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Press release:
At today’s Wholesome Games Showcase, publisher Cozy Lives (The cozy offshoot of Free Lives, known for Anger Foot and Terra Nil) announced the release window for their highly anticipated cozy crafting game Dressmaker with a new trailer.

It’s coming to PC via Steam this September!

Dressmaker is a tactile tailoring game inspired by real dressmaking! Choose fabric, cut out patterns, and sew them all together to satisfy (or sabotage!) townsfolk with your creations. The game started as a viral Itch.io prototype sensation with over 155.000 downloads, millions of views on socials and is now getting made into a full length Steam game with 60,000 wishlists and counting.

About the Game:

Dressmaker is a cozy simulation game where every part of making a dress is under your control. Choose fabric, arrange and cut out patterns, sew garments, then feed your fabric through the sewing machine to stitch it together. Decorate with buttons, bows and add accessories by hand.

There’s a whole town’s worth of customers and a full calendar of special events. Impress them with made-to-order creations, or display your own designs in the window and sell pre-made dresses off of the rack. Create the dress of your dreams, by hand, one step at a time, with complete creative freedom!

Features:

Buy from a wide range of fabrics, including cotton, linen, wool, silk and velvet.

Design and colour in your sketchbook, adding fabric samples and appliqué.

Arrange and cut out your dress pattern and preview them on a mannequin .

Turn in your dresses to your customers to gain both reputation and coin.

Pet the kitty.

About the team and dev history:

Dressmaker began as a passion project between partners Jonathan Hau-Yoon (Fortnite, Terra Nil) – and Sabrina Becker, an artist and dressmaking expert with a deep passion for costume and fashion history.

Sabrina hoped to pursue costume design professionally, until Ehlers-Danlos syndrome, a connective tissue disorder, put a stop to that dream. Dressmaker grew from Jonathan’s desire to enable Sabrina to pursue her craft via their shared love for games, and they collaborated on an early proof of concept.

Originally envisioned as a small side project, Dressmaker exploded online before a playable prototype even existed. Recognizing the potential, Jonathan pitched the project to his employer Free Lives, an independent games studio in South Africa. It was initially a tough sell, as studio owner Evan Greenwood had built the studio around violent and comedic games like Broforce, GORN and Anger Foot.

Undeterred, Jonathan teamed up with developers Ruan Rothmann (Broforce, GORN) and Sara Laubscher (Terra Nil) to build a prototype in just three weeks (with music by Terra Nil collaborator Meydän). The prototype quickly gained traction online, surpassing 100,000 downloads and inspiring countless players to share their creations.

This overwhelming positive response left the studio with no other option than to greenlight the project under a new label: Cozy Lives!

Today, Dressmaker is being developed for Steam by a dedicated team at Free Lives, with music by Meydän and writing by Kerstin Hall.