Actions speak louder than words, and they can even jumpstart much-needed conversations. The language of flowers embodies that sentiment, allowing for hidden meaning and symbolism behind the seemingly simple act of choosing a bouquet for someone. Such is the premise behind the visual novel Hanako’s Flower Shop, where the titular main character helps customers express their feelings through flower arrangements. It’s a charming VN centered around a recent high school graduate and her loving grandfather’s flower shop nestled within a close-knit community. I delighted in the game’s varied and diverse narratives while appreciating how thoughtfully and sensitively the title delves into serious subject matter. The plot’s beginning and middle portions are engaging, while the heartfelt ending made me tear up.
Hanako’s grandfather devotedly raised her after her parents moved away from their small city in Japan to live abroad, and helping him at the shop has been her lifelong dream. To help settle into the routine and find her rhythm, her grandfather makes Hanako take charge of the day-to-day activities of running the shop, all while offering a supportive shoulder for Hanako. It isn’t long before she comes into contact with many memorable customers, all wanting different things from the bouquets they seek to purchase. Can Hanako ensure the family business continues even as she tries to help those who visit it? What happens when an unexpected tragedy hits close to home? Hanako’s Flower Shop deals with universal themes of love and loss, joy and grief, pain and healing in equal measure. Because of this, the game has a content warning disclaimer that players should note.
To say more about the roughly twelve-hour plot would spoil it, so I’ll refrain. Suffice it to say, Hanako’s Flower Shop delves into some surprising territory at times, but it’s tinged with a sense of realism and care. There’s a core message that it earnestly wants to convey, and I feel it largely succeeds in doing so, given the game’s final moving portion. The realistic characters in Hanako’s orbit all have understandable situations and problems, some of which are easy fixes, while others aren’t. It’s endemic to what you come across in real life. The narrative manages to be both bittersweet and hopeful, as well as soft and powerful. Those with whom the story resonates will carry its poignant themes long after the credits roll.
A game day in Hanako’s Flower Shop begins with Hanako preparing for what lies ahead and entering the shop. From there, you can do several activities: listening to the radio for helpful weather forecasts or mood-improving music; visiting the garden; taking a walk to gather flowers should the weather permit; ordering extra seeds or flowers with your funds; stocking up on emotion-boosting sweets at the candy shop; getting two young neighbor kids to retrieve extra flowers for you; or waiting for a customer to arrive.
Of course, like in real life, even excellent customer service cannot solve every issue with sympathy and well-intentioned messages alone. Some of the problems the customers bring inside the shop are too big even for the helpful Hanako to tackle, and sometimes she allows customers to vent. There’s also an emotion meter that factors into the gameplay. If Hanako makes a mistake at work, the emotion meter lowers. Eating sweets or listening to music helps recharge the meter so she can begin anew. It’s relatively easy to keep the meter high, given all the break opportunities you get on a given game day.
Restocking your supplies is vital to ensuring you always have enough of a particular flower to meet customer demand, though each procurement method has drawbacks. For example, the twins can only gather so much at a time, and their picks are random. There’s also the fact that you’re limited to seven bushels of flowers to carry during walks, and the different flowers available change constantly. The colors differentiating flowers during walks can be similar for various types, so you’re never sure what you might pick up. Any seeds planted in the garden take a few game days to grow before harvesting, and getting orders delivered to the shop also takes time. Managing the different ways to collect flowers can be especially tricky in the beginning phases when you don’t have robust funds and when things like the weather impact how often you can go outside. Hanako won’t go out to the garden or for a walk if it is raining.
The game’s bouquet-creating portion is when the language of flowers and communication generally become relevant. When a customer enters the shop, a conversation begins between them and Hanako. You must listen carefully to what’s said, picking up vital clues about what they’re looking for in their order. Fortunately, you have access to a notebook to highlight key words that you believe are worth remembering, and there’s a dialogue log as well, should you need to go over things in more detail. Hanako then begins creating a bouquet using her stockpile of flowers, all of which have three “flower language” descriptors applied to them that will be added to the bouquet’s inherent message/meaning should you add a particular flower into the mix. The descriptors and the bouquet message remain handily displayed throughout the process, so you’re never unaware. Once the bouquet is complete, Hanako gets a monetary reward for her work, and the entire process more or less repeats with a new customer until she calls it a day.
Beyond the game’s flower shop simulation elements, visual novel mechanics also play a significant role. You play as both Hanako and her grandfather at different story points depending on the scene. What you decide and how you choose to respond to queries during these VN portions impact how other characters view you or how a future scene might play out. I was honestly very impressed by how often my choices came up throughout the plot, even after other things had occurred between them. Depending on how things play out in the story, the customers’ plotlines also evolve fascinatingly. Not only will they occasionally visit Hanako at the shop to tell her how things are going with them, but you also get lengthy and detailed letters from customers. It’s a nice touch that makes the world feel more lived in.
Because Hanako’s Flower Shop‘s story has an underlying message it wishes to convey, I’d say the game’s biggest weakness might be the copious amount of handholding to try and get players to the finish line. You’d have to work to “fail” at the game, as it provides numerous opportunities to restock supplies and improve Hanako’s mood. Yes, you do lose some points in the emotions meter should you make a mistake when flower arranging, but so long as you keep the emotions meter high enough, it isn’t a problem. Hanako gives you substantial clues as to which flower needs replacing and which substitutions would work. I imagine those wanting a less casual gameplay loop might find it too easy and forgiving. For the many initial tutorials, though, I found it extremely odd that the game doesn’t mention how to manually save (hint: the pause button in the corner of the screen is your friend!). Given the ease of the gameplay mechanics and the heavy realism of various scenarios, I feel Hanako’s Flower Shop has a story cycle best served by playing in short bursts rather than trying to complete it in one go.
Visually, Hanako’s Flower Shop is a mostly bright and colorful game with some creative and artistic reasons to go darker during specific story points. It isn’t a high-budget VN, but it creatively uses animation effects and expressive character sprites to counter that. The character designs are reminiscent of Studio Ghibli, beautifully conveying the characters’ reactions and emotions. The visuals are eye-catching and clever, helping convey the story’s emotional elements.
Soundwise, Hanako’s Flower Shop‘s BGM is lovely to listen to and helps players resonate with the emotional context of a given scene. I credit the game because it is fully voice-acted, with the English voice actors giving dynamic performances. The English script is easy to follow and understand, with only a few typographical errors and the odd occasion where a spoken line doesn’t completely match the dialogue text. Sometimes, the script’s English translation comes across as too stiff and formal for everyday speech, but it still manages to convey the emotions at work. The game’s entirely playable with just a mouse, so it’s easy enough to get into from a control schematic sense, even if you don’t have a controller for your PC.
Hanako’s Flower Shop is a VN that leans more into the simple side with its gameplay mechanics and overall presentation, but it has a lot of heart and a surprising amount of depth beneath the surface. Those looking for a more casual gaming experience that manages to bring a lot to the table in terms of thoughtful and universal narrative themes should give the title a chance. It communicates so much through what it says directly and what it has you inwardly think about, all in a language very much its own.
