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Get Children Gardening

Video games are mostly inside experiences. However, they offer experiences that can connect players to a love of gardening and the outside. The games in this list have a garden aspect to their story, gameplay and interactions.

In some of the games, you use gardening and farming as central elements, while other games offer gardening as something optional. Either way, these interactions introduce players to concepts of the seasons, crop rotation, soil, fertiliser and the impact on the environment.

If you want to have more time to talk about gardening with a child or want to introduce them to the idea that they could create their own garden (or crop) then these games are a great way to extend those ideas into reality.

This list includes 59 games from the last 17 years, with 1,343 likes. They come from a range of different genres and play-styles and are all good games if you want to inspire a love of mud.

Stardew Valley

Release Date: 26/02/2016, updated in 2018

Out Now: Amazon Fire, Android, Mac, PC, PS Vita, PS4, Switch, Xbox One and iOS

Skill Rating: 9+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead, Day and Night, Grid, Open World and Pixels

Stardew Valley looks like a farming simulator. That’s partly what it is, but you also develop relationships with the other townsfolk and delve deep into the mines. Its quirky labyrinthine attention to detail is inviting for young players to try their...

Apico

Release Date: 20/05/2022, updated in 2022

Out Now: Mac, PC, Switch, Xbox One and Xbox X|S

Skill Rating: 8+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead, Day and Night, Grid and Pixels

Apico is a simulation game where you play a beekeeper and conservationist. You explore environments, breed rare bees and release them into the wild while growing your business. There are no enemies, time constraints or set objectives so you can focus on...

Graveyard Keeper

Release Date: 15/08/2018

Out Now: PC, PS4, Switch and Xbox One

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead, Day and Night, Grid, Open World and Pixels

Graveyard Keeper is a funeral-themed role-playing game where you are the caretaker of a local cemetery. You make choices about how to lay out the plot, what services to offer and generally how to make money from your unusual enterprise. The pixilated...

Terra Nil

Release Date: 28/03/2023

Out Now: Mac, PC and iOS

Skill Rating: 11+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead, Grid and Open World

Terra Nil is a strategy game where you use clean technology to bring back life to a barren world. It's a city-building game where you aren't building a city at all, but a clean thriving ecology. It raises interesting themes of how humanity plays an...

Rootown

Release Date: Coming soon

Coming Soon: Android, Mac, PC and iOS

Skill Rating: 8+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On and Pixels

Rootown is a traversal strategy game where you guide tree roots down through the soil. You play by planting a tree and then steering its roots to find good soil and avoid stones. The better you do the bigger the tree and the more resources you have to...

Mutazione

Release Date: 23/09/2019

Out Now: Mac, PS4 and iOS

Skill Rating: 11+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On and Day and Night

Mutazione is a narrative adventure game where you play as a 15-year-old girl visiting her grandfather on a faraway island inhabited by friendly but mutated villagers. By finding seeds, tending to gardens and talking to people, you uncover a tightly knit...

Slime Rancher

Release Date: 14/10/2016

Out Now: Mac, PC, PS4, Switch and Xbox One

Skill Rating: 7+ year-olds

Components: 3D First-Person, Cartoon, Day and Night and Open World

Slime Rancher is a farming simulation with a difference. Rather than chickens, sheep or cows, you farm slimes. As you gather more slimes and species, you collect more types of plorts from them, which can be used to upgrade your farm and your gear. It...

Astroneer

Release Date: 16/12/2016, updated in 2019

Out Now: PC, PS4, Switch and Xbox One

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person, Day and Night and Open World

Astroneer is an open-world space adventure where you colonize planets by creating habitable structures, farming and mining resources. There is no specific story, although the challenges of each planet give rise to struggles of achievement to placate the...

Farm Together

Release Date: 25/02/2018, updated in 2019

Out Now: Mac, PC, PS4, Switch and Xbox One

Skill Rating: 8+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person, Cartoon, Day and Night and Open World

Farm Together is a low-pressure farm simulator. You develop your farm by yourself or cooperate with your friends. Starting with an empty plot you can grow crops, plant trees, take care of the animals, add buildings and facilities, and unlock new items...

House Flipper

Release Date: 17/05/2018, updated in 2019

Out Now: Android, Mac, PC, PS4, Switch, Xbox One, Xbox X|S and iOS

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 3D First-Person

House Flipper is a simulation game where you renovate old broken houses to make money. It's a blend of money management, detailed interior design and repair right down to the electric circuitry. It fosters a sense of creativity and imagination in how...

Littlewood

Release Date: 18/06/2019

Out Now: Mac, PC and Switch

Skill Rating: 8+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead, Day and Night, Open World and Pixels

Littlewood is a town and farming simulator a little like Stardew Valley or Animal Crossing. Here though, the twist is that the game is set after a grand adventure. You beat the boss, and...

One Hour One Life

Release Date: 27/02/2018

Out Now: Android, Mac, PC and iOS

Skill Rating: 9+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead, Hand-Made and Open World

One Hour One Life is a civilisation survival game where each player lives a whole life in an hour of play and then passes away. Born as a baby into the care of anonymous other online players, you initially depend on them for food. Quickly growing, you...

