Meaningful decisions through limited choice. How the devs behind Tiny Bookshop were inspired to design their hit cozy game

Recently, I had the opportunity to ask some questions of David Zapfe-Wildemann, the co-founder of neoludic games, the studio behind the recent cozy hit, Tiny Bookshop. In this delightful management simulator, the player opens a, quite literally, tiny bookshop. It’s no more than a small shed that can be pulled along by a car. Set up shop in scenic locations, get to know the locals, figure out the best recommendations, and of course, sell some books.

Conversation with the co-founder of the studio behind Tiny Bookshop

Tiny Bookshop has a loyal audience for a small, single-player cozy experience. In the months after its release, thousands of players were still logging in on Steam every day. TB was also released on Nintendo Switch, which in my opinion is a perfect choice for this type of game. Meanwhile, the online communities for Tiny Bookshop have been impressively active too.

The interview took place over email a few weeks ago and we covered some great topics. Zapfe-Wildemann spoke about the various influences Tiny Bookshop had, interestingly including the Pokémon series, opened up about how players can better understand the 52 types of book tags the game uses, and shared what books they are reading right now. Here’s the interview with neoludic games’ co-founder.

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Matt Buckley, Gamepressure: Could you please introduce yourself to our audience? What is your name, and what is your role on the team?

David Zapfe-Wildemann: Hi there, I’m David Zapfe-Wildemann, the designer of Tiny Bookshop, and co-founder of our small indie studio, neoludic games.

Source: Tiny Bookshop, developer: neoludic games

MB: Tiny Bookshop has really captured an audience of cozy gamers. Aside from the sheer high quality of the game, do you think there is anything the team did to help foster a strong and active player base?

DZW: I think the core values of our game are kindness and compassion, and that is something our players value too, in the spaces they visit and the conversations they have. I think that makes our Discord, Reddit, and so on just really nice spaces to hang out in general.

MB: I’m curious about what kinds of other games inspired Tiny Bookshop. Are there any other games that influenced mechanics or the aesthetic of the game?

DZW: I love the way the Pokémon games create meaningful decisions through limited choice. You have a roster of 6 critters to take with you; each can only memorize four attacks. Limiting these choices makes players’ decisions much more meaningful and ends up making the actual fights a lot snappier, too. Another game I look up to is Frog Fractions, the way it manages to surprise and delight players through its twists and turns was something we tried to capture in the many little side quests and adventures you can go on, which you hopefully weren’t expecting when starting up Tiny Bookshop for the first time. And of course, Night in the Woods for the vibes, and the writing.

Source: Tiny Bookshop, developer: neoludic games

MB: Something I’m seeing come up a lot in the community is a question of how book recommendation logic works. Is there anything you want to address here and now, such as what tags matter most, or if there are any hidden factors? Have you thought about including a way for players to see why their recommendation was rejected?

DZW: That’s a fun question. We have about 52 tags that can be assigned to a book, and a request can consist of 2-3 expressed taste statements. As well as some hidden, implied ones. For instance, kids tend not to like 16+ books, while seniors aren’t often fond of graphic novels. We make sure that every request is doable, but it’s not a puzzle with a clear and perfect solution. Sometimes you might not have the perfect book on your shelf, and it’s good to remember that when your customers ask for help, it’s often because the obvious books have already been sold.

Here are my personal top 3 tips for recommending books in TB:

1. Pay attention to the way people ask for books, how strongly do they word each of their preferences.

2. If you can’t find a book that matches everything your customer requested, avoid the things they dislike and focus on the one thing that’s most important to them.

3. Look in unexpected places. Many kids' books have fantasy in them. Classics can be a wild card for any other genre, and so on.

Source: Tiny Bookshop, developer: neoludic games

MB: Are there any plans to allow players to sort of design their own shelves at any point in the future?

DZW: That would be really cool! Very early on, we had envisioned a woodworking character that could help you customize your shop and shelves, we even had concept art for them, but we had to bench them for the 1.0 release.

MB: Do you have plans for future content updates? If so, what kind of content? Will it be more gameplay-focused or more cosmetic decorations? New books?

DZW: We’re actually in the middle of running a book council with people recruited from our community to help us expand and diversify our selection of books further. The results of this will be in the first content update.

Source: Tiny Bookshop, developer: neoludic games

MB: I’ve seen this come up a few times, so I have to ask, are children’s books low sales part of the design? Or is there something players are missing?

DZW: Since you’re running a second-hand mobile bookshop, we want to incentivize players to move around town. We do that through quests, characters, points of interest, but also by having a limited number of books for sale on any given day. If you are really great at selling crime books, and you only focus on that, odds are, you might run into supply issues. The kids’ genre is certainly the one where we have the least items and quests interacting with it yet. Despite the castle, beach, supermarket, and park all being good places to sell kids' books, it’s one of the trickier genres to sell large quantities of.

MB: Finally, do you have a favorite book or one you’re reading right now?

DZW: I’ve been enjoying Martha Wells’s Murderbot Diaries a lot recently, and am just now starting my annual fall tradition of re-listening to the Song of Ice and Fire audiobooks. That should get me through the winter.

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Thanks to David Zapfe-Wildemann and neoludic games for the opportunity to talk about this cozy indie game. If you want to check out Tiny Bookshop, it comes highly recommended. You can find it now on Steam and Nintendo Switch.

Tiny Bookshop

August 7, 2025

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