• Price: $14.99 USD
• Developer/Publisher: Petal Cat Games
• Release Date: August 27, 2026

A review code was kindly provided by Petal Cat Games. We thank them for allowing us to cover something they’ve worked so hard on.

It can be difficult to stand out in the “field” 👩‍🌾 of cozy games, but I was drawn to Research Story due to its unique concept. Instead of immediately purchasing seeds and livestock from the local stores, you must observe different plants and wildlife and gather enough data to tame and raise them. The information you gain from your efforts will help you solve the mysteries behind the town of Shimmerbrook!

Before you start playing there are a few decisions to make. I appreciated some of the options in settings, such as preventing your character from fainting if you deplete all of your energy, deciding if you want time to pause indoors, your base energy, the length of each day, etc.

There are also 2 different gameplay modes: relaxed and normal. Relaxed mode allows players to purchase items and tool upgrades for lower prices, prevent animal happiness from going down if you miss a feeding, and makes you immune to certain conditions further down in the mines. I played in relaxed mode because I just wanted to chill; it’s quite nice of the developer to give players this much control over the experience.

Next you get to customize your character. Choose a name and set your birthday, and then make selections that change your appearance. There are options for skin tone, more than 30 hair styles, hair colors, cute accessories, face options, and some clothes (which are unfortunately kind of hard to see on your character).

Once you’ve finished setting up the game, it’s time to make your move to Shimmerbrook. Your character has been invited to the town as their new plants and animals expert; they already have some other experts – such as a geologist and a mycologist – hard at work!

You’re provided with a small house and a large plot of land to build habitats for the animals you tame and plant the new flowers, herbs, and produce that you’ve discovered. As you explore Shimmerbrook and the surrounding areas you’ll notice new plants and animals everywhere. After gathering some samples you can drag them to the research tab to begin your investigation into the characteristics of that species. 🔎

Plants are more straightforward as far as observing them is concerned. Once you’ve started researching a plant you must “observe” them by clicking on them and pressing and holding the button until the process is complete. You have to do this several times until the game says you’ve learned how to harvest that plant’s seeds as well.

With the seeds in hand you can then start planting them on your farmland. You must check your journal to find out the plant’s ideal growing conditions that “you” observed in the wild. I was really impressed with the amount of different growth requirements!

There are plants that need certain types of soil or fertilizer to grow, or that may need to be planted near/far away from the water. They may require more or less sun or shade, and some have to be planted under specific conditions (i.e. at night, a cloudy day, etc.).

Plants often have multiple special requirements, too, so you really have to be careful and double-check your journal before planting anything. Thankfully, if a plant needs fertilizer you only have to craft enough for the initial planting, and don’t have to remember to make any more than that.

Animals, on the other hand, seem to be more complicated in the observation stage. You have to observe them a few times like with plants, but there are a few animals that have behaviors you have to observe (in the wild) before you can complete its research scroll and submit it to the Archive.

Some critters are much more skittish than others, and you’ll have to slow down to get close enough to pet them and grab a sample, observe them, or tame them. Others only appear at night, so you’ll have to go around checking each area again to see what might appear.

I really appreciated the addition of “Shimmers,” or alternative color variants of each animal. The different colors are very pretty! I have yet to obtain a pink chicken by my second year, but thankfully Shimmers have a much higher spawn rate than the shinies in Pokémon; I had a lot of Shimmers appear in my playthrough.

You should probably make sure that you keep enough food of each type on you at all times so you don’t miss out on a Shimmer. I found that unless they were in the lower levels of the cave they’d stay on the screen if you left to get the right food, so that’s a plus.

Anyways, whether they’re shiny or not, once you complete tasks for an animal’s research requirements you’ll learn enough information from your journal (the type(s) of food it likes) to tame it. You can purchase the food bowls and/or the crafting recipes to make them yourself. Naturally, it’s more cost effective to make them instead, but in the beginning it’s probably easier to buy them.

Once you place the right food by an animal you can tame and name it, then bring it on home. You have to purchase the right den for their needs (or buy the recipe and craft one) then place it on your farm. Each den can hold 2 animals, and you can only place one type of food there so you must consider which animals you put together. I did wish we had some bigger den options.

It’s important to keep your creatures happy both because it’s the right thing to do, but also because they’ll provide you with byproducts and perks. Obviously you have to feed them the right food every day, but animals have traits that allow you to increase their bond level faster to unlock their perks. For example, they may enjoy having flowers near their den or want to be further away from predator species.

I loved having Theo build little relaxation/play areas for the animals of each biome type. It’s just so cute seeing them chilling out together! (The way their dens have big leaves that pop up to protect them from the rain is adorable, too. 🥹) Eventually your farmland will be full of dens, and you may want to reorganize. Thankfully Theo can move the relaxation areas for you instantly – and for free!

Another fun element is the ability to ride capybaras around. I think you can only ride capybaras, but I still really liked this feature because it’s A) cute and B) convenient. Unfortunately you can’t run on foot, so this is at least a nice workaround to get around faster. (I also appreciated the smooth transition between indoors and outdoors because once you go back out you’re on the capybara again.)

