Two of the wildest and most ridiculous games I got to check out at PAX East were Goobie Garden and Tales of Tuscany – a mobile idle creature-collecting game and a very goofy RPG, respectively. Somehow, I had never heard of these games or developer Nico Papalia’s previous title, Athenian Rhapsody, but I am absolutely on board to check them all out after seeing what they’re all about.
Starting with Goobie Garden, which I got to try out on a demo phone at the Goobie Garden LLC. booth. The gist of the game is that you have a garden filled with the titular Goobies, who you can interact with in a bunch of different ways. Primarily, you tap on them to smack them around, making them shoot out EXP orbs that you can then collect. You then have the chance to talk to your Goobie, who, in my case, asked me to tell them a joke. The dialogue options were a mix of meta and sort of insane, but definitely in a comical way. Based on the choice I made, it said that one of the Goobie’s bizarre stats went up, which can apparently lead them to evolve into a plethora of different freaks.
I heard Papalia say that this is going to be an especially satisfying game for people who enjoy filling the Pokédex across the various Pokémon titles, which assures me it will be insanely fun for people like me specifically. If comically smacking around these little weirdos wasn’t funny enough, being able to collect a bunch of them while filling out a catalogue has absolutely got me champing at the bit to play.
Tales of Tuscany, meanwhile, is a more full-fledged RPG. There’s a lot of clear Undertale inspiration, with bullet-hell-esque attack dodging being a primary mechanic in combat. Additionally, you can build up your team by choosing to Befriend your enemies, or you can defeat them in battle, so the Undertale influence goes pretty hard. I’m surprised more games haven’t done this in the last decade, but this one seems to be doing it well.
The main character, Lambypoo, looks wonderfully dumb and adorable, and it seems like he’s able to mess with the game’s environments using a big “baa.” Any game with a button that lets me make goofy sounds with the press of a button has my interest, especially when said goofy sound can actually do something. A small thing that has me stoked is the ability to encounter Shiny versions of enemies that you can befriend, which has eaten up a lot of my time across Pokémon games. Apparently, someone even ran into one during PAX, which is incredibly cool.
The pixel art in Goobie Garden and Tales of Tuscany is incredibly endearing.
Tales of Tuscany and Goobie Garden both feature extremely charming, well-executed pixel art, with creature designs that look wonderfully silly. I only got to see a few of them overall, but there wasn’t one that didn’t stick out as memorable and ridiculous, so I’m looking forward to seeing all the bizarre monsters that are in store.
Both Goobie Garden and Tales of Tuscany look firmly up my alley, and I can’t wait to check out Athenian Rhapsody in the near future in preparation. Both games feel similarly unhinged in a way that will absolutely not appeal to everyone, but as someone whose brain was deep-fried by the internet in the early 2000s and onwards, I can tell it’s likely going to hook me in pretty hard. There’s no release date for either title at this time, though Tales of Tuscany has a 2026 window, while you can sign up for updates on Goobie Garden on the game’s official website to get an exclusive in-game item and to be first to join the beta.
