Author: Lil (Darlinganddeath)
Date: 07-12-2023
There's no doubt that if you've been following our pages for a while, you've seen us share about the recent release Pekoe. We first found it through Twitter a couple of months ago and it'd been on our Wishlist ever since. The day finally came when we sent in our request for a Review Copy in the hopes that we could provide coverage for it and when their response was a yes, we did the happy dance, put on some tea in anticipation, and patiently awaited the release of the game.
Now, we were a bit shocked to see that upon its release the reviews were mixed, but, we understood why. We'd already played through a bit of the game and experienced bugs galore with some completely game-breaking ones that required restarts. It was a tad frustrating, but the game that shone underneath the surface of those bugs was just too good to ignore. We knew that the game was releasing under Early Access when we hopped into it and we patiently reported every single bug we encountered, put the game down for a few days, and upon seeing not one, but two patches get pushed out, we were confident enough to stream it on our YouTube channel.
You'll be pleased to know that all the previous bugs we'd experienced were gone and that the reviews for Pekoe are now happily resting at "Mostly Positive", which is where it definitely belongs. Our review fits that same light and is going more towards "overwhelmingly positive" the more patches they push out. True to the Pillow Fort style, you can expect us to detail the bugs and frustrations we experienced but also highlight the incredible game that Pekoe is, and it absolutely is. If you're the type that enjoys Early Access in order to participate in its journey, then you should consider picking up Pekoe. It's Peaceful, Thoughtful, Wholesome, and just an all-around good time. You don't really think the sentence, "make tea for cats", is going to flesh out into a fun-to-play and thoughtful game, but it absolutely did.
Don't want to read? Don't worry, the video review is just around the corner!
Purrfect People...
Now, sometimes I'll leave the Story section out completely when a game doesn't have one. You can only write so much about another Farming Sim where you have to go fix up the farm for some long-lost relative and for some reason, you're the only one that can save the town. Ya know? Some stories have just been beaten to death, and some games lack one altogether. Pekoe, to our great surprise, was not that way at all.
I won't lie and say I thought Pekoe was going to have a great story. It's so hard to portray story aspects through game trailers and text details without spoiling it that sometimes games miss the mark altogether. You end up left with nothing but basic gameplay aspects and "hints" as to what it's going to be. This isn't me saying Pekoe missed the mark, from what we saw it seemed wholesome and charming at the very least, but this is me saying that I wasn't sure what to expect.
I'll happily report that I was actually touched by how thoughtful the story was and how it was told. It's all just reading text lines with no voice dialogue (except hilarious cat noises) or fancy cut scenes, but the depth of the story was nice. Each NPC had a vastly different personality to the next and they all complimented each other nicely. The Pekoe team even went so far as to provide backstories for all of them that you can learn over time, so if you're the gamer that wants to know everything a game has to offer lore-wise, don't worry, there's plenty.
Pekoe works as most Farming Sims do with their relationship system and I love it. You can keep track of your reputation with each of your townmates and learn what they like, love, and would rather not speak about. It's even more rewarding that every time you upgrade your town, you simultaneously unlock more of the story, so it feels worth it to keep pushing forward with making tea, serving customers, and learning more about the town and its past. I honestly couldn't believe how much I wanted to learn more about my new cat friends. Most games I spam-click through text dialogues, only absorbing what I feel is absolutely necessary to play the game, and I go about my way. Pekoe had me reading and dropping the good ol' "awww", anytime something sad or heart-wrenching would be said. What's a game that doesn't tear into you a little, right?
We, as always, don't want to spoil more than that in terms of story aspects, but just know tons of charming and wholesome conversations are waiting in the world of Pekoe, so if that's your thing, it's there.
Tealightful Gameplay...
So, it feels impossible for me to say that the gameplay isn't "simple", because it is, but the word simple is often associated with boring, monotonous, or unenjoyable after a while and I don't feel like Pekoe deserves any of these remarks as despite how simple the gameplay felt, I was thoroughly invested into the story, and adored quite literally "making tea for cats".
