So I Tried… Flower Shop: Winter in Fairbrook

Each edition of So I Tried… I will try a game that I have never tried before. Will I find something new to love? Will I find something new to despise? I'll take a full half hour, no matter how bad it gets or how badly I do, to see if this is the game for me. This time I went for the PC version of Flower Shop: Winter in Fairbrook.

What I thought it was
A dating sim, a genre I’ve never attempted before. I may have allegedly accidentally opened up some Flash games with ‘boy meets girl’ elements not fit for under-18s, but that’s just hearsay. I’ve dabbled with visual novels, so I knew to expect a lot of text to read through.

What it actually is
On winter break from college, Natalie finds herself needing a job because her parents told her to. Desperate, her roommate offers a job in her hometown of Fairbrook at the local flower shop. So Natalie goes and after a lot of exposition, begins to plan her weeks - with your help.
You can choose what to do in your afternoons after work; work more, rest, or visit a location which is frequented by one of four potential suitors. Working involves watering, planting and tending to flowers. These require seeds from the shop, which means at least one trip to the general shop each week. You have 11 weeks from the start of the game to build up a relationship with one of the guys before Natalie goes to her parents’ after Christmas. You could go every day to the library and see Trent, or just work and rest to make sure your income and health stay… healthy.

Will I keep playing
I may never have played a dating sim before, but I was still expecting a little more voice acting - Flower Shop: Winter in Fairbrook has none. This isn’t a deal breaker, but a common way of trying to go to sleep is to read - I don’t want to fall asleep while playing a game. There are apparently nine different endings, which I believe is about normal for a dating sim, so I’ll likely play it through at least once. I need to find out if I can steal Trent away from Marian the librarian, after all… Though I am curious to what the ‘special ending’ is...