My Friend Peppa Pig

Release Date: 22/10/2021

Out Now: PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One and Xbox X|S

Skill Rating: 4+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On, Cartoon and Day and Night

My Friend Peppa Pig is a narrative role-play game. It recreates the TV show Peppa Pig and features a few of the voice actors from the programme. Unlike the show, you are in the cartoon, controlling a character you create. You play with Peppa and her...

Hokko Life

Release Date: 02/06/2021, updated in 2022

Out Now: PC, PS4, Switch and Xbox One

Skill Rating: 8+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person, Cartoon, Day and Night and Open World

Hokko Life is a community simulation game like Animal Crossing. You pick a town and set up your home, before spending time helping the place develop into a charming rural idyl everyone loves. Even though it's the creation of one person, it has most of...

Paralives

Release Date: Coming soon

Coming Soon: Mac and PC

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead

Paralives is a simulation game where you build houses for people and then control how they live. It's inspired by games like the Sims, however, you have complete control over every aspect of the design of the house and its residents. Its balance of...

Grounded

Release Date: 28/07/2020, updated in 2022

Out Now: PC, Xbox One and Xbox X|S

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 3D First-Person, 3D Third-Person, Cartoon, Day and Night and Open World

Grounded is a survival game where you are tiny and find yourself in someone’s back garden. It’s like Honey I Shrunk The Kids meets Fortnite. Ants, cockroaches, and bees pose a threat along with environmental hazards like water, tall grass and large...

Hundred Days, Winemaking Simulator

Release Date: 13/05/2021

Out Now: Android, PC, Stadia, Switch and iOS

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead, Cards and Grid

Hundred Days, Winemaking Simulator is a strategy game about making wine. You control every aspect of a new Winery, choose vines, and learn how to grow them and when to harvest. You make decisions about the process with a simple interface that takes you...

Little Dragons Café

Release Date: 21/09/2018

Out Now: PC, PS4 and Switch

Skill Rating: 8+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person, Day and Night and Open World

Little Dragons Café is a strategy game about running a cafe. Unlike other farming and friendship games, you don't have to earn money or toil to gain ingredients. Simply explore, collect and cook. It's farming gaming without the stress.

Viva Pinata

Release Date: 09/09/2006

Out Now: DS, PC, Xbox 360 and Xbox One

Skill Rating: 8+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person, Cartoon and Day and Night

Viva Pinata is a strategy garden simulation where you tend and care for 60 different piñata animals. Play involves interacting with the Pinata themselves, but also creating the right environment to attract new creatures and helping them thrive. It...

PowerWash Simulator

Release Date: 19/05/2021, updated in 2023

Out Now: PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One and Xbox X|S

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 3D First-Person

PowerWash Simulator is a puzzle game where you clean different objects and locations using a pressure washer. It's designed to be soothing with sounds of high-pressure water and satisfyingly clean results as you blast away every speck of dirt and grime.

My Time at Sandrock

Release Date: 26/05/2022

Out Now: PC, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One and Xbox X|S

Skill Rating: 7+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person, Cartoon, Day and Night and Open World

My Time at Sandrock is a life-simulating role-play game where you restore a run-down town. It's set in the same wholesome yet post-apocalyptic world as My Time at Portia. You start by working as a builder, but soon...

The Garden Path

Release Date: Coming soon

Coming Soon: Mac, PC and Switch

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead, Cartoon and Open World

The Garden Path is a slice-of-life simulation game about the small pleasures of gardening. You tend to a world and make it your own through fishing, growing, trading and making new friends. As you do an adventure emerges.

Grow Up

Release Date: 26/08/2016

Out Now: PC, PS4 and Xbox One

Skill Rating: 9+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person, Day and Night and Open World

Grow Up is a running and jumping adventure. It is the sequel to 2015's Grow Home and extends the real physics exploration that lets you push, pull, climb and direct how plants grow in the world.

Garden Story

Release Date: 11/08/2021

Out Now: Mac, PC, Switch and Xbox One

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead, Open World and Pixels

Garden Story is a role-playing adventure, crafting and farming game similar to Stardew Valley. It also features combat, dungeons and puzzles similar to the Zelda games. You defend your garden home from an invasion of...

Eco

Release Date: 06/02/2018

Out Now: Mac and PC

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 3D First-Person, Blocks, Day and Night and Open World

Eco extends the resource-collecting and building of Minecraft by introducing environmental implications to your actions. Using resources like trees will erode the soil; mining might pollute the river; and each animal depends on another.

Wildmender

Release Date: 28/09/2023

Out Now: PC, PS5 and Xbox X|S

Skill Rating: 11+ year-olds

Components: 3D First-Person, Cartoon, Day and Night, Open World and Weather

Wildmender is a world-building game where you unearth the past in the desert. Play involves exploring to discover what has gone before, so you can restore the environment for your future. You work to revive withering plant life, cultivate a garden and...

