Potion Permit is an adventure game about a chemist working to help village inhabitants get better from various ailments. You explore the world for ingredients and craft medicine by completing puzzles and mini-games. It stands out for the tension it expresses between superstition and science, along with the expansive world and charming people you meet within it.

After the town's Witch Doctor fails to cure the Mayor's daughter, you're sent in by the Medical Association to try and overcome the distrust for modern alchemy and medicine. You forage the surrounding area for ingredients, sometimes having to fight monsters and animals to get them. You chop down trees, pick plants, and fish in the stream. Sometimes, your potions require animal parts so you have to take on bears and other creatures in fast-paced combat.

You then craft medicinal potions to match the needs of the townsfolk. Crafting is more than just throwing the right ingredients into the pot, you have to fit each one into a grid with no overlaps or spaces, like a game of Tetris. To administer the correct medicine to each patient, you first need to diagnose them through a mini-game where you need to press buttons at the right time in a rhythm challenge. Once you've done this, you can give the patient the needed medicine.

Get all this right and you increase your standing in the town. This deepens your relationships with the locals and lets you upgrade the town's run-down buildings, and customise your own house with items you unlock.

At its core, Potion Permit is a game about helping people, be that by curing their illnesses, rebuilding their village, or nurturing deeper relationships with them. Using the simple loop of fetching, brewing and mini-games, it creates a strong sense of personal achievement as you restore a village and its people to their former status.