Garden Quest

About the Game

You are the specialist gardening gnome of Scandinavia. Your love of growing and designing new gardens is exceeded only by your obsession of living surrounded by plants. This has given you a reputation for expert preparation, planning, and construction of beautiful creations, making your aesthetic designs highly valued all around. Now the local residents of the island of Heimaey wish to hire you to build up beautiful gardens to match their lush scenery. Are you up to the challenge?

"Garden Quest" has different game modes: "Fill a Garden," "Expand your Garden," and "Defend your Garden." In the "Fill" game mode, your goal is to cover the level in a certain amount of plant growth. In the "Expand" game mode, you must expand your garden from one location to the next through a series of puzzles and obstacles. In "Defend" game mode, you must maintain and protect your garden from invasions of harmful pests that wish to eat your beautiful creations, within a time limit and without letting too much of the garden die. Winning the game involves beating all the various challenges (from among the different types) and creating gardens all across the island of Heimaey.

The challenges are therefore varied depending on the mode you are in. Creating a garden is no small task, as you must prepare the soil and build up long support structures of plants, watering and caring for them as necessary to reach the fill goal. When extending a garden to another location, you must find a way to grow your plants around the mazes, obstacles, and other obstructions in your path. Defending your garden will entail watering and repairing the damage to your flowers in face of the hungry pests.

You are in control of the gnome. Move the gnome by using the arrow keys in the four cardinal directions. The gnome has a reticule in front of him to show what square he is facing. You can do three actions into this square: Dig, Plant, and Water. Note that on Defend levels, you may only use Water.

There are ten levels of each game type. Each room contains a map that you must navigate within, along with a Heads-Up-Display that contains information about your current mission. The seed icon in your HUD will contain an overlay indicating to you what the next type of plant will be when it blooms. Use this to plan your gardens strategically. Here you will also find progress bars showing your current progress towards the mission's goal, along with timers (for Defend levels).

The goal of the game is to create gardens. In Fill and Expand types of levels, you must grow new plants to fill up certain portions of the map. A plant's growth starts in the soft earth, so you cannot grow on rocks or walls. To start a plant, you must first dig a hole. To do this, use the 'D' key to dig the square in the reticule. Once you have a hole, you may plant a seed in it. Do this with the 'S' key. Once a seed is planted, it must be watered a few times before it starts to grow. To apply water, hit the spacebar. Once the plant grows, it will take but a moment to bloom fully. The plants will eventually need to be watered in again in order to last, and will distinctly darken in color when they are losing water. Simply run over and water their squares to restore them. Should a plant die, you must Dig it up before you can replant on that square.

There are several types of plants. The most basic and simple is the Flower, which occupies a single square. The Vine will start growing fast, and will spread in a line to any dug up spots. In order to take advantage of the vine, you must make sure to dig a line of holes for it to spread, otherwise it will die. The Thorn will spread randomly in any direction very quickly, but does not need to have holes dug for it ahead of time. This can be a very helpful tool for spreading through an area! The Bush will bloom slowly, but will eventually occupy all the surrounding squares. Be careful not to hamper its growth; should any other plants or objects occupy one of the squares it is trying to grow into, the bush will die. After a while, a matured bush will provide a fruit, which will be a Power Up.

There are two types of Power Ups that will grow off of Bushes. One is a Speed Boost, which allows the gnome to move faster. The other is a Super Watering Can, which allows the gnome to simultaneously water all the squares around him. These power ups are the key to success in the harder levels, where you must constantly water your massive gardens.

The Fill levels require you to fill specific areas with plants. Once you have put plants into all of the needed zones, you will proceed to the next level. Expand levels are very similar to the Fill levels, except that you must have a stretch of touching plants going from the Start point to the Goal at the edge of the map. Defend levels are more unique; you will be unable to dig or plant seeds. You may only water the plants that are preplaced, and will not be able to restore ones that die. You must keep a certain amount of the garden alive within the time allotted. You will also be attacked by various pests who will drain the water from your plants. Spray the pests with water and they'll flee, giving you a chance to rehydrate your garden.

You must pass each mission to move onto the next. Failing a mission will require you to redo it until you succeed. The levels get significantly more challenging, so practice often!