My birthday was the other day, and I was feeling a certain way, so I decided to sit down and play another cleaning game. The genre has come so far, and this week’s game adds to it. This week, I begin to really enjoy ripping up and laying floorboards.

This week is my Hozy review!

Hozy is a cozy cleaning (or restoration) game from Come On Studio and Tinybuild. The game was released on Steam on March 30th and retails for $15.

Huge shout-out to the developer and the publisher for the key! It is an honor to experience the sensation of ripping up floorboards!

Moving out is hard to do, especially if moving involves going from a rural/suburban area to an urban one. This can also be the case for returning home, which is the case for Hozy. Hozy is about coming home and igniting a passion for restoration, as the hometown you left has been forgotten, and the sense of community has dwindled.

The story is there, but it’s the spaces that you create and restore that tell the real story.

It is almost immediate, the feeling of being overwhelmed. Upon stepping into each space, they are FILTHY. The windows are stained, the floors are all dirty, and the piles of trash are alarming. There is a small checklist to adhere to to complete the level, but getting there is up to you. Hozy is a game all about creativity, and most of the time, it excels at letting the player do just about anything, with a few restrictions: most notably, there are only a few paint splotches to choose from.

For furnishings, Hozy takes the cake. There are so many items to choose from in each space, and you are free to place them however you want. There are a total of nine levels to furnish, and each space is vastly different from the previous one. A seemingly haunted loft-like area is replaced with a super tight New York-like apartment with a bed that folds into the wall.

I lost the story early on in Hozy, but I wasn’t there for it; I was there to clean and furnish spaces.

All of this ties the gameplay up in a nice bow. Picking up trash is easy, as moving the mouse picks up everything into a nice little trash ball, and in the bin it goes. Sweeping/mopping is just as satisfying as moving the mouse along a line, and the clean lines on the floor start to shine. There was nothing more satisfying than ripping up floorboards with what looked like a crowbar, and the sound of the boards finally breaking with a *CRACK* had me giddy to do it more. Spaces can be rotated and zoomed in using the mouse and WASD, making it easier to tidy up. After all the cleanup is done, the anxiety-ridden activity of unpacking and furnishing is on deck.

There are so many boxes to unpack, too, and most of the time, there is not enough space for all of the stuff. Opening boxes is fun because they are labeled, but you have no idea what the items in the boxes look like, and most of the time, the light fixtures are completely absurd-looking (I’m looking at you 2nd level). Items can be picked up, dropped, zoomed in on, and rotated with the mouse. Items that are not wanted are easily disposed of by dragging them outside the area, and packed into a box and shipped to what I think is a nice little storage unit.

Hozy wants the player to place at their own pace; there is no need to rush. Furnishing a space is simple and is an absolute blast, setting up tables, goofy-looking chairs, flora, pictures, and little knick-knacks. It had me feeling like I was on an episode of any HGTV show. After all is said and done, the player has an option to take a picture to remember this fond moment to show friends and family, which is a nice added feature that allows for cooler talk.

When you have a simple, cozy game like Hozy, you need a cozy, simple soundtrack to put you in the mood to clean, and Yann Van Der Cruyssen does a wonderful job of creating a vibe that is conducive to cleaning. These light tunes with catchy melodies are just as good as the intricate sounds of Hozy. Laying carpet, plucking old wood planks, and laying all have incredible sound design.

Hozy is a simple game that excels at what it puts out to do. The emphasis on creating your own space for a town long forgotten is fun and therapeutic. Instructions are on the light side, and it urges the player to do whatever they want, within reason. There are moments when I wanted more freedom, but I did not sour. I rolled credits in 3-4 hours, and I felt like I played enough. The art and sound design are fantastic, the customization options are great, and the overall experience left me satisfied. For $15, Hozy is a great, unique take on the cozy cleaning genre.

8/10