September is here!! So I want to cook soup, make friends with a ghost and move into a cottage belonging to a woodland witch. Doesn’t everyone?!
I’ve grown a bit tired of seeing the same old recommendations online, so I asked the cosy gaming community here on Substack which games make them feel most ready for the cosy season.
Some are witchy and Halloween-themed, others are stories about change and uncertainty. So, make yourself a hot drink, find the softest blanket in the house and settle in! Your next cosy autumn game might be right here…
1. The Wild at Heart
The first recommendation came from Luna:
“I would recommend The Wild at Heart. Though I only played the game once, it’s beautiful and emotional, perfect for autumn ❤️”
I hadn’t come across The Wild at Heart before, but its artwork was enough to convince me to pick it up. Similar to Wytchwood, it has forests, weird little creatures, and a really lovely colour palette!
You follow two young runaways as they explore the Deep Woods, a hidden realm with magical creatures called Spritelings. You can gather and command the Spritelings to solve puzzles, build paths and defend yourself against whatever’s hiding in the trees.
It does have some combat, so it may not be for everyone, but the hand-drawn art and emotional story make it feel very autumn.
2. A Short Hike
A Short Hike might seem like a surprising autumn choice given that it takes place during summer, but Evan C. Moore made a very convincing case for including it!
“A Short Hike takes place in summer on an island, but here me out: the mountains has snow on it, and the game presents a transition from lively and warm to dead and cold. It’s thematically autumnal, if not aesthetically.”
I absolutely loved this game! Autumn is a season of transition, and A Short Hike does have a feeling of being ‘between’.
Claire is a little bird hiking up a big mountain trying to find some phone reception. There is no ‘correct’ route to the top, so you can follow the marked trails or head off to fish, search for treasure, help other hikers or just enjoy being outdoors.
The climb becomes colder as you get to the top, which gives it a feeling of moving through the seasons, too.
3. Firewatch
Arcade Academia described this one perfectly:
“Firewatch isn’t explicitly October-y, but it feels autumnal in my heart.”
Technically, Firewatch is set during the (late?) summer of 1989, but in every other respect it feels like Autumn.
You play as Henry, a man who has left his life behind to work as a fire lookout in Wyoming. His only human connection is his supervisor who he speaks to over a handheld radio. What begins as a summer job turns into a tense mystery as strange things start happening in the woods…
This is also the Good Game Lobby game of the month for September! If you would like to play along and chat about it with other lovely gamers, come and join us in the Discord.
4. REKA
There’s absolutely no debate about REKA. As Arcade Academia puts it:
“REKA is very witchy, very woodsy, very autumn 🍂”
You are an apprentice to a witch, and travel through the Central European countryside in a walking cottage (yes! A walking cottage!) You can build and decorate your home, gather plants, practise witchcraft, help local villagers and explore.
Rather than having a fixed plot of land, your home travels with you, carrying all your cosy furniture on its weird chicken legs. REKA is probably the most visibly autumnal game on this list and I can’t wait to play.
5. Magical Delicacy
Donna recommended this one after trying the demo:
“It’s pixel-y and cosy following a young witch (definitely autumn/Halloween vibes right?) in a new town. She needs to get a kitchen up and running, and I love cooking games because for me, cooking hearty meals or baking something warm and sweet is the epitome of autumn.”
You play as Flora, a young witch who arrives in town to pursue her dream of becoming a grown up witch. After setting up a kitchen, you gather and buy ingredients, prepare magical meals and potions, and deliver your creations to the townspeople.
Customers have particular requirements, ingredients contain different properties and some orders need you to experiment a bit. When you aren’t cooking, you can explore the town through some (light) platforming, find new routes and talk to the residents.
I also played the demo and loved it. It combines two of my favourite autumn activities: cooking something yummy and exploring a little town.
6. Cult of the Lamb
I’ve just started playing this one, and it’s definitely more on the Halloween end of autumnal games! Elliot Gardner’s recommendation was spot on for this time of year, and it’s on sale!
Cult of the Lamb combines dungeon-crawling combat with base building and cult management. When you’re not fighting your way through the Lands of the Old Faith, you can return home to cook for your followers, decorate the compound, grow crops and keep everyone happy and devoted to you. Top tip! Play on Easy mode for a more chilled experience.
