• Year played: 2022
• Platform: Steam deck
• Playtime: 40 hours
• Completion level: 100%
• Overall rating: 8.5 / 10

Apico is a game I had been following for quite some time - I think I first saw it in a nintendo direct (or was it wholesome direct?), and also tried it out at PAX last year. It definitely fits in the category of "stardew-like" games that have been coming out like crazy the past couple years - and I am HERE FOR IT because I love these kind of games.

Despite a lot of the similarities to stardew and other games in the craft-farm-collect-manage genre, Apico brings a ton of new ideas to the table. I really enjoyed it, despite some rough edges.

Most of the game revolves around breeding and raising bees. In each of your hives, you can create a queen bee by pairing two normal bees, who will produce honey and other materials for a period of time before dying and leaving several offspring behind. The new bees will inherit traits based on the queen's genetics (yes, there are punnet squares in this game!) which governs things like how long they live, how much they produce, and what types of weather they like. Crossbreeding different species of bees can sometimes result in a new species being discovered, sometimes only under certain circumstances - for example, one species of bee can only be born while it's raining.

It starts simple, but ramps up in complexity as you go, and can at times feel sorta hectic. I spent a lot of time drawing charts and graphs of what crossbreeds I was working on and what I needed to do next. This bee needs hot weather, but my heater is out of fuel, better go grab some more wood - oh wait, have to refuel the smoker over here, because this other bee won't produce unless there's a certain type of flower being smoked nearby - and ahhh crap I forgot to replant my seeds, I'm out of that flower.... and so on.

Unlike many games in this genre, there's not a whole lot of automation to allow you to scale your operations. You get improved tools and slightly more powerful machinery, but there's definitely a limit on how many hives you can reasonably manage at once since you'll be doing most of the hands-on work yourself. At times I found this sorta frustrating and limiting, but I can also appreciate the way it makes you slow down and think about what you're doing.

It does mean you're spending a lot of time menuing and managing inventories though. I played it on the steam deck, and the handheld-optimized version of the game struggles with the controls being kinda wonky (moving around in menus often randomly sends your cursor in directions you didn't expect), and some features being broken or unavailable. A lot of the broken features were patched, but there's still things you can only do on PC with mouse and keyboard - like having multiple menus open at once, which lets you craft with materials from storage without withdrawing them first.

There were a lot of things I really liked about the way the game handles inventory management though. My favorite quality-of-life feature is that every crafting station has a row of storage slots at the bottom, which is a great way to keep supplies and related items stored exactly where you need them. Every game with crafting mechanics should copy this idea, it's awesome.

So, overall? Apico is a great little indie title. There's a lot of stuff to do - I didn't even mention the quests and storyline, the flower breeding mechanics, seafaring exploration, base building, or a lot of other stuff. It has mod support as well with a few really awesome community mods already out there, like one which adds loads of automation so you can have the bee-factorio of your dreams. And the devs have a lot of planned updates in the works too.

Apico may have slid under the radar a bit, but I recommend checking it out! You might even learn a few things about beekeeping. The bee species are made up, but all the mechanics are based on the real thing. I definitely enjoyed the time I spent on it.