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Swery's The Good Life is listed on Steam, but won't be out until 2021

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The Irregular Corporation will publish Swery's oddball game about cats, dogs, and rural English life.

The Good Life
(Image credit: White Owls Inc.)

Hidetaka "Swery" Suehiro, the director of Deadly Premonition and D4: Dark Dreams Don't Die, announced The Good Life in 2017 with a trailer teasing life in the "happiest town in the world," whose residents, for reasons that weren't entirely clear, all turn into cats and dogs at night. There's also a murder, which leaves the body of a mysterious woman floating in a lake—with a sword driven through her torso, giving it all a bit of an out-of-nowhere Arthurian twist.

It looked very weird and potentially interesting, but a $1.5 million crowdfunding campaign on Fig failed to get much beyond the halfway point. Swery tried again in 2018 with a Kickstarter campaign (and a much lower goal) that was ultimately successful, after which we got a story trailer and then a year of silence, followed by a delay to 2020.

We haven't heard much about it since then, but today The Irregular Corporation announced that it has partnered with Swery's White Owls Inc. studio to publish The Good Life, which is now slated to arrive in summer 2021.

The Good Life also has a Steam listing now, which provides a little more information on what it's actually all about. You, as NYC-based photographer Naomi Woods, have been hired to uncover the mystery behind Rainy Woods, a rural English town filled with quirky residents. But you'll also take on a variety of part-time jobs in the town while you're there, as it seems that some less-than-ideal life choices in your past have left you deeply in debt, so you need the cash.

You're not entirely enthusiastic about the whole thing at first—it's a big change from the city life you're used to—but it's not all work and no play: You can also do things like grow a garden, hit the pub, explore the world as a furry four-legged creature, maybe solve a murder, and try to live—here it is—a good life.

The Irregular Corporation has put up an FAQ for The Good Life that you can dive into here. It's pretty bare bones at the moment, but will be expanded with more information "in the coming months."

Andy Chalk
Andy Chalk
US News Lead

Andy has been gaming on PCs from the very beginning, starting as a youngster with text adventures and primitive action games on a cassette-based TRS80. From there he graduated to the glory days of Sierra Online adventures and Microprose sims, ran a local BBS, learned how to build PCs, and developed a longstanding love of RPGs, immersive sims, and shooters. He began writing videogame news in 2007 for The Escapist and somehow managed to avoid getting fired until 2014, when he joined the storied ranks of PC Gamer. He covers all aspects of the industry, from new game announcements and patch notes to legal disputes, Twitch beefs, esports, and Henry Cavill. Lots of Henry Cavill.