Game: The Abbess Garden
Genre: Casual, Indie, Simulation
System: Steam (Windows, SteamOS, Linux, MacOS)
Developers | Publishers: MD Studio | indie.io
Steam Deck: Playable
Controller Support: No
Price: US $9.99 | UK £7.99 | EU € 9,49
Release Date: March 2nd, 2026
A review code was provided; many thanks to Press Engine.
Premise
In simulation game The Abbess Garden, we are transported to Port-Royal-des-Champs, France, in 1643. We play as Agnès, a young peasant, who has been given the keys to the personal garden of the Abbess. The garden is shrouded in mystery, forbidden and forgotten and our task is to restore it to its former glory, by growing and identifying real plants through the seasons. Along the way, we will uncover a spy plot, help the community and maybe even find a romance.
Interestingly enough, Port-Royal-des-Champs is a real life historical site- it was an abbey of Cistercian nuns in Magny-les-Hameaux, in the Vallée de Chevreuse southwest of Paris that launched a number of culturally important institutions. Several schools were founded, famous for the high quality of the education they provided. Mathematician and physicist Blaise Pascal is known to have spend time at Port- Royal-des- Champs. While the abbey itself was abolished in the 1700s, some of its buildings as well as the gardens survive and can still be visited today.
Planting some seeds.
Gameplay
The Abbess Garden combines elements of gardening sim and a visual novel. The main part is restoring and taking care of the garden. The plants are real and the garden itself behaves like a real ecosystem. Each plant has its own water and soil preferences, as well as blooming season. If our plants are not growing well, we can move them to a different spot. We need to carefully plan where and when to plant, taking into account soil and water conditions, as well as other plants in the vicinity.
We gather and receive seeds and sometimes we might hold onto them for a season or two, until it’s the right time for planting. Agnès has a variety of tools at her disposal, each only available when really needed. As the story progresses, new areas of the garden open up, and with them, more opportunities for plants and discoveries. As we nurture our garden, we also gather flowers, leaves and seeds for botany, expanding our knowledge in the process. All that we learn is compiled into an encyclopedia, which we can access at any point.
Writing our own botanical encyclopedia
For a gardening sim, The Abbess Garden is quite slow and even laid back. We get the tools we need, when we need them. There are no timers and no grids and no resource gathering – we can plant and water as we want to. Some players might find the gardening repetitive, but I’d like to think it’s more of a meditative experience. The game’s pacing is mostly in the player’s hands. Instead of in-game days, we have seasons and only once we are ready with all our tasks and quests and we’ve grown tired of Autumn, can we turn the seasons’ wheel at the bottom of the screen to winter and so on.
We are encouraged to wander about the garden and look around. We might find some hidden objects in the overgrowth and ruins. Each item can trigger new quests and conversations, even meetings with new characters. Among our discoveries will be a book, written by a long forgotten spy. The book is a secret, a dangerous one and people are already looking for it. In our quest to uncover its meaning, we will get to know the local community and meet a variety of characters.
Meeting friends and foes.
Some Other Things
Visually, at first glance, The Abbess Garden might look a bit simplistic, but I think the art style complements the simple gameplay well. The color palette is soft and pastel, and the soundtrack is suitably calm. We also have a lot ambient sounds, like wind, birdsong and so on.
The Abbess Garden has Steam achievements, but no trading cards yet. The game has basic audio and visual settings.
Conclusion for The Abbess Garden
Despite its espionage and politics intrigue, The Abbess Garden is a cozy little retreat of greennery and flowers, that offers a reprieve from the real world. We can garden to our hearts content, at our own pace. We can progress the story whenever we want, or just spent hours wandering about our little garden.
If you like narrative-driven, nature inspired games, give The Abbess Garden a try, you might love it as well.
Final Verdict: I Like it a Lot
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