restored to their original state, and be sure to then fill them with a variety of plants. Once you’ve chosen your broken pot, your first task will be to put it all back together in the game’s puzzle phase. Overall, this isn’t terribly hard, with you simply picking up the various broken pieces, and then rotating and figuring out where to place them to get everything back in the proper order.

Once you’re through with that phase, the rest of the steps are a bit more on the farming sim side as you’ll fill the pot with dirt, plant some seeds, water, and then prune the plant to get it into shape for placing back in the sun and moving onto the next one. This is absolutely the weaker of the two phases, and honestly it feels half-hearted at best. You’ll simply grab and move some dirt, shake a packet of seeds until it is empty, point your hose at it briefly to water, and then hold two buttons down until the plant is ready to go. The thing is, almost all of these steps have nothing interesting or engaging to offer. They just feel there to check off the list. At least the puzzling aspect makes you think a little, but without something more than changing which 2 buttons you press for the sun to help the plant grow, all of these steps quickly become pointless.

What that leaves you with is a bit of a misstep. The modest challenge of getting the pots put back together is reasonably satisfying, but then you’re just going to go through the motions for the rest. Given that there aren’t all that many pots and plants to restore, and that aside from the puzzling challenge what you do simply doesn’t vary much, it’s tough to give the game more than a half-hearted shrug overall.