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In Urban Jungle, developed by Kylyk Games and distributed by Assemble Entertainment, players use lush plants to transform their home into a natural sanctuary. The goal is to find the best spot for each plant in a small apartment and enjoy the pleasures of gardening. Although there is no official release date yet, the studio shared details about the game’s design process.

Maria from Kylyk Games explained that the idea for the game came from a joke. “The idea for the game came from the joke that I was turning into a crazy plant lady. My friends and I had to move to another country in 2022. After hearing my regrets about leaving behind a collection of beloved plants, my friends suggested we could make a game where you fill tiny rental apartments with greenery. We were looking for a small, simple-to-develop game concept for some time, so we decided to go with it.”

The core mechanic of Urban Jungle involves finding the best spot for each plant in very limited space, adding a puzzle element to the simple decorating gameplay. “You can turn on/off humidifiers and lamps to ensure that every plant gets the ideal environment. Each plant gives you points for unlocking new plants. The goal is to balance aesthetics and earn enough points to move to the next level,” Maria detailed.

The studio faces significant challenges related to time and experience. “Currently it’s August, and we’ve been developing Urban Jungle for 10 months. It’s our first game, and every task is entirely new to us, so development is taking much longer than we anticipated. We aim to create a very small, condensed game, but it’s surprisingly time-consuming, even though it looks simple. There are many things that players won’t notice but contribute to the overall polish, and we just want to make the best game possible. I’m talking about localization, controller support, settings, etc. It takes a lot of time. And we have to learn to code, model, paint while developing the game.”

Maria ended on an optimistic note, “We really hope to release the game this year. Our dream is to meet our players' expectations and sell enough copies to start working on the next game.