HGTV is one of my favorite channels, with all the interior decorating, home renovation shows. So a game based on this kind of theme seemed like a pretty entertaining and creative experience.
Home Sweet Home puts you in the shoes of an interior designer and a small team of workers. With a few hints from your clients and a budget, your job is to redecorate a particular room within the time limit while tending to the client’s needs.
As far as what the client likes or dislikes, you usually get a riddle or some vague sentences, so you have to do quite a bit of reading between the lines and word/idea association. For example, you will know one of your clients enjoys soap operas and likes sunny colors, which means she will want a TV and plenty of yellow and orange. Another one is a magician who does tricks with doves and gets a lot of books as gifts… in other words, give him enough bookshelves and a birdcage. You even get a clue that comes in as a cryptogram – that was a tricky one!
Although this is a guessing job, while you browse and place the furniture and decorations in the room, you can notice the client’s approval in a handy meter. But it will always be a matter of balancing your budget, client’s satisfaction, and your team’s time.
You always work with a specific time limit, so you must take in consideration that it takes time for your workers to complete projects. This means many times you can only place the few key items to keep the client happy, and little else.
Your team is composed of three people, each more prone to certain tasks. To have them do something, click on the worker and then on the item you want him or her to work on. Each of them has an energy meter that will gradually go down as they work, so occasionally you will want to drag and drop some coffe from the pot onto the tired person. Workers will complete projects faster when the objects glow with their respective color. You can also assign all three workers to a single project to finish it faster (useful for large things such as walls and carpets). You also need to make them pick up the garbage they leave behind and occasionally give them the tools they need. This sometimes is a problem, when they’re all bunched up working on the same project.
The team isn’t too hard to manage, that is, until they get hurt. When they do, they run around the room randomly and you need to click the first aid kit on them to get them back to normal… if you can catch them standing still long enough. While they run around, you will also notice their project progression going down, and this is something that sometimes will cost you and interfere with completion plans.
You also get a portfolio where you can see all the rooms you have created as finished products, as if in a photo album.
Initially, Home Sweet Home reminded me of The Sims (even in the isometric view), but I didn’t expect it to be so limited regarding the room design. Still, it’s simple to control, even if the wacky workers pose a few issues at times. But overall, it’s a fun and entertaining game for the aspiring virtual interior decorator.