There once was a time when many people feared the Witching Hour. Now, people can’t seem to get enough of it. Being able to wield magic from the forces of nature to the supernatural worlds would be quite incredible, to say the least. Sadly, humanity has yet to tap into the mysterious powers beyond our comprehension, so we’ll have to make do with video games to carry out our magical fantasies. A nice way to start would be with Witchcrafty by Pigeon Dev. This 2D pixel platformer follows the adventure of a young witch trying to save her home and master a few spells while she’s at it.
Witch Is The Way Forward?
A lot of witch stories range from light and funny to serious and horrifying. Lucky for us, Witchcrafty goes for the former in its own way. You play a nameless witch living in the forest among various Woodfolk such as Satyrs and Gnome-Dwarves. One day, Goblins attack your village which is highly unusual despite their reputation for being jerks. Your mentor decides that something is corrupting the land and affecting the minds of the creatures within it. So, it’s up to you, your wand, and your hat to fight through the enraged creatures and fix the problem. Short and sweet, it’s gets going quickly.
It’s Like Magic
When something is so good that we struggle to find the words to describe it, we sometimes end up calling it “magic.” With this in mind, there are many things in Witchcrafty that are magic, both literally and figuratively. The first is the visual presentation. This game is a cartoon of pixels that come together in just such a nice and clean way. The animations for all the characters and enemies are quite detailed smooth. All the assets have a strong look, and all the important things pop as they should.
Then there’s the difficulty of the gameplay. This game follows a classic Mega Man sort of structure where areas are broken up into contained rooms. You can navigate the area through various paths and directions to approach certain rooms as you please. Each room has a layout with enemies and traps arranged to punish you if you’re not careful. As soon as you enter, certain enemies can become alerted while others may plant themselves to restrict your movement options. The game’s cuteness disguises the level of challenge that awaits you in each area.
Then there are the controls and speed of the overall game. Within the first few rooms, it’s easy to get a handle on all the moves you’ll need to master to make it through to the end. On top of that, the game never really slows down unless that’s what you choose. You can speed through or speed time gathering every goody that catches your eye.
Curses!
One of the scariest elements associated with magic is the idea of the curse, energy placed on you to make something bad happen. The bad news for Witchrafty is that it has a few curses of its own. The first is a lack of variety in its hazards. Though you’ll go through several different worlds, you’ll only encounter a handful of enemy-types wearing various outfits. The hazards many take the form of spikes or instant death falls which leaves more to be desired.
Another cursed aspect is the magic. You’ll get elements to wield over the course of the game but there’s very little to distinguish them. They’re all essentially the same projectile in different colors which removes a lot of their punch. Also, it’s strange that even though there are enemies with distinct elemental themes, using the opposing element to attack them doesn’t have any noticeable effect. The special attacks look cool, but their high magic cost and the spacing of enemies make it so there aren’t many reasons to use them.
Finally, there are technical issues better known as bugs. Just to list them off, there’s a recurring issue where attacking can lock the witch into a frame where she can’t move. Sometimes the double jump doesn’t trigger when it should. There’s a boss fight that with a cutscene glitch that allows it to be skipped. Certain enemies stay on you delivering back-to-back hits over a few seconds. Finally, when respawning at some Save Points, the witch simply won’t appear.
Crafting Witchery
Witchcrafty is a 2D pixel-platform game about a witch trying to save her home from a corrupting force. It’s cute, colorful, quick, easy to learn, and surprisingly challenging at times. It has issues in terms of lacking variety in hazards and magic use with some pretty big technical bugs that need squashing. Even so, it’s a fun little romp to give you a taste of magic.
Final Score: 6.5
This review is based on a digital download code provided by the publisher. Witchcrafty is available now for PS Vita and PC via Steam.
