Whitethorn Games is wrapping up yet another fun year, full of new games, updates, and company announcements. Today, the indie publisher wants to recap the biggest highlights of 2022, and take a look ahead at the great things to come in 2023.
Princess Farmer Burrows Onto Mobile
In early 2023, Mother Gaia’s magic will allow players to experience Princess Farmer’s entire adventure from the palm of their hands, when the match-3 game comes to mobile platforms. Plus, players can look forward to new hare dyes, outfits, and sparkles for purchase, and an all-new Quest system in the mobile version!
Princess Farmer is a match-3 puzzle and visual novel game with easy-to-learn action mechanics and different play styles that let you breeze through the game or challenge you. Princess Farmer was just an ordinary farmer when one day she woke up under the Gaia Tree. Now through the magic of Mother Gaia, she can hoist up whole rows of veggies with ease to make matches and smash obstacles by herself, in co-op, or even with an AI companion!
Princess Farmer is now available for PC via Steam and Epic Games, Xbox One and Series X|S, PlayStation 4, and Nintendo Switch™ .
Calico Gets Pawsome New Features
The Pawsome Edition is the biggest content update for Calico yet and contains plenty of purrific new features, both big and small. These include new animals sprinkled around the island for players to play with, a UI and overall visual overhaul to provide a more pleasant playing experience, the ability to customize players’ wallpaper and floors while in the cafe, and the big new feature: a brand new cooking minigame!
Calico is a day-in-the-life community sim game where you are given an important and adorable task: rebuild the town’s cat café and fill it with cute and cuddly creatures! Build up your café by filling it with cute furniture, fun decorations, yummy pastries, and get it bustling with animals again!
Calico: Pawsome Edition is making its way to PC, Nintendo Switch™, and Xbox on December 22!
Big Buzz for APICO
Launched on World Bee Day back in May, APICO has bee-n Whitethorn’s most buzzworthy game of 2022. The bee-lightful simulation game found sweet success on PC, Nintendo Switch, and PlayStation consoles, received new content with the 2.0 update, and will continue receiving updates into 2023.
Combining resource gathering, biology, and minigames with ideas from both real-life and fantasy beekeeping and gardening, APICO will teach players about the ins-and-outs of maintaining a healthy hive and the importance of our irreplaceable pollinating pals. The islands of APICO were once abuzz with different species of bees, and it’s up to players to rediscover lost species, cross-breed new ones, and repopulate each unique bee-ome. Progressing further into the game may also uncover some forgotten secrets. But that’s none of our beeswax.
APICO is now available on PlayStation 4 & 5, Nintendo Switch™ , and PC via Steam, itch.io, GameJolt, the Epic Games Store, and Humble Store.
Warming Things Up with Onsen Master
Waking Oni Games and Whitethorn joined forces to launch their arcade-style hot spring customer management game, Onsen Master, to Nintendo Switch™ , Xbox, and PC this past September.
Onsen Master features arcade-style single and two-player co-op, where players must manage the customers of their hot springs, and prepare and put together the correct ingredients to cure their ailments. Running around the hot springs, wrangling wandering customers, and putting the right concoctions into the right baths can be hectic enough already, but troublesome yokai look to impede players’ excellent service as well. Can you overcome obstacles to revitalize and reconnect the communities of Izajima? Spring into action and find out!
New Life for Whitethorn Hits
Throughout the year, many of Whitethorn Game’s most popular titles had a resurgence, making their way to new platforms and getting physical editions. The tea-lightful adventure game Teacup launched on Android, and iOS, and the wild photography safari Beasts of Maravilla Island launched on PlayStation 4 & 5. Meanwhile, the cottage-core escapism of Lake and the fairytale crafting of Wytchwood on Switch received physical editions.
A Transparent Company
This year, Whitethorn Games decided to release financial information about the company in an effort to give indie developers a more transparent view of the company’s business practices! The publisher released documents sharing information on salary rate, revenue share, publishing agreements and statistics, marketing costs, and more. You can learn more by reading the full transparency and publishing documents.
2023, the Year of Whitethorn
While 2022 was a big year for Whitethorn Games, 2023 is shaping up to be even bigger! Here’s a look ahead at what cozy goodness is in store for players next year.
- On January 17, the mind-bending puzzle adventure RE:CALL will launch on Nintendo Switch™, Xbox Series S|X, and PC.
- Whitethorn’s own Brian Wilson is hard at work developing his environmental thriller The Forest Cathedral. The game will launch on Xbox and PC in 2023.
- Nintendo’s Indie World Presentation, hosted in November, revealed Botany Manor, the debut title from Balloon Studios. The first-person botanical puzzle game will launch on Nintendo Switch™ and PC sometime in 2023.
- Revealed in October by Wholesome Games, Mythwrecked: Ambrosia Island is a brand new take on the Greek gods of mythology. The sun-soaked friend ‘em up adventure will launch on PC in 2023.
Plenty more announcements will be made throughout the year, so be sure to keep a close eye on Whitethorn Games! You can do so by following the company on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Youtube, and Twitch, join the official Whitethorn Games Discord, and visit https://whitethorngames.com.
