Rekindled Trails mixes Stardew Valley elements with tactical inventory puzzles

At a first glance, Rekindled Trails looks like the perfect game for disengaging your brain and destressing. A cozy life sim with the kind of resource-gathering activities you'd find in games like Stardew Valley, it's aiming to tell a charming tale of a fiery villager looking to make life in Aurteris as pleasant as possible. However, with some intricate inventory puzzles that will test your Tetris skills and a narrative that sees you trying to rebuild citizens' trust in deity-like flame, there's more to the recently released Rekindled Trails than meets the eye.

Steam is awash with cozy life sims that will see you while away the hours foraging, fishing, and forging relationships with your neighbors. ConcernedApe's masterpiece is of course the king, but it's inspired so many brilliant games like Stardew Valley that take things in new directions - in the last 12 months, we've been blessed by the likes of Mirthwood, Dinkum, and Luma Island. Rekindled Trails is the latest to arrive on Steam, and it's got a rather intriguing narrative premise.

The world of Aurteris used to worship the Flame, which resides in a massive furnace-like structure. However, loyalty to the Flame has diminished, and with it, the settlements of Aurteris have begun to fall into despair and disrepair. It's your job to solve the inhabitants' problems, rebuild their towns and villages, and ultimately restore their faith in the Flame.

However, navigating this world isn't as straightforward as walking from A to B. You'll need to gather resources to trade for items that will help you unlock new sections of the map, giving you access to more settlements. To do this, there are three main minigames in the overworld that will feel familiar to life sim fans - mining, fishing, and foraging, each with an associated tool.

You can then trade the minerals, fish, and plants that you acquire with vendors, but you need to be strategic to maximize their value. You have a tile-based inventory, and so does each vendor. Depending on which one you're dealing with, their inventory may be a different shape, have tiles blacked out, or have bonus tiles that will add a multiplier to the value of certain items. You have to slot your items into their inventory so that everything lines up in the optimum way. It's like a mini game of Tetris. It's an interesting wrinkle to go for a tile-based inventory system like the one found in one of my favorite indie games, Dredge, or even in hardcore shooters like Escape From Tarkov.

Rekindled Trails is out on Steam right now. Until Monday, July 14, a 20% discount will make it just $14.39 / £11.99, and there's a free demo available if you want to try before you buy. Head to its Steam page here if you want to give it a spin.

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