Since some species – such as fish – only appear during the day (or vice versa), it’s great to have the capybaras to help you get things done faster. While there are a few regular fish species, you can also research special fish. First fish up their items from the sparkles in the water, and then you must use the machine at Sesame’s house to analyze it and gain insight into the fish’s preferences.

These special fishies may only appear during a specific time of day, in certain seasons and/or locations, and can only be caught with their preferred bait. Again, I’m impressed by the level of detail in the requirements; it may sound a little difficult but it’s really not.

They made it so you can catch fish during any season in the caves, which was nice, and I really liked the simplicity of the fishing mini game. My only complaint about the fish is that we don’t get to display them anywhere, like in aquariums in our house or at the Archives.

Once you’ve completed research on a creature, plant, or fish, you can submit your research scroll to the Archives. There are shelves of books there that you’ll fill with scrolls; you’ll receive rewards for each book you complete, and the other researchers will give you even more rewards for increasing your research level. The Archives have additional features that unlock at a high enough research level!

Research Story, as the name would suggest, does indeed include both research and a story. 😂 The story is mainly connected to the caves surrounding Shimmerbrook, and you’ll need certain species and items to solve puzzles that unlock the next steps.

The story isn’t massive, but it’s kind of interesting and gives us more information on this magical world and the townspeople of Shimmerbrook. There are more than 20 characters who live there (10 of which are marriage candidates), but I never felt like there were too many people.

Perhaps this is because most of the townspeople live in the center of town, so it’s pretty easy to quickly go around and speak to everyone and give them their daily gift. Another way to see everyone in one place would be the festivals that take place every season.

They only hold one festival per season, but they’re at least creative and different; there aren’t any of the standard New Year’s events that are usually held on the first and last days of the year in many farming games. I really enjoyed the cherry blossom festival with the poetry contest, and you can buy event-exclusive furniture as well!

And speaking of events, the game also has casual hangout events and story hangouts that you can schedule with characters once you’ve increased their friendship levels enough. Unfortunately it seems like the non-romanceable characters don’t get story hangouts. But I did appreciate how the game reminds you that you have a scheduled hangout when you wake up in the morning and an hour before the event.

Casual hangouts are repeatable, but there are 3 story hangout options with marriage candidates that only happen once at each of the 3 location options. In story hangouts you get to participate in multiple activities with a character, and there’s additional dialogue. This is nice because outside of these events I didn’t feel like there was enough variation in everyday dialogue.

You can date multiple characters – at the same time – of any gender. I believe you must complete all 3 story hangouts and view all of their heart events to marry a character (plus the mandatory house upgrades).

Some of the heart event requirements were a bit difficult to fulfill. I was unable to view one of Vallee’s events until my second year because it took me that long to reach a weekend with clear skies (sunny and no clouds) by the time I got her friendship levels high enough. However, I did like how the character profiles tell you the requirements for each heart events; it’s extremely convenient not having to look them up.

I also liked how some characters have a kind of reverse proposal event where they basically tell you they want to marry you and the ball is in your court. You still have to get the ring and propose properly yourself, but it was still nice to have these events.

Theo was my favorite love interest because he was nice and his story seemed the most interesting to me. Once you propose you get to choose the date as well as the color scheme. Proposing also unlocks several options for your wedding outfit in your wardrobe.

The wedding ceremony is cute, although people don’t seem to acknowledge your marriage outside of the wedding as much (which is another issue with the limited dialogue). I did like how our chosen spouse gets their own special room in the house after marriage. And they actually contribute something to the household, even if it’s only 10 G a day! 😂 I don’t think kids are an option in this game, but I don’t mind that as much.

The requirements for certain creatures and character events definitely encourage players to keep playing into the second year. I spent roughly 100 hours playing Research Story all the way into mid-spring of year 2 (with my days lengthened to 200% in settings). I stopped – for now – at 95%, only missing 3 creatures who apparently appear later in year 2.

There are more than 90 species of plants, animals, and fish to research and collect in the game. I love the amount of details that unlock in the research journal after completing research tasks – especially the adorable creature art!

The community of Shimmerbrook has a lot of other small details that I appreciate. I really enjoyed seeing the other researchers writing down their findings with their quills at tables in the Archives, and some of the characters have regular meetings (or even spars!) around town. I found the graphics (and soundtrack) quite charming.

Research Story does have a few areas where it could use improvement. I wish there were some quality of life features such as an auto-fill option for crafting and additional inventory expansions. It also would be nice if we could purchase out-of-season seeds we’ve already unlocked at the general store.

As stated before, I think the game could have used more dialogue, and the characters’ individual stories aren’t as complete as I’d like. However, I do like the characters overall, and there’s some fun dialogue and puns here and there. The amount of lore is cool, too!

There’s a lot of great content here at an extremely reasonable price, and if you enjoy completing collections, taking care of adorable critters, unlocking new areas, and discovering secrets this should last you a long time. It’s a chill, cozy game that I found hard to put down. I’d love to see more from Petal Cat Games in the future!