Whether it qualifies as cosy is definitely up for debate… There are sacrifices, monsters and a ton of cartoon death! It’s cute, horrible and very funny all at once, which makes it perfect for Halloween. I am personally finding it a very cosy and fun experience.
The new Woolhaven DLC adds even more, with a wintry setting, ranching and new ways to care for your followers, taking us all the way to Christmas. I’ll be picking this up when I’m near the end of the base game.
7. Cozy Grove
The clue is very much in the name with Cozy Grove. ⋆˚｡⋆୨✧୧˚ 𝔤𝔞𝔪𝔢𝔞𝔯𝔢𝔩𝔩𝔞 ˚୨✧୧⋆｡˚⋆ recommended it because of its Autumn content:
“Cozy Grove for sure, their Fall event is so cute.”
In Cozy Grove, you’re a Spirit Scout camping on a haunted island populated by ghost bears. Each real-time day, you explore, resource-gather, craft, and complete little quests that help the bears tell their stories
The game plays in real time, with a collection of quests available each day. It’s quite a nice one before bed, as you can check on the bears, fulfill their quests and then come back tomorrow. It’s probably about an hour or two a day of gameplay.
It looks like a cute, hand-drawn storybook, but some of the bears’ stories are really quite sad. I wasn’t expecting a game full of ghost bears to have so much to say about grief!
8. Night in the Woods
This was the only game recommended by more than one person, and it may be the definitive autumn game. Despite it having been on my wishlist for aaaages, I still haven’t played Night in the Woods, but I’ll be playing it this year!
Mae Borowski has dropped out of uni and returned to her hometown of Possum Springs, hoping to slip back into her old life. Instead, she finds that her friends have changed, and the town no longer feels like the home she remembers.
Preparations are under way for Harfest, the town’s Halloween celebration, but something strange is happening in Possum Springs…
Obviously, the colours, small-town setting and Halloween celebrations all make Night in the Woods look autumnal. I think it’s also the feeling of returning home and realising that neither you nor the place you left behind has stayed the same. It deals with friendship, mental health and the uncertainty of trying to work out what comes next.
9. Beacon Pines
My personal recommendation here is Beacon Pines, a cute and creepy adventure that takes place inside a book.
You play as both the reader of the book and Luka, its main character. Something strange is happening in the town of Beacon Pines, so Luka and his friends sneak out to investigate. As you explore, you unlock words you can use in the book called Charms. You can choose which of these words fits into gaps in the story, changing what happens and opening new branches of the tale.
Its presentation is cosy, but the mystery underneath becomes really quite dark. It feels perfect for Halloween, when you want your cosiness to come with some spookiness.
10. Wytchwood
My favourite autumn game of all time, Wytchwood sees you play as an old witch who lives alone in a cottage in the woods. After waking with amnesia, she discovers that she has a contract to fulfil involving a sleeping maiden and a collection of souls.
Most of the game is fetch-quests, gathering ingredients and brewing spells, potions and magical solutions to solve other people’s problems.
For autumnal appeal, there are forest biomes, mushrooms, animals and shelves stuffed with jars of spooky ingredients.
Best of all, we get to play as a cantankerous older woman! We still don’t see nearly enough older women in video games. She is not interested in being charming or accommodating, hell no! She has spells to brew, debts to settle and doesn’t suffer fools lightly!
11. Life is Strange
Life is Strange is another of my own additions to the list, because very few games make me want to put on a hoodie and order a coffee. I love it.
You play as Max, a photography student who returns to her hometown of Arcadia Bay to attend the prestigious Blackwell Academy. After witnessing something awful, Max discovers that she can rewind time. She reconnects with her childhood friend Chloe, and the two begin investigating the disappearance of a local student.
A word of warning, the story explores grief, abuse, bullying, mental health and loss, and some of its most memorable moments are uncomfortable.
Its cosiness comes from listening to the music, looking through old photos, looking around a sleepy town and solving puzzles. It has a mixture of nostalgia, sadness and change that feels very autumnal to me.
So, which game do you gravitate to every autumn? Which games are you excited to play this season? Let me know!
What a great list. I am looking forward to play each and every one of the recommendations!
This list really captures that autumn feeling beyond just spooky themes Night in the Woods and Wytchwood especially feel like they were made for a cosy October evening.