Hands-on with Cozy Playtest is here, where I discuss several games I have had the pleasure of playtesting. This time, I look at Poof! Cleaning Services. You can find my previous playtest here.
Hands-on with Cozy Playtests: Poof! Cleaning Servies
I had the extreme pleasure of participating in a playtest for the game Poof! Cleaning Services, which was developed and produced by Serious Sim. It’s a cleaning and organizing game. I played on a PC using a touchpad and occasionally a keyboard.
The Backstory of Poof! Cleaning Services
Lena is a new immigrant to an unnamed country, and she does not speak the language very well. In the opening scenes, she is negotiating renting a room with the landlord, Mr Davies. He tells her the previous renter, also an immigrant, disappeared one night, leaving all her belongings behind. He believes she may have been deported.
Lena is told that a condition of renting the room is that she must clean it up. She agrees, and a taskbar opens up for us.
This is how the room looked when Lena started cleaning it.
The Gameplay of Poof! Cleaning Services
The gameplay of Poof! Cleaning Services is pretty simple but compelling. You can throw out trash in the white box at the bottom. When that bin gets full, you empty it using the button next to it.
As you get rid of trash, you are creating room to reorganize the items in the room. Some of the items are special and you can pick them up, examine them in detail and learn about them from the text.
I am examining a photo I found on the wall. I can rotate it too.
I really enjoyed looking through the contents of the room I will be staying in. I found some interesting items. I put things like clothes in the dresser drawers, and I put cooking supplies near the hot plate.
I basically tidied up. I need a lot of handholding when I begin a game, and I caught on to Poof! Cleaning Services pretty quickly. It’s not complicated, but it’s really addictive!
This is how it looked when I was done. Nice!!
I love how I can zoom in and look at all the items in the room. The level of detail is great!
Check out my cooking area! Nice and neat now
Helpful icons at the top
- Poof! Cleaning Services* has helpful icons at the top. There’s a running list of objectives and my progress on the left side. On the right side, the Log has all my dialogues in case I want to review what was said, and the “???” button has help screens with instructions. Last is the “snap” button. When it’s activated, items will stick to an invisible grid to help with placement. You can choose to use it or not.
The Second Room in the Playtest
The second room was my first paying job. I was hired to clean and organize the room of a man who had died. His son was my employer, and he did not have a relationship with his father. The son wanted me to make the room more presentable to possible purchasers, to clean it and get rid of clutter basically. He also requested I set aside any items which may have some sentimental value to him.
This is what his room looked like before I began
This room had some objects that had to be moved before I could access other objects. That made it challenging and a lot of fun.
I also had to clean this room, which involved moving a cloth back and forth with my touchpad. I discarded some items to make room. I can get rid of cobwebs and small trash items by just pressing on them. Like magic! I wish it were this easy in real life.
This is how the room looked when I was done.
I found some items which I thought could be meaningful for the son and saved them in a different box, a blue one this time, which was provided for me. It turns out that the items were indeed significant and gave the son some wonderful insights into his late father.
The Atmosphere of Poof! Cleaning Services
The soundtrack was very calm and soothing. The colors in the rooms were nice but not too bright. The shapes of the items in the room seemed a bit rounded and soft. I really liked the atmosphere. You can turn on the lights, the fan and the record player. That’s so cool!
I generally don’t play decorating games, but this one caught my eye and I’m so glad I did. It’s something special.
Final Thoughts
Poof! Cleaning Services is created by a husband and wife team, Serious Sim. The husband did the programming and production while the wife was the project leader and main artist. The game is based on personal experiences for them because both of their parents emigrated for work in the 80s and 90s. They heard some stories about their parents’ experiences when they were growing up. That makes the game even more meaningful to me.
I had a few small questions about Poof! Cleaning Services. The developer got back to me quickly and assisted me. I appreciated that! I always respect when a developer takes the time to interact with the people playing their game. It demonstrates their commitment to creating a high-quality game, in my opinion.
The two rooms in the playtest took me just about an hour. The final game should have between 10-12 rooms. That’s a lot of gameplay!! I absolutely loved my time playing. When you play the Poof! Cleaning Services demo, your rooms will probably end up very different from mine did, and that’s great too!! The final game will be released sometime in 2026. I wish this team all the best with Poof! Cleaning Services and future endeavours!
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