Wylde Flowers

Release Date: 18/02/2022

Out Now: Apple TV, Mac, PC, Switch and iOS

Skill Rating: 7+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead, Day and Night, Grid and Weather

Wylde Flowers is a cozy life and farming strategy game with a witchy twist. It's a charming world of diverse characters, magical spells and player choices. You play Tara, who has moved in to help her grandma and the family farm. By day you work the farm...

Strange Horticulture

Release Date: 21/01/2021

Out Now: PC

Skill Rating: 11+ year-olds

Components: 2D Side-On and Hand-Made

Strange Horticulture is an occult puzzle detective game where you run a plant shop. While you identify and sell new plants to your customers you discover and influence their interweaving lives. It's unusual because your power is in your knowledge of...

From Dust

Release Date: 27/07/2011, updated in 2011

Out Now: PC, PS3 and Xbox 360

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person, Day and Night and Weather

From Dust is a strategy game. You play as an all powerful God of a primitive people. The land is ancient but devoid of humans. Unusually, you control the landscape rather than the people, moving land and water and lava to give villagers pathways to...

Wildflower From The Embers

Release Date: Coming soon

Coming Soon: Mac and PC

Components: 3D Third-Person, Open World and Weather

Wildflower From The Embers is a narrative role-play game about a young witch and her life in a new town. Drawing on play developed in Tenderfoot Tactics, you talk to locals, solve problems, fight demons and witch hunters and commune with the forest...

The Stillness of the Wind

Release Date: 07/02/2019

Out Now: Mac, PC, Switch and iOS

Components: 2D Overhead and Hand-Made

The Stillness of the Wind is a narrative puzzle game where you play an old woman who looks after a dilapidated farm. Over the course of a few hours, no matter what your efforts, the farm falls apart as you learn about the woman’s family and have the...

Tree

Release Date: 13/08/2018

Out Now: PC

Components: 2D Side-On and Hand-Made

Tree is a narrative game that tells the story of a boy who plants a small tree. You control the planting, watering and how the tree grows each season. It stands out for how it illustrates the passing of time and the way we interact and form connections...

Cloud Gardens

Release Date: 09/09/2020, updated in 2021

Out Now: Mac, PC, Xbox One and Xbox X|S

Skill Rating: 6+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead and Blocks

Cloud Gardens is a puzzle game where you grow vegetation over a dilapidated post-apocalyptic world. It's a low-pressure puzzle, from the team behind Kingdom. It has the same pixel-art style, but here you are left to take your time...

Lawn Mowing Simulator

Release Date: 10/08/2021

Out Now: PC, PS5, Xbox One and Xbox X|S

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person

Lawn Mowing Simulator is an adventure game where you ride an authentic and expansive roster of lawnmowers. The novelty is a combination of absolute control over lawn care and weed eradication. This is extended beyond a brief distraction by the inclusion...

Staxel

Release Date: 23/09/2021

Out Now: PC and Switch

Skill Rating: 7+ year-olds

Components: 3D Third-Person, Blocks and Open World

Staxel is a strategy farming game. It looks like Minecraft and has block building tools that are similar. However, this is a farming game more like Stardew Valley rather than open-world adventure. There are no monsters or dangers you find in other...

Deiland Pocket Planet

Release Date: 09/08/2018

Out Now: PC, PS4 and Switch

Components: 3D Third-Person, Day and Night and Open World

Deiland Pocket Planet is an adventure set on a small spherical planet. You farm, craft, and build your own world. Improve your skills, craft tools, cook food, brew potions, and create tools. As you make your home, you will attract merchants to trade...

Ritual of Raven

Release Date: Coming soon

Coming Soon: PC

Skill Rating: 10+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead, Blocks and Pixels

Ritual of Raven is a farming game like Stardew Valley but here you add programming code to the inhabitants of the farm to help them grow and harvest the plants. Similarly to Rabbids Coding,...

Fae Farm

Release Date: 08/09/2023

Out Now: PC and Switch

Skill Rating: 8+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead and Cartoon

Fae Farm is a simulation game where you build a farmstead, harvest your crops, and go adventuring. It's an increasingly common set-up for a game. Here though, you use magical spells to grow your plants, defeat enemies and interact with a varied cast of...

Pocket Oasis

Release Date: Coming soon

Coming Soon: PC, Switch and iOS

Skill Rating: 7+ year-olds

Components: 2D Overhead and Hand-Made

Pocket Oasis is a gentle horticulture simulation where you care for plants and pets on your balcony. It's a meditative experience where the end goal, rather than being a defined objective, is simply to create a beautiful balcony with an array of...

Spring Falls

Release Date: 17/11/2019

Out Now: Mac, PC and iOS

Components: 2D Overhead and Blocks

Spring Falls is a puzzle where you erode a geometric landscape to let water flow down the mountain and help plants grow. Along with the low-pressure puzzle play, the game offers a calming experience with soft visuals, ambient music and interactive...

Taming Gaming Book Written by parents for parents, the database complements the in-depth discussion about video game addiction, violence, spending and online safety in the Taming Gaming book. We are an editorially independent, free resource without adverts that is supported by partnerships.

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