There was an era when my bedtime rituals were dominated by screentime—usually doomscrolling online or fighting for my life with my Steam Deck just inches from my face. It was hell on my eyes (and my sleep schedule), so I’ve slowly replaced those hours with books to wind down at night. I’m better for the change, though sometimes a game comes along and I just can’t help myself.
Tiny Bookshop is one of those exceptions. It’s a cute, calm bookselling sim that lets me move around a seaside town peddling a library of literary classics, self-help books, manga, and everything else in between. I’ve spent just about every night for the last week playing a bit while nodding off, forgoing reading books in favor of selling them instead. It’s relaxing to restock and customize my shop until I’m sleepy enough to part ways with my handheld.
As a newcomer in Tiny Bookshop’s sleepy little town, you’ll make fast friends with locals eager to help out and see your pop-up bookshop succeed. Some of them ask for a few favors themselves—like Tilde making me haul her junk around to sell at the local flea market—but aiding them paves the way to expanding your shop. Sure, Tilde is kind of pushy and her request cost me valuable book-selling space, but the good deed meant another happy customer and new ways to spruce up my store.
I was pretty surprised by the bonuses loyal customers and new decorations bring, too. Stat implementation feels thoughtfully catered to the bookstore, and individual item perks gave me ways to move excess inventory. On one occasion, I set out a skull to boost crime novel sales when that was the bulk of my library. Some customers also prefer certain items, so you can tailor the shop to their tastes. Their happiness was often contagious, and I’d get a little buff to encourage more frequent transactions with passersby.
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It’s not an overly complicated system, but a nice touch that matters just enough to impact sales. If I didn’t make enough money, I couldn’t restock books or buy new decorations for my frequent remodeling (the most important part of any game, really). I like that it’s about as laid back or overly involved as I want it to be. Since I’m not interested in stressing while cozied up at night, I roll with the punches and coast through most bad days.
And most of those bad bookselling days were thanks to poor decor decisions. Sometimes I’d forget that carrying bigger items meant paying more in rent, and I’d lose profit lugging Tilde’s junk around. I also offended the local fishermen by showing up to Waterfront Square with not a nautical decoration in sight. They didn’t appreciate me killing the vibe at the Fish Market, so I was scolded into cluttering my bookstore with buoys and life preservers. Those guys hate my whimsy.
The only serious demands on my tired noggin came from customers seeking book recommendations, and much like Emily explained in her Tiny Bookshop preview, I found suggesting books to be one of the best parts of life as a mobile shopkeep. There’s not always an obvious choice in your stock that fits a customer’s taste, but they’ll give you an idea of their usual likes and dislikes, and then you can make a suggestion.
Tiny Bookshop fills its shelves with real books, so I was delighted when I could suggest Naoko Takeuchi’s shoujo classic Sailor Moon or even Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing. I loved how worldly I felt combing my modicum of literature knowledge to make each recommendation. Pretentious is probably the better word there, but in my fantasy bookshop everyone loves listening to me yap.
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Well, mostly everyone. I often made myself chuckle at the expense of customers with more annoying requests I couldn’t fill. I know you asked for a kid’s book with no romance that was written within the last decade, but how about this cardinal kidnapping Dan Brown murder mystery instead? Eventually I sold my one copy of Angels and Demons, but not before annoying every parent in town.
It was nice that I could make those mistakes (intentional or not) without being left overly frustrated or sweating disappointment. I can easily stop for the night and pick up where I left off tomorrow, plus feel good about sort of sticking to my goal of regularly relaxing with a good book. I know I didn’t just read Sense and Sensibility, but I did tell someone else to. It’s a book adjacent activity, okay?
Anyway I swear I’m not advocating for more bright screens in your face before turning in for the night, but if you’re looking for the gaming equivalent of a warm bedtime story, then Tiny Bookshop is just that (but maybe minus the Robert Langdon stories). It’s novel enough as a cozy management sim to hold my attention, but never so demanding that I can’t find a good place to stop when my eyes get heavy.