Botany Manor - Find the Strawberry

At first glance, Botany Manor is a simple and beautiful walking sim about cataloguing flowers.

However, delve a little deeper and you’ll find that Arabella Greene is actually quite badass!

As it turns out, Arabella isn’t married and she has no children. So scandalous! At least in Victorian England, where Botany Manor is set.

I really enjoyed this about Botany Manor. It was refreshing to play as an older woman living an unusual lifestyle for her time period. Arabella has achieved a lot in her time and has an awesome friend group for support. So cool!

You don’t actually see any of them. Just like Firewatch, What Remains of Edith Finch or even Unpacking, you will explore the sprawling lawns of buildings of Botany Manor solo. Learning everything about the place and Arabella from your surrounds. I find this so interesting in games. It’s fun to see how builds character and atmosphere when there is no one to talk to.

Botany Manor is a first person perspective game. This can cause issues for people who suffer from motion sickness (I’m one of them). Fortunately, there is are Accessibility and Motion Sickness menus. Options like crosshair and Field of View (FOV) scales helped make Botany Manor a much more enjoyable experience for me.

Once you get past the motion sickness (hopefully), you can begin to explore all the nooks, crannies and secrets of the manor. If it ever feels a little overwhelming or you need to ponder on a puzzle, there are seats you can sit on everywhere! It’s nice to be able to have a moment in the library, or out in the gardens, or almost any part of the property.

Flower blooming in a bathtub — Flowers blooming in a bathtub

I definitely needed to ponder on the puzzles. Some of them did have me scratching my head at what mystery I had to reveal to grow a plant. A more experienced puzzle gamer might find the puzzles on the easy side though

Lucky for us, every part of Botany Manor is beautiful! No matter where you sit, or if you get stuck on a puzzle, there will be something lovely to look at. I especially love the stain-glass windows which extend to the games achievements.

Overall, I’m glad that motion sickness was considered so that I could play this beautiful walking sim. It is relatively short, at only 3 hours long, but a very enjoyable experience.