I’ll be the first to admit that I’m not a huge fan of “sim” style games. I’ve never played Animal Crossing, and the only reason I lasted so long with Viva Pinata on the Xbox 360 was because of how adorable the Pinatas were.
So, why is it that I can’t stop growing flowers and decorating my gardens with various garden ornaments?!
Flower Town on the 3DS is one of the four mini-games now available for Mii Plaza, and of the four, it’s the only one that gives players something to do outside of receiving StreetPasses. As a result, it’s one of the more complex offerings of the four—perhaps comparable in complexity with Monster Manor—and gives players a wide variety of activity options outside of the core of the game.
The premise of the game is to grow flowers, with an initial goal of 20 different kinds of flowers entered into your in-game journal. Each time you receive StreetPasses, visitors to your garden help water your current plant so it will grow. Once a plant has grown to maturity, it will produce seeds that Miis help to harvest.
Different plants produce different amounts of seeds, and the value (and usefulness) of each seed will vary according to a number of factors. You can also cross-pollinate seeds with your “flower buddies”—getting other Miis to help you grow flowers to different results.
There are “jobs” to take on, garden spaces to decorate, pots to experiment with (as different pots are more or less likely to produce new breeds), and so on.
Comparatively to the other Mii plaza games, it’s a bit of a time sink, and while I enjoyed the little thrill of growing new breeds and getting rare flowers to grow, it had its annoyances. Every time you enter Flower Town, the guiding character repeats the same few spiels to you that you’re unable to exit out of until he’s done. The game also constantly reminds you how to do things that you already know how to do, which detracts from the experience and becomes more of a frustration than anything else.
I’m also not sure why there’s a limit to the amount of garden space you can have, as this forces you to sell off flowers you might otherwise like to keep and display—but I suppose like any game with an inventory, it’s necessary to make the hard decisions sometimes.
Overall, it’s a fun little game—more soothing and calming than anything else, but it should appeal to a broad segment that enjoys sim-style games (and especially decorating / personalizing in-game areas). Admittedly it becomes harder to grow new breeds as the game progresses, but this gives an otherwise small-scale Mii Plaza game extended playability.
As someone who often finds these types of games quickly tedious, it’s been surprising how much I’ve started to care about growing virtual flowers…!