If you’ve ever wanted to snub society and live in the woods, or run your own cafe catering to animals and forest sprites alike, have I got news for you! Tailside: Cozy Cafe Sim offers up the perfect blend of both. You’ll play as an adorable brown fox, running your own cafe, and getting to know the other forest folk. There’s even small, interconnected storylines told through the daily newspaper.

It’s all very The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, except its target audience is exhausted adults who just need to zone out for a while with the occasional reminder that they’re doing a good job.

Plus, the pixel art is absolutely gorgeous. Decorating is a huge part of the gameplay loop, and there are lots of different options, including plants and plushies. You can design the perfectly matched cafe of your dreams or mix and match everything. You can even change it up on a daily basis if you want to!

Players who love games like Pixel Cafe and Cats & Cups are in for a special treat. In Tailside: Cozy Cafe Sim, chaos only comes when you invite it. The drink orders are simple and there are no penalties for getting an order wrong.

One of the best features of the game is the plush machine. After a few days in your cafe, Leila, an adorable bunny NPC, will bring you a plush gacha machine. If your cafe is clean and you leave your window open at night, legend has it that a special coin will be dropped off in the morning. You can use your coins to pull plushies, but it’s random, so you can get duplicates.

Watch the trailer for Tailside: Cozy Cafe Sim!

Everything in Tailside: Cozy Cafe Sim can be managed using your keyboard and mouse. If you have dexterity issues in your hands, you’ll be pleased to know that whipping up drinks for customers is a point-and-click process, from grinding the beans to heating the milk. The latte art mini-game does require just a bit more range of motion, but you can use the space bar to toggle it, and turn off latte scoring in the menu if you really don’t want to bother with the mini-game.

But it’s not all latte art and cute gacha games, I’m afraid.

While playing Tailside: Cozy Cafe Sim, I encountered a game-breaking bug that reset my progress back to nothing. Thousands of coins and hundreds of experience points were catapulted back to nothing. Even worse, I was unable to open the cafe. My coffee bar had reverted to the default color instead of the lovely salmon-and-white one I’d purchased, and while all of my plushies were present and accounted for, the tab to use the plush machine was gone. The build and buy modes were also empty of extra furniture I had purchased.

Luckily, I was able to speak with the dev team. Their communication skills were top-notch, and they worked quickly to solve the problem. While my save was unable to be rescued, they are working on patching the issue. So, it’s unlikely that you’ll run into the same issue that I did!

There is a lot to discover in Tailside: Cozy Cafe Sim, and with such a dedicated dev team, I can’t wait to jump into early access. Tailside: Cozy Cafe Sim is releasing on Steam in early access on January 21st for $9.89.

If you want more coffee-based cozy games, you can check out our article on 3 cozy coffee games for a quick fix!