The game's biggest gameplay focus is the tea-making portions, and they're nothing but peaceful sessions of scooping some tea leaves into an infuser and tossing some milk and cinnamon sticks in, then waiting for the pot of water to boil to the right temperature, and ensuring that your tea properly steeps and is stirred to purrfection. After that, you'll serve it to your furry, friendly customer and they'll tip you extra well if you delivered something they loved.
We want to stress how important being creative with your teas is. It's all about building up your town points and the more recipes you discover, the more points you'll receive and the faster your town levels up. Leveling the town up unlocks all kinds of goodies, including a nicer tea shop for yourself, so our biggest gameplay recommendation is to focus on this portion. You don't even have to have customers to experiment with tea. Simply go to your tea counter in the shop and start brewing.
What's truly brilliant? It fits the bill of "casual" perfectly. I see the label "casual" on upcoming games like Cuisineer and Grimoire Groves, and while they fit the comfy-cozy and cute labels, their roguelike aspects can definitely be stressful for some. To me, if the game is stressful at any point, it's not "truly" casual. Why did I go into that? Well... if you're like me who wants a purely casual game after losing in Ranked League of Legends, then you don't want any stressful aspects in your post-game and Pekoe was perfect in this respect.
This game stands out in the "Shop Owner" genre as there aren't any time management aspects. The only thing you're managing during a tea-making session is making sure the water doesn't overboil and that's incredibly easy to do. This is not a fast-paced, serve as many customers as possible type of game. Nope, in Pekoe you're going to experiment with every type of tea combination and learn what your kitty friends love to drink most, learn about the history of the town and its residents, and collect more tea ingredients and adorable upgrades for your shop. It's simple, yet brilliant.
There's one last feature I want to highlight and compliment and it's their "New Resident Registration" form.
Not only can you choose your pronouns, but you can completely customize yourself to fit the true you. This isn't something you find in many games, so we want to give props to Pekoe for being so thoughtful of their players.
Cute, Cozy, and whoops...?
We'll throw in a good paragraph or two about the graphics and audio. Starting with Graphics, they're adorable. It's obvious that they're still making upgrades to some of the customer character models, and I'm almost positive that we'll see rounds of new decoration items entering the game in future patches as well as more content in general, but I already love what we see. Even with the graphics the exact way they are, it's cute, cozy, and the cats are adorable (especially the kittens). I'll compliment them with their mix of settings in the main menu as well. We've noticed quite a few Indie titles failing to offer a proper menu of graphic settings and it's been the bane of our existence lately. We're happy to report, that's not a problem with this title.
The audio meshes perfectly and did not earn a mute from me. I turned it down to comfortable background noise and enjoyed the aesthetic and ambiance. I will say, however, that the UI noises did earn a mute from me. You go in and out of home / town areas so often, or start a conversation with the townsfolk, and every single time you do you'll hear little "pops" and "whoops" (lol). It got so annoying to the point that I muted them. It then felt incredibly weird playing the game after they were off to a hilarious degree, so I almost understand now why they're there, but they're an area that could be improved at the very least.
The Cat's Meow
Honestly, if you fully understand what it means for a game to be in "Early Access" then please consider picking up Pekoe. It's not perfect, and we'll always be exceptionally honest with our community when a game has bugs and imperfections, but this one is worth it if it's your type of game.
I will also happily state that we have not experienced any game-breaking bugs since the new patches have been released, so we're tentatively deeming it Fully Stable in terms of playability with just a few comedic bugs here and there. If you know us, you know that we can't promote a game that we don't deem as "playable", meaning games get an automatic failed review if we experience game-breaking graphic or bug issues. This, though, did not happen with Pekoe and it's why we're still giving it our Positive review. We do ask that you make the choice for yourself though and consider both your own gaming preferences, our review, and other media sources, in order to best decide if Pekoe is for you.
We want to give an extra-special thanks again to the Developers for providing us a Review copy of the game. We'll be continuing to share news related to patches and future content for Pekoe, so make sure you follow us on Twitter, and them as well, to stay up-to-date with the game.
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Disclaimer:
Please note that while we did receive this game for free, we have not been paid or promoted for this review, and are not affiliated with Pekoe or its developers officially in any way. All thoughts are based on our own genuine experience of the game. All footage is based on the Game in its current state as of 07/12/2023 and is subject to change or be completely omitted in future patches at the developer's discretion.
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