Crafting potions is a staple in fantasy RPGs. Typically called alchemy, mixing together magical and chemical components to create potions is at the core of many fantasy games that feature magic. However, this potion brewing is typically overshadowed by other RPG elements like combat and story. Potion Craft: Alchemist Simulator aims to take this often overlooked mechanic and make an entire store-management simulator game out of brewing and selling potions.
An announcement trailer for Potion Craft was recently released alongside a demo, which is available on Steam for free. The game's Steam page advertises a unique art style, physical and tactile interactions with ingredients, and a free-form sandbox environment that lets the player shape their career as they see fit. There's certainly a massive focus on sandbox gameplay with Potion Craft, which is fairly unique for these kinds of store-management simulators.
The way players interact with ingredients is a strong focus of this game, with the developers putting a heavy emphasis on the physical nature of ingredient interaction. In games similar to Potion Craft, players often click on an ingredient and watch a tool automatically do the work. The difference with Potion Craft is that players perform the action to grind and mix ingredients themselves, similar to games like Cooking Mama.
This physical interaction puts the player in control of their own potion making, which is another strong element of the game. It's clear that the player's freedom to shape the kinds of potions that their store produces is a top priority. There's an alchemy map to guide them in learning new potion-making techniques and finding new markets to sell to. Both of these serve as a strong indicators of progression to guide players while still letting them express their own creativity.
The player's freedom also doesn't stop with the kinds of potions they can make. Potion Craft lets players grow their own ingredients, customize the look of the bottles they store their potions in and even set prices for their brews through haggling. It seems that a solid amount of Potion Craft was designed to be as open-ended as possible.
Games like Potion Craft, where players manage their own stores full of homemade products, have the opportunity to support creativity. However, many of them will suppress that by limiting the products that players can make through systems like restrictive recipes. While Potion Craft does include recipes that the player can learn, the game's Steam page encourages players to invent their own recipes through experimentation.
Creativity and freedom aren't the only two selling points of Potion Craft, as the game's art style is incredibly unique. It takes inspiration from Medieval-era artwork that would be right at home in a fantasy world. The game's Steam page also connects it to Medieval medical documents that fit with the medicinal nature and origins of alchemy. This aesthetic helps unique elements such as potion bottles and the various ingredients the player can use stand out from each other.
Potion Craft appears to be an incredibly unique take on the simulation genre. It stands out from other games thanks to its level of customizability as well as its unique art style that perfectly fits its theme. While the game only has a planned release window of 2021, there's a playable demo available for free on Steam.