It was love at first sight. I knew I was meant to play cozy horror farming sim Grave Seasons as soon as I learned about its unconventional story of an ex-convict restoring the dark fairytale town Ashenridge, where handsome farmers, werewolves, and other serial killers exist in bloody disharmony.
"Grave Seasons is really special in that we don't hold back on the horror elements," developer Perfect Garbage co-founder and narrative director Emmett Nahil tells me during a Summer Game Fest 2026 interview, where I was happy to discover the game seems just as bold as I'd hoped.
I got to play a bit of Grave Seasons' introduction, where I wander a farm and dig up some plots for carrot plants, but I arrive in Ashenridge in a conspicuous prison jumpsuit. From just this experience, it's easy for me to determine the pastoral town isn't your typical, green suburbia, where khaki shorts neighbors smirk privately at those they think dress a little funny, and it isn't your Animal Crossing island, either, where you suppress feelings of hatred for community members because their little piggy noses are pretty cute. Developer Perfect Garbage's eerie countryside is different: there's death and emotional challenges as you define your new life as a reformed criminal, which makes my interest swell – like a diseased artery!
You have one in-game year to learn who's the supernatural murderer terrorizing Ashenridge, whether or not they're the love of your life, and what you should do with that information. Save the world and prove that you've changed? Or keep filling up your watering can like nothing's wrong?
It'll probably be tougher than you think. Nahil says, "I always want to see more moral ambiguity, generally" in story narratives, and Grave Seasons has no easy answers.
Nahil continues, "I find a lot of game writing, when done to the broadest audience possible, can fall into a sort of good-versus-bad binary. Some of the games that I like most have really embraced the middle area, embrace that moral grayness, embrace the complicated repercussions of player decisions."
Putting players into the trudging shoes of protagonist Dara – whose appearance is customizable, but who begins Grave Seasons in that sickly orange jumpsuit no matter what – is the perfect way to force a nuanced mindset from the beginning. Nahil says he wants players to "embrace the fun, roguish nature of Dara. I really want them to feel like they can experiment with their choices and have fun, and also experience the consequences of maybe not-so-savory reactions."
This is the kind of daring narrative ambition I always crave in horror, specifically, which I think has a duty to be visceral, itchy, and extra-impactful on an innocent audience member's sense of self. More specifically, Nahil says, "I want players to learn that it's worthwhile to get to know the people around you, to really learn deeply about the people that are in your community, no matter what kind of person you are. That's what Grave Seasons does best."
Maybe I should switch to rollercoasters, or a glass of wine, but I've always had the desperate need for art to encourage me toward emotional places I never thought of going before. With its unique premise and magnanimous thoughts about community, it seems like Grave Seasons can do that with only a few bite marks and bags of carrot seeds.
I can't wait. Grave Seasons' original August 14 release date has been delayed to this fall, but I'll sit around until its new launch time is announced. Not patiently!
