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Genre: Arcade

Developer: Toybox Games

Publisher: Big Fish Games

Minimum System Requirements: 400MHz G3, Mac OS X, 128MB VRAM

Price: $19.99

Demo: www.bigfishgames.com (22.6MB - must provide e-mail address)

For years, your grandmother grew prize-winning vegetables. She couldn't keep the same pace in her older years, however, so her garden fell into neglect. Without the income from selling the vegetables, she couldn't pay her bills, so it's up to you to use your green thumb and help your grandmother out.

In each level, you start out with some plants you have to keep watered or else they'll wither and die. After the vegetables become ripe, they'll drop from the vine and you need to pick them up quickly before they rot. The faster you pick up the vegetables, the more money you get from them. In addition to giving the money to your grandmother to beat each level, you can use it for more seeds to plant as well as purchase upgrades to the water system, better bug spray, and stronger fertilizer.

In every level, you can bring up to three friends such as animals that help you attack the bugs, animals that pick up the vegetables, new kinds of plants that don't need to be watered, assistants that turn your vegetables into food and drink for more money, items that water your plants for you, and more. The friends can't be used until you beat the level which unlocks them, which provides incentive to keep on playing.

You also get different kinds of plants that have different qualities. Tomatoes grow quickly but don't sell for a lot of money. Beans give you lots of money but it's hard to quickly click on each bean before they go bad. Pumpkins grow slowly but sell well and can be turned into pumpkin pies for even more money. After beating levels, you can unlock other vegetables with their own advantages and disadvantages.

Every so often, you'll be attacked by bugs who will eat your plants unless you kill them first. Fortunately, you have bug spray which can be upgraded and friends to help you to more quickly get rid of them, which is good because there are some bugs who need all the power you can muster.

Garden Dreams is a fun game, although once you've completed all of the levels the only thing you can do is start over with the friends you've unlocked and a bonus friend so you can use four instead of three. It also seems a tad easy since there's no time limit to collect the money in each level and the only way to fail is to lose all of your plants. However, Garden Dreams seems to be an ideal game for a person who wants to play an arcade game but who might not have the best reflexes or who is just getting started in gaming. With the colorful graphics and simple but fun gameplay, it's easy to recommend trying out the demo.

Download Garden Dreams.