As I’ve noted in another recent review, while the pretty steady flood of cozy games recently has been impressive, it also inherently raises the bar that titles in this space need to clear to warrant some attention. The tricky thing about this specific category though, is that by design what traditionally would make some games better than others may not as clearly apply. If the goal for people is some degree of peace or calm, gameplay that would normally be viewed as more lackluster could have appeal. Nevertheless, it’s still important to look at things like replayability and the overall return on investment, and in those areas I believe Make It Cozy struggles quite a bit.

In essence, I would consider this the digital equivalent of old-school paper dolls, except instead of trying to dress up a person you’re applying that concept to designing rooms. Starting out, you’ll initially choose the shape of the space you’re looking to design, and then element by element working through the menus to find the furniture, accents, and accessories you want to help make it your own. You’ll have the ability to layer multiple things on top of one another, thus creating the feel of digital paper dolls, and to some degree this does give you some freedom.

The issue is roughly the same as with paper dolls themselves though, and that’s the fact that at some point there’s only so much you can do with them before play gets a little tedious. Unlike paper dolls though, some of the shortcomings of this digital implementation are self-inflicted wounds that could have been improved upon greatly. For instance, while you may like the general style of certain pieces, you’ll be stuck with the collective color palette they share, either sticking you with the look you like, but not the colors, or if you’re mixing styles you could have colors that don’t get along since they’re static, even though they shouldn’t need to be. Similarly, while it’s nice to be able to turn elements to face one other direction, you’ll quickly hit design limitations if your room layout would have an element like the television facing away from the screen, removing many additional options people could have had if only a bit more effort had been expended. There’s still a possibility some may enjoy this, at least for a little while, but it really should have gone further to expand its potential replayability.