Thank you Might and Delight for providing us with a review code!

When I was a child, I often enjoyed building structures out of building blocks, then taking them apart and starting over. There are some video games that allow doing this as much as the player would like. Twinkleby is a game allowing one to build and rebuild as they please, though it's not entirely a success.

Twinkleby takes place on a series of islands in the sky. You arrive to build on these islands. By placing various set pieces, you can attract people to visit these islands and make them their home. As a fun twist, these islands can also be rebuilt at will by the player by simply throwing all the materials used to construct them off the islands, returning the materials to the player to rebuild them as they see fit.

The player starts with a few simple islands, where they are introduced to a shop to buy more materials to build up the islands. The first several islands serve as an extended tutorial, allowing the player to master the game mechanics. Eventually, the player is cut loose to do whatever they see fit and build whatever they see fit in whatever shape they choose.

The player has a few interesting ways to expand their set pieces and other building materials. Stars will fall from the sky, which can be caught and used as currency to buy more building materials from the shop. If people who visit the islands are happy with how the islands have been built up, they will sometimes offer the player gifts of stars. Chests can be found that, when opened, also provide more building materials.

Graphically, this game uses a cel-shaded cartoony style, mixed with some pastel touches to lend a childlike tone to the graphics. Given the cutesy tone, this works wonderfully, especially since the developer has described the game as "cozy". The cutsey style is also further helped by how the NPC people will do all sorts of cheerful animations, such as singing.

The music and sounds are largely ambient and somewhat otherworldly in tone. When NPCs are happy, they will sing, which is represented by a cheerful tune that is very soothing to hear. There isn't too much to talk about, but overall, the soundtrack and sound effects are just as relaxing as the graphics.

This game can be controlled with a keyboard and mouse or any Steam-supported controller (at least Xbox-style controllers). I found both to be fairly intuitive. That said, some of the tutorials are a bit obtuse. To rotate an object, for example, the standard mouse tutorial shows what looks like depressing the right mouse button. This is supposed to indicate you merely tap the item you wish to rotate, not by holding it down. This aside, I found the controls fairly simple.

Stability is pretty solid. This title will run natively on macOS, Microsoft Windows, and Linux. By proxy, this will run out of the box on the Steam Deck.

Morally, there is hardly anything to complain about. There is no violence, foul language, or sexual content of note. There is also no occult or supernatural content. Finally, this game is simply a sandbox for building, much like a child would use a box of Legos to build, and there is nothing morally wrong with that.

Overall, this game is enjoyable. Technically, it's fairly solid, even if some of the tutorials are not too helpful. Morally, this is fit for almost any age. This is not my favorite type of game, even in the cozy building game genre, but it is recommended if you want a cozy game that lets you be creative and is very cute and relaxing.