Just before writing this, one of my hamsters dropped a maꦕssive turd at the bottom of my screen. Looks awfully ple♎ased with himself too, the little furball – it’s about two times his size. But it's nothing my magical flying poop-scoop broom can’t handle, because that’s what Tiny Pasture is all about: experiencing the joys of a virtual pet without the struggles.

As a pet simulation game specifically designed to be played during work or study time, Tiny Pasture is built on an unusual concept. Gaming and working doesn’t sound like the most productive or desirable match, but with nearly 20🌠K peak daily players since it came out on Ste🗹am, I figured it must be doing something right.

Twenty-p♍lus hours later, and I’m having a blast with one of the least demanding digipet game𝓰s I’ve ever played. Take that, Tamagotchi.

Zombie zoo

Due to the ‘farming sim’ genre tag, I was expecting a toned-down version of 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:Stardew Valley upon entering my tiny pasture for the first time. Except for the gorgeous pixel art, they have little in common. While you could grow a few plants in your pixelated pasture, all you 𒐪really need to do is get a baby animal, feed it, remove its droppings from time to time, and watch it grow into a healthy adult. As long as it stays alive, the grown-up critter will generate coins over time, thus allowing you to buy more creatures: hamsters, capybaras, red pandas, and – for some reason – slimes, ghosts, and zombies. I'll admit to being nervous when I bought my first zombie, and felt quite relieved when I saw him munching on a blueberry pie rather than my hamster.

But Tiny Pasture isn’t your average pet simulation game. As a ‘desktop overlay’ game, it only occupies a small (adjustable) horizontal strip near the bottom of your screen. The gameplay is ‘idle’, which means the animals only require sporadic care while you work, study, watch YouTube videos, or even play other games. The rest of the time, just glance at the lower end of the ☂screen to watch your critters sleep, bounce around, eat cheese (they have an odd diet), and defilᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ⁤⁤⁤⁤ᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚe your status bar.

Doesn’t that remind you of something? Tiny ꧅Pasture feels awfully similar to🎶 keeping a Tamagotchi, the famous (or infamous, if you ask '90s parents) virtual Japanese pet. It may sound like an easy comparison to make, but in this case, it’s not so much the ‘raise a virtual pet’ schtick as it is the manner of raising it. Instead of playing a simulation in active time, Tiny Pasture is meant to be a background activity, just like a Tamagotchi. You pick it up, play for a minute, then put it down again.

Admittedly, I was equally excited and terrified upon making this discovery as my Tamagotchi track record ain’t that great. About a ꦓyear and a half ago, I got myself an original Angelgotchi from 1997, and long story short, it never lives long. Whether it’s my 🅺work ethic or my digital dependent, something’s always got to give… And now here I am, attempting to raise a digipet yet again. Dang.

Imagine my relief, then, when I realized that even a total of 15 pasture pets aren’t nearly as demanding as a single Tamagotchi. It took a few hours to get there, but Tiny Pasture makes it possible to create a fully self-sufficient zoo, complete with tax-collector bees, a food-dropping tree house, and a poop-scooping magic broom (as evidenced by the picture above, I really needed that last one). Just try to keep the first few animals alive until you get these pasture upgrades, and you can safely go for a number two yourself – your pets will still beꦿ alive and thriving when you return.

Less is more

You might be wondering how these digipets are fun if they don’t require care, but that’s the thing: I can care for them whenever I want. I can pet my parrots, feed mushrooms to my panda bears, and wake my zombies from their graves, but I don’t have t💝o do it. I can also dedicate myself to animal breeding, collecting all fur colours, and improving the animals’ rarity levels, but nothing will happen if I choose 💞to ignore it all – they’ll brighten up my screen nonetheless.

Tamagotchi’s challenging nature sounds better on paper, but in reality, it doesn’t match a typical workday at all. Besides, the process of feeding, petting, and playing is always the same, turning it into a chore rather than a game. I’m quite thrilled to have found something less botherso🐲me to give me that sensation of playing a game and having a pet.

That’s not to say I don’t occasionall♕y suffer from intrusive thoughts such as “imagine how cool a bunch of mini-games would be” or “a manual grooming mechanic would be so much fun” when I look at Tiny Pasture, but then I have to remind myself that I would surely get too distracted by such nonsense, resulting in the game&🦩rsquo;s permanent banishment from my PC. So, Tiny Pasture, you better stay passive and perfect. Somehow, that works – and I work too.

You can play Tiny Pasture alongside any of the 澳洲幸运5开奖号码历史查询:best PC games we've hand-picked for the platform