Cozy Companion (Issue #2)

So, as I write this, I arrived in Nashville yesterday and spent a nice easy day recovering from my three day drive. The friend that I’ll be travelling with for the next few weeks arrived early this morning from their stupid early flight from Canada’s East Coast, so we both just needed to relax. To encourage this bit of vital self-care, the universe decided to drop a big ol’ thunderstorm on us in the evening. What better time to cozy up with Issue #2 of Cozy Companion, a magazine of cozy games and fiction by the fine folx at Snowbright Studio. Yes, that was three cozys in one sentence and I don’t care.

If you recall, I raved about Issue #1 and burned through it in a single night. Circumstances prevented me from doing the same thing again here. But on the upside, that’s also the main reason this was one of the few physical books I brought with me. Boy oh boy, am I glad that I did. One of the things I mentioned, albeit briefly, in my Issue #1 review, was that “I expect the tone and overall format to stay fairly close [in future issues], but there are always things that could change.” I said that having very specifically not looked at Issue #2. 

Having now read Issue #2, I can say that I was unequivocally right. Same tone and the graphic layout has been ever so slightly tweaked, with the addition of colour-coded topic flags at the beginning of each article. There’s no mistaking if what you are about to read is real-world science, in-game Lore, or a fiction piece. The only place I didn’t like it (and this is me being picky) was the purple Fiction flag that clashed horribly with the distinct black and white art style of the ink-universe for Shadow in the Night part 2. But I’ll come back to that in a bit. 

Last issue had a theme of Fungi, a fitting first theme given they are the hot new cuteness out there. This issue has a less fancy but much more flowery theme of pollinators. The birds and the bees. (Not like that, this is supposed to be cozy ya perv) The butterflies and the Mothcat. (Wait what?) From the present to the prehistoric. (Are we still on the same topic…?) Without pollinators, our entire ecosystem would whither away. That’s not even being terribly hyperbolic, no pollinators means almost no plants. Certainly not enough plants to maintain our delicate food chain. In recent years bees have been getting acknowledged for their role as more than just a Winnie the Pooh side quest. (Hmm, Pooh is in the public domain and now I sort of want a Thousand Acre Wood RPG. If anyone out there takes my idea and makes one, let me know.) Sorry, I got distracted, where was I? Right… bees getting all the hype. Bees are prolific pollinators, but there are many more that get some love as the issue progresses. 

I’m going to take a slightly less linear approach to this issue, partly because there are more, shorter, bits this time. On the very short end, things kick off with a Letter from the Editor about what is to come; a pair of “Friends of Snowbright” photo layouts with snapshots submitted by staff, friends, and fans; and a pair of young-at-heart activities. There is also a new Snowbright Science Corner on “Plucky Pollinators,” which is a column I’m really going enjoy seeing more of, assuming future topics are suitable.

Then we have three separate interviews. First up is Paul Salomon, designer of the game Honey Buzz. Just like the last issue’s designer interview, you can also watch the whole interview on YouTube. As well, there is an interview with Nancy Sheehan from Journey North, a participatory science program that is celebrating 30 years at the University of Wisconsin Madison Arboretum. Journey North does some fascinating things and, like a surprising amount of Cozy Companion, the interview is stuffed so full of information that it’s just easier to say go read it for yourself. The third interview looks at another of the Snowbright Team’s favourite cozy hangouts, Brewella’s in Lakewood, Ohio. That interview closes with a delicious looking recipe for a lavender syrup that they claim is good in just about everything. They specifically suggest pouring it over frozen blueberries and seltzer water or adding it to some lemonade, for a refreshing treat. I make a mean lemonade, and some locally sourced Saskatoon berries would make for an even tastier version of that blueberry seltzer. I may have just found my next YouTube short when I get home in a few weeks.

Now let’s get into some of my favourite bits, starting with some Verdant Isle Lore. First up is “Life in the Eyelet: An Excerpt from the Amberhaven Tourist Guide” written by Calami Jacks, an Eyelet Ranger and Guardian. Jack notes that he “ain’t much of a writer, but Charlotte said I should send a note to y’all at the Amberhaven Tourism Office because you got a lot of things wrong the last time you wrote about us here on the coast.” the two page letter continues with that same sort of down-home feel and winds up with an invite to Charlotte for some Kelp Dip, as long as she doesn’t bring Grimsby. That guy gets on his nerves. The second scrap of Lore is “A Guide to Plants of the Verdant Isles” and I feel like this piece is part of why Snowbright has added those topic flags I mentioned earlier. It is fairly obvious that this is fictional, but it comes immediately after the real-world “Pollinator Paradise” photo spread and Snowbright is so brilliant at blending fact and fiction that noting which is which could be important. Sort of like back in the 80s when Saturday morning cartoons were required to insert a bumper to differentiate the show from the commercials.

There was one thing I was SUPER excited about in this issue, after finishing the last one. Shadow in the Night part 2! Taking place in the world of Snowbright’s second TTRPG, ink, the story answered all of the questions brought up in part 1, yet left me hollowed out inside with the final words: THE END. Thankfully it also says “to be continued in future adventures” and that gives me hope. Do you hear me Grace Collins? Hope. Don’t destroy this pinprick of light in the darkness for me. Issue #3 is right around the corner. ink it up.

Of course one of the prominent components of Cozy Companion is the adventure. But this time we don’t just get an adventure, we get an entirely new RPG System, based on the video game Time Tails. This is, of course, the Shrinkified Version of what I hope will eventually come out as a standalone product. But you can play this with just the included rules and characters. Briefly, your anthropomorphic feline character has four Habits (attributes): Paws, Claws, Curiosity, and Snuggles; plus four Mindsets (similar to attributes, but more how you approach a situation): Flow, Rational, Firecracker, and Raditude. Habits and Mindsets are represented by two intersecting lines, quartering a circle, the wedges between the two lines are where the actual stat numbers are filled in, meaning that bonuses or penalties apply to each of the adjacent Habits or Mindsets.

The adventure itself is titled The Mystery of Mothcat and if that isn’t enough to sell you on it, I don’t know that anything else I can tell you about it will. But you are going to leave your home in 1980, travel to the city of Cozy Point, West Virginia, and track down several prehistoric creatures that have been sucked through a time glitch into the year 1966. Return the wayward critters to the Eocene era, repair the glitch, and learn the secret of the legendary Mothcat. Easy breezy.

I somehow missed mentioning a very important segment of the magazine last time around. Snowbright’s Head of HR, Ryla, presents a few short game reviews. Oh, Ryla is also a cat.

These reviews are symbolic of what makes Snowbright Studio such a great company. In Cozy Companion they interview the designers of games published by another company. The office cat reviewed several games published by other companies. They interviewed businesses that have no official connection to their own company. They are happy to chat with their interviewees about games published by other companies. Not everyone would do that. It creates a sense of community that I absolutely love and it makes me love their team even more. I’m so excited for Issue #3 to see how this magazine continues to evolve and grow. What a time we live in. What. A. Time.

You can all sorts of cozy things from Snowbright Studio online at www.snowbrightstudio.com or on Facebook at facebook.com/SnowbrightStudio.