This cozy roguelite about growing magical plant creatures looks like my kind of dungeon crawler

Grimoire Groves
(Image credit: Stardust)

This upcoming dungeon crawler feels just like Hades, just a heck of a lot cuter and with magical plant creatures.

Grimoire Groves is a cozy roguelite dungeon crawler that sees players take on the role of a young witch as they explore a mysterious forest and grow adorable plant creatures. Unlike plenty of dungeon crawlers, Grimoire Groves has stunning bright visuals and is far less punishing, making it feel much more inviting and a good game to get started with if you're a fan of the genre. 

In Grimoire Groves, players will find seeds to grow new plants, befriend a cast of unique characters, craft and collect magical items, learn new spells, decorate their homes, and unravel the mystery of Grimoire Groves. The game is being developed by Switzerland-based developer Stardust and takes inspiration from several game genres, including both roguelikes and cozy games.

Speaking of inspirations, Stardust lists games like Animal Crossing: New Horizons, Stardew Valley, Hades, Moonlighter, and more as its game inspiration, but also cartoons like Adventure Time, She-Ra, and The Owl House too - which we can definitely see in the game's art direction. I'm especially a fan of the various plant guys that follow you around and can be seen multiple times in the trailer. 

Luckily for Stardust, it seems there's plenty of other people out there looking for a cozy dungeon crawler as the game's Kickstarter campaign has already raised more than double its target, managing to not only unlock various stretch targets but also the Nintendo Switch port of the game too - with seven days still left to go on the project.  

We don't have a release date for Grimoire Groves just yet but we do suggest wishlisting the game on Steam and following the developer on Twitter to stay up to date with the project. 

Wondering what else you should keep an eye out for? Take a look at our upcoming indie games list. 

Hope Bellingham
News Writer

After studying Film Studies and Creative Writing at university, I was lucky enough to land a job as an intern at Player Two PR where I helped to release a number of indie titles. I then got even luckier when I became a Trainee News Writer at GamesRadar+ before being promoted to a fully-fledged News Writer after a year and a half of training.  My expertise lies in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, cozy indies, and The Last of Us, but especially in the Kingdom Hearts series. I'm also known to write about the odd Korean drama for the Entertainment team every now and then.