This dress-up game is the unsung superstar of showcase season, and you can play part of it now

Infold cornered the market for dress-up games with Infinity Nikki and its predecessors, but some stiff competition showed up during June 6’s Wholesome Direct: Dressmaker. It’s part management sim, where you get to know your client base and their preferences, and part dress-up sandbox that lets you stitch together an absolutely massive variety of outfits.

If the idea sounds familiar, there’s a good reason for that. Dressmaker started life as an Itch.io prototype in August 2025, a collaboration between Terra Nil co-creator Jonathan Hau-Yoon and artist and fashion historian Sabrina Becker. It went over so well that Hau-Yoon pitched it to Free Lives a few months later, the publisher behind the ultra-violent VR game Gorn and the crude comedy game Genital Jousting. It was hardly their métier, but Free Lives recognized the potential — and saw how much enthusiasm people had for it in such a short time — and approved a pitch from the team for a full game.

Cozy Lives still has the prototype up on Itch if you wanted to give it a try. There’s also a log with some of the major changes implemented since the original version, like improved interface and detailed body sliders and measurements for properly bespoke clothing. If only other devs recognized multiple body types exist, too!

Anyway, here’s how Dressmaker works. Clients visit the store with requests ranging from exceptionally vague (“a work-appropriate dress for a library”) to the very specific (garden party dress with flowers, oh and make it cute and romantic), and then you’re free to decide what exactly that should look like. Like in the Nikki games, everything has a range of style metrics that, ideally, add up to meet the client’s expectations. But you’re free to decide how it all goes together.

There’s a sketchbook where you can plan your creation — coloring in sections, deciding styles, that kind of thing. After you get an idea of the materials you’ll need, it’s time to pick your fabric. My brain was already lit up during the trailer, but it practically short-circuited here. The fabric selection even in just the prototype and trailer is loaded. Silks, wool, and cottons of every description, houndstooth, florals, plaids, damask, gingham — it’s a massive collection of choices. And you can even scrunch it up while you’re checking it out to see how it’ll look if it’s cinched or bunched.

After you pick out your appliqués and suchlike, you place your pattern parts as efficiently as possible on your fabric, cut it out, stitch them together, and then arrange the final piece on a mannequin, where you apply your ribbons and other trim of choice. One feature of the original prototype was the idea of making clients happy or “sabotaging” their dreams, though with the final game built around improving your reputation, it sounds like there’s not much room for that. Which is fine by me. With as much creative freedom as Dressmaker seems to offer, I’m far more interested in making fabulous clothes than I am in being a dress goblin.

Dressmaker is slated for launch on Windows PC in September.