MakeRoom review: a lovely sandbox decorator for sad millennials

Millennials from all walks of life are connected by a singular pain: the thought of never owning our own homes, and having our living spaces dictated by landlords and arbitrary rules. MakeRoom is a light salve to that conundrum: a cosy simulation game that allows you to establish and decorate your own cosy living space, in any way you like. This is a minimalist version of The Sims, providing you with a space and thousands of lovely hand-crafted objects to fill it with love and light.

There’s no fuss in this creation. MakeRoom minimises friction in its UX, going for a minimalist approach that allows you to focus on building your cosy space creatively. You get options for item sizing, colour, and placement (and you can even create your own custom furniture, if you have the patience) and you’re given free rein to realise the dream space in your head.

If you find yourself looking at a blank canvas, paralysed by the choices presented, the game does also provide you with light doses of inspiration. From the main menu screen, you can either start a room fresh, or you can jump into one of a dozen set spaces, to put your own mark on them.

These include a ‘cat paradise’ living room, a vampire’s lair, a gamer bedroom, a moving van, and more. In each location, you’ll find only a handful of tasks to complete – these are more tutorial levels than anything – but they reveal the possibilities, and allow you to bring lessons back to your own cosy spaces.

Bring your imagination to MakeRoom, and your future dreams

With each space in MakeRoom allowing a freedom of choice, you can relax, and find yourself transported into a world of possibilities, where money is no object. For a sad millennial, it’s a dream sandbox simulator, allowing for an expression of creative thought. What if my landlord let me put a photograph or an artwork on the walls? What if I could afford a cool hexagonal rug, or enough plants to make my space seem like a veritable greenhouse? What about a dog or a cat?

For an entire generation, these humble dreams seem distant. In MakeRoom, you can imagine a brighter future, where these dreams are in reach – even if creating your ideal rooms in a virtual world also comes with the sting of longing. Close your eyes against it, and you’ll find much to love in MakeRoom, even in its simplicity.

This is a game with a simple purpose: to allow you to create virtual rooms. It’s not more complex beyond that, and it’s all the better for its minimalist approach. It evokes childhood play in many aspects, with its cutesy furniture, plants, and light fittings sharing a lovely, plasticky doll-like aesthetic. With each added decoration, your space gets a little cosier, and it gets easier to imagine a tiny human (or yourself) living inside, having the best life.

You can also let your imagination run wilder, beyond the sad dreams of millennials. You can imagine yourself as a monster in a basement, and place dark, gothic furniture in a virtual dungeon. Or, if you’ve had lighter dreams lately, you can place cabinets and foodstuffs to imagine yourself as a cafe proprietor. Maybe even a cat cafe proprietor.

Whatever you choose, MakeRoom gives you the tools to imagine a cosy space, from every angle.

What should be understood in this process is that all the satisfaction of your progress lies in the creation of art, and not much further beyond. This is a sandbox simulator that lets you live out your cosy decorator dreams, without the pressure that set goals or an end state might provide. You’ll need to be happy with gazing and appreciation to full enjoy the experience.

That lack of depth may be disappointing to some players, but not so long as the core tenant of MakeRoom is understood. This is not a deep game, and your cosy spaces serve no tangible purpose. But that’s the joy of the experience. You’re creating for the sake of creating, in a world with no firm guidelines or rules. No landlord to tell you not to hang a painting off the wall.

In MakeRoom, you can simply create and vibe. That’s all this game is, and all it needs to be. Once you accept that, you’ll find yourself in a cosier world, where anything feels possible.

_{A copy of MakeRoom was provided by the publisher for the purposes of this review.}

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