Plantera 2: Golden Acorn is another fantastic entry in the Plantera series. While it is a sequel, there is no need to play the original to understand what is happening in this entry. For those unfamiliar, Plantera 2: Golden Acorn is an idle game developed and published by VaragtP and features charming pixelized visuals, a bright bubbly soundtrack, and a satisfying progression system.
Plant, Expand, Sleep and Repeat
In this new exciting, addictive game, the Mellows are back to help you, the player, tend to the garden and grow the fabled Oak tree. These round blue creatures will help you harvest your crops and other resources. By harvesting, your coin count will increase allowing you to expand the garden even further. You can even buy animals to further increase profits.
While there is a lot to learn, it is all introduced with the player’s rank. The game will force you to start by growing leaks, then move to strawberry bushes, and so forth. The player rank will grow as you make more money, in turn allowing you to increase the variety in your garden. All of these mechanics combine into a wonderfully enjoyable experience that kept me hooked for a very long time. I thoroughly enjoyed expanding my garden and customizing it to my liking.
The Oak Tree
New to this sequel is the golden acorn meter. This meter increases over time and can be increased further by planting decorations all over the garden. Once this meter has maxed out, it will grant you a golden acorn, which can be used to grow the Oak tree in the center of your garden. This tree has several benefits, including housing bees to protect the garden from pests and increasing the speed at which the Mellows work. This new feature adds some nice quality-of-life changes to the gameplay. This includes bees attacking aliens, something which the dogs of the previous game cannot do. It is very addicting and satisfying to watch as the tree grows taller and taller.
Sit back and Idle
As an idle game, this game is all about sitting back and watching the money roll in. This is not a bad thing. As stated earlier, players can expand the Garden to further increase their profits. However, if there is nothing else the player can do they can turn off the game and let the Mellows do some work for a while. How long they will work is determined by how much the player has upgraded the clock upgrade. A huge problem most idle games have is being forced to babysit the computer as the game automatically makes profits. This feature is perfect as I can turn the game off, go to the grocery store, then boot it back up to continue expanding my garden.
Cuteness and charm abound
This game has plenty of charm, from the bright bubbly music to the amazing colorful pixelated graphics. Further exuding this charm is the ability to customize your Mellows. New to this sequel is the ability to put hats on your Mellows. This is a neat new feature that I am glad they added. I enjoyed putting top hats on all my Mellows, making them look fancy. Another thing that makes this game so pleasant to look at is the adorable character designs. This cute and cuddly game is a visual treat for the eyes.
Plantera 2: Golden Acorn Idling at its finest
From the charming visuals to the fun and addicting gameplay, Plantera 2 is one of the best idle games I have played. The only negative I can think of is that it hurt my hand a tiny bit when I was mashing click on a Loot Hero. Outside of that very minor problem, this game is fantastic. I loved every second of this charming expierence.
