August 2026

Digseum is a brilliant little game that is very enjoyable while also valuing your time. The digging and excavation loop is genuinely fun, the incremental progression is satisfying, and I loved basically every second of it. It never gets boring, scales really well for its short runtime, and never once felt like it was padding itself out just for the sake of it. Highly recommended!

My Little Spider is a cute desktop companion idler that undermines its own appeal with a rough early game, poor customization, and an oddly active gameplay loop for something meant to sit in the background. The spider and art style are genuinely charming, but between the visual clutter, the lack of scaling options, and a slog of a first few hours before things actually feel idle, this one has a fair bit of friction for what's supposed to be a low-effort desktop pet. Recommended, but just know the game has a slow start and the more active elements don't exactly feel like they pay off all that much.

My Little Life starts off slow, cramped, and a little frustrating, but stick with it and it turns into something worth your time. Once you get a second person and enough money to actually start decorating, the game opens up in a way the early hours don't hint at. It's very forgiving with its economy, refreshingly customizable, and more active than you'd expect. Give it a real chance before writing it off. Recommended, but just know the start may be a bit rough.

Rusty's Retirement is the perfect mix of active and idle content for a desktop companion game. It's an idle-farming sim that sits at the bottom of your screen, but there's actually a ton to engage with beyond just watching numbers go up. I'm not a fan of desktop idlers that don't have much substance to them, and this definitely isn't one of those. Between the layout optimization, the wonderful pixel art, and the way the game politely gets out of your way when you need it to, this one's a very easy recommendation.

All Hail the Orb has a lot of soul. The atmosphere, animations, and overall presentation are far better than I expected going in, the incremental progression has plenty of systems to sink your teeth into, and the developer even coded in a funny little callout for autoclicker users, which honestly won me over more than it annoyed me. A few UI and movement issues hold it back from being flawless, but this one's easy to recommend.