Game Review: Clouzy! (Xbox Series X)

A light blend of farming simulation, exploration, gathering, and pet care, Clouzy! seems like it would the perfect game to unwind with, except it’s blighted by small annoyances and issues that stop it being as good as it wants to be.

Cute visuals, relaxing music, uncomplicated gameplay and a basic story. Clouzy! drops you in a colourful world and puts you in charge of making the residents, fluffy clouds, happy. While exploring to unlock the secrets of the land. Along the way, other residents (unseen – they just send you messages) will ask you to care for their pet cloud or complete orders. Which in tow, earns you money that you can spend on minor upgrades to your storage, backpack, cooking machine and so on.

It sounds complex but it’s far easier to get to the grips with than you think. Feeding clouds just requires you to make a meal with the ingredients dotted around the land. Washing them is as simple as pouring water on them, comforting them comes with a simple press of button (simulating a hug) and playing with them, requires you to find a toy and give it to them.

Aside from quest completion, there’s almost no reason to bother with any of it though. Something most will be glad for as the strange limitations the game has, makes a lot of it feel like a chore.

The most notable limitation comes from the backpack and the number of items you can store in it. Early on in the game, you’ll be constantly backtracking just to drop items off in your storage chest as your backpack is full. Likewise, the limitations on the storage chest means you really have to be careful of the amount of ingredients you have. There’s simply no point filling a chest with one type of item as you’ll just not have the room for anything else.

Both the chests and backpacks are upgradable but not by much and even then, you’ll still spend a ton of time backtracking just to empty your pockets. It’s tedious and not much fun, especially as there is no fast travel. The map is useless and cooking is poorly done.

The game gives you a companion, a cat. Although it does seem like you can have a dog too, that content is not in the game at this time. Alongside a few other things that are available in the PC version but not included here.

The purpose of this companion is limited, following you around, and later gaining abilities to help you jump higher or create platforms of light. It feels very unnecessary and again, proves to be a source of frustration as the companion acts like a solid wall and often gets in the way.

A small annoyance but yet another one in a game that sells itself as a relaxing experience. Which brings us to the bugs and goodness, is this a buggy game. Screen tearing, poor rendering, items becoming unusable unless you go into the menu and back out, cut-scenes repeating and a finale that just fades to black, then freezes. Wait around 15 seconds, then you’ll get the credits. Also, if you’re an achievement hunter, beware the ‘collect all teas’ achievement which seems to be bugged and not unlocking for some (us).

Clouzy! has a lot of promise but fails to live up to it. Its cutesy nature and simple gameplay is appealing but it’s got too many issues to ignore.