''Grunn'' is a 2024 gardening-themed

simulation game Simulation video games are a diverse super-category of video games, generally designed to closely simulate real world activities. A simulation game attempts to copy various activities from real life in the form of a game for various purposes such ...

with horror elements developed and published by

Sokpop Collective Sokpop Collective, also known as simply Sokpop (Dutch for "sock puppet"), is an independent video game development studio located in Utrecht, The Netherlands. The studio was founded in 2015 and consists of four people. The studio is run as a col ...

. The

player character A player character (also known as a playable character or PC) is a fictional Character (arts), character in a video game or tabletop role-playing game whose actions are controlled by a player rather than the rules of the game. The characters tha ...

takes a bus to a

Dutch Dutch or Nederlands commonly refers to: * Something of, from, or related to the Netherlands ** Dutch people as an ethnic group () ** Dutch nationality law, history and regulations of Dutch citizenship () ** Dutch language () * In specific terms, i ...

village in which they maintain a garden where mysterious secrets are littered throughout. Critics praised ''Grunn'' juxtaposition with the game's appearance as a gardening game compared to its horror elements.

Gameplay

''Grunn''

, who is played in a

first-person perspective A first-person narrative (also known as a first-person perspective, voice, point of view, etc.) is a mode of storytelling in which a storyteller recounts events from that storyteller's own personal point of view, using first-person grammar suc ...

, travels by bus to a village in the

Netherlands , Terminology of the Low Countries, informally Holland, is a country in Northwestern Europe, with Caribbean Netherlands, overseas territories in the Caribbean. It is the largest of the four constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Nether ...

to maintain an absent homeowner's garden. The player utilizes their gardening tools to perform various tasks, which include clipping tall grass, digging up molehills, and watering plants. The player may also depart from the house and travel through the village, which includes impossible,

non-Euclidean In mathematics, non-Euclidean geometry consists of two geometries based on axioms closely related to those that specify Euclidean geometry. As Euclidean geometry lies at the intersection of metric geometry and affine geometry, non-Euclidean geo ...

architecture. Various puzzles and unsettling secrets may be discovered; these include corpses, ghosts that haunt past sundown, and

gnomes A gnome () is a mythological creature and diminutive spirit in Renaissance magic and alchemy, introduced by Paracelsus in the 16th century and widely adopted by authors, including those of modern fantasy literature. They are typically depict ...

that appear randomly. Polaroid images are found throughout the game which provide hints to puzzles and are kept through multiple playthroughs. ''Grunn'' has 11 endings, most of which including the death of the player.

Development

''Grunn'' is developed by Tom van den Boogaart and published by

. The game's release date was announced in a trailer in September 2024; ''Grunn'' released on October 4 of that year. Much of ''Grunn'' secrets are influenced by

European folklore European folklore or Western folklore refers to the folklore of the Western world, especially when discussed comparatively. The history of Christendom during the Early Modern period has resulted in a number of traditions that are shared in many E ...

. Its marketing intended to disguise itself as a normal gardening game without horror elements.

Reception

The game received "generally favorable" reviews according to

review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews and ratings of products and services, such as films, books, video games, music, software, hardware, or cars. This system then stores the reviews to be used for supporting a website where user ...

Metacritic Metacritic is an American website that aggregates reviews of films, television shows, music albums, video games, and formerly books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted average). Metacritic was created ...

. A demo review by ''

Rock, Paper, Shotgun ''Rock Paper Shotgun'' is a British video game journalism website. It was launched in July 2007 to focus on PC games and was acquired by Gamer Network, a network of sites led by ''Eurogamer'', in May 2017. History ''Rock Paper Shotgun'' ...

'' found the game enjoyable. Their review upon release found the game's secrets "dark and silly". ''Grunn'' mysterious gameplay was equivalent to napping and waking up to a "thrashing anomaly in the space between the walls". ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...

'' enjoyed the game's secrets as ''

Eurogamer ''Eurogamer'' is a British video game journalism website launched in 1999 alongside parent company Gamer Network. In 2008, it started in the formerly eponymous trade fair EGX (Eurogamer Expo until 2013) organised by its parent company. Fr ...

'' found the endings "pleasantly skin-crawling". The game was difficult to categorize to ''

Polygon In geometry, a polygon () is a plane figure made up of line segments connected to form a closed polygonal chain. The segments of a closed polygonal chain are called its '' edges'' or ''sides''. The points where two edges meet are the polygon ...

'', who complimented ''Grunn'' visuals and the amount of content compared to the village's modest size. ''

GamesRadar+ ''GamesRadar+'' (formerly ''GamesRadar'') is an entertainment website for video game-related news, previews, and reviews. It is owned by Future plc. In late 2014, Future Publishing-owned sites ''Total Film'', '' SFX'', '' Edge'' and '' Compute ...

'' also found the gardening theme as a clever decoy. To them, the game's real focus was its secrets, which made the player feel like a "surreal detective". The

Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences The Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences (AIAS) is a non-profit organization of video game industry professionals. It organizes the annual Design Innovate Communicate Entertain Summit, better known as D.I.C.E., which includes the presentation ...

nominated ''Grunn'' for " Outstanding Achievement for an Independent Game" at the

28th Annual D.I.C.E. Awards The ''28th Annual D.I.C.E. Awards'' was the 28th edition of the D.I.C.E. Awards ("Design Innovate Communicate Entertain"), an annual awards event that honored the best games in the video game industry during 2024 in video games, 2024. The awards ...

References

{{reflist 2024 video games Horror video games Indie games Single-player video games Sokpop Collective games Video games developed in the Netherlands