My Cozy Hero: How Cozy Games Challenge Conventional Hero Dynamics

This paper examines how cozy video games reshape the traditional hero paradigm that dominates mainstream digital play. Written by Mia Consalvo, Andy Phelps, and Kelly Boudreau, it argues that cozy games shift emphasis away from combat, conquest, and power accumulation toward care, gentleness, and relational support. Drawing on Miguel Sicart's concept of "player logic" and on Project Horseshoe's definition of coziness as "the fantasy of safety, abundance, and softness," the authors position coziness as both an aesthetic and an ethical stance. The work is presented as among the first systematic studies of the hero's role in this genre, which the authors note has grown rapidly in popularity and scholarly attention in recent years.

The analysis rests on close readings of three recent titles, Spiritfarer, Wanderstop, and Sips and Sonnets, rather than on large-scale player surveys or quantitative data. In Spiritfarer, the protagonist Stella ferries spirits toward the afterlife through hugging, listening, and emotional support, and her heroism culminates in accepting her own mortality. Wanderstop inverts the reluctant hero trope by having an exhausted fighter learn the value of rest while running a tea shop, and Sips and Sonnets centers an aging former journalist whose wisdom, memory, and conversations, rather than physical prowess, define her capabilities. Across these cases, the authors find that helpful acts carry no gameplay rewards yet gain meaning through their transformative, nontransactional character.

The authors conclude that cozy games expand the repertoire of playable heroism by foregrounding older, frailer, and less conventionally agential protagonists. They argue that such design choices invite players toward alternative models of leadership, care, and community, and thereby broaden how games shape moral imagination and what a hero can be.