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Hi everyone, and welcome to the 94th Page of the Journal! We have just 6 pages left until we reach Page 100, which is quite insane to be honest. 👀 It almost feels like only yesterday that I was writing Page 1…
Nostalgia aside, I’ve had yet another insane week, as work keeps unexpectedly piling up… Hopefully it will be a bit better as summer approaches (I work as an English teacher). In the meantime, I’ve managed to finish Witchspring R (which is today’s topic, surprise surprise), and I also started playing a game called “Let’s School” (yes, taking a break from work by playing a school game is weird, but it’s a weirdly relaxing one). It’s quite hard to manage everything, as your budget is limited, but luckily our resident EmeraldDM8 has already played it twice (he was also the one who introduced me to the game), so he managed to come in and save me from bankruptcy in about 5 minutes. 🙂 We’ll talk about that game in a proper Joint Blog that we’re working on, so I hope you’ll be looking forward to that!
I’ve also started another game by the famous developer Suda51 (the one who made the No More Heroes games), called Killer is Dead; while the game is quite fun so far, the Steam port (released in 2014) has so many problems running on current hardware… In fact, if you set the resolution to anything above 720p and your framerate goes above 30, you’ll have to heavily edit many of the .ini files of the game to fix the countless QTEs; I had found a guide to set the resolution to 1440p and I was quite happy, only for me to later find out that it made a certain QTE on Chapter 4 impossible until I reduced everything back to 1080p… Well, while I’ve surely spent more time fixing it than playing it, I’ve been working on it for good reason, as the game is actually really intriguing and fun! I just wish it was more future-proofed…
Moving on, I haven’t really managed to continue working on the other blogs I was writing, mainly because it’s unfortunately already been a challenge to even write this weekly Page (especially because of the curse called “I have nothing to talk about because I don’t have time to finish games and my backlog of previously completed games I can sneak in is depleting”), but don’t worry, I’ll be fine. 🙂 Luckily the Xerox Star blog isn’t so far from being done, and EmeraldDM8 has many currently in the pipeline (which are admittedly being a bit held up by the site improvements he’s also working on) that we’re also hoping to release soon, although I must admit that I am a little bit worried about whether the April Fools one will be ready… Hopefully I’ll be able to work on it during the Easter holidays.
Now, let’s fight these depressing thoughts with one of my newly found gems…
| Witchspring R |
|---|
This is a Korean Strategic JRPG developed by Kiwi Walks and originally released on Android and iOS in 2015, simply called Witchspring; it was then fully remade for Windows in 2023 as Witchspring R, and it’s expected to also be released on Nintendo Switch, PS5, and Xbox Series. As it often happens, I played the remake on both my Desktop and my Steam Deck.
Before I talk about the remake, let me briefly mention something important; as you’ve seen, this game was originally a mobile game, but that doesn’t mean that it was a gacha game with ads and in-game purchases! It was exactly like a normal console or PC game, as you’d just spend a few bucks when buying it and that would be it, no more surprises; this is sadly a rare phenomenon nowadays, as mobile games seem to have largely gone the way of gacha in recent years…
Moving on, let’s talk about the unusual plot of this title; we follow the adventures of the young and amnesiac witch Pieberry (she gave herself this name as she absolutely adores pie and strawberries), who lives in a forest hidden from the human world. She keeps dreaming of some exceptional pie she used to eat as a kid, probably made by her mum; for this reason, she sets out on an adventure, hoping to find a similar pie, and maybe encounter her mum, who supposedly abandoned her a few years earlier.
After learning mind control magic and managing to “befriend” an annoying round bird, Black Joe, she manages to slip past the barrier that connects her forest to the human world; however, once she gets there, she quickly finds out that humans absolutely despise witches, and an individual, called the Pope, is currently leading a massive witch hunt (Is this game anti-religious? Eh… No more than an SMT Game. Hold on… that may have been a bad comparison… Um… Don’t worry about it. 👀). Thus, to continue her search in the nearby Lalaque Village, Pieberry needs to disguise herself as a human, but once she does, this soon allows her to not only discover the truth about the human world and the witch hunt, but may also allow her to hopefully get a glimpse toward what happened to her mother… Will Pieberry manage to find her mum, or will the Pope find her first?
When I bought this game, I must admit that I was initially more attracted by the art and the gameplay, and didn’t really pay too much attention to the plot, which seemed quite silly (I mean, “young adorable witch goes on an adventure to find delicious pie”). Even so, at some point, everything changed, and I understood that this game’s plot was far from silly, as the Pope was not only killing witches, he was—No, hold on; I can’t say more than that, or else I’ll risk delving into spoilers, but you can rest assured that you will be in for an exceptional ride.
Thus, let’s get to the reason I bought this game for, the gameplay! While it’s a JRPG at heart, it has some crafting elements; you can gather some materials in dungeons to make useful items, improve your magic staffs, or craft new powerful magic. You even have the possibility of recruiting some of the monsters you encounter, thanks to the mind control magic that convinces Black Joe to join you; this is extremely crucial to do, as otherwise you’ll always fight alone, and the game wasn’t conceived for you to play without some allies.
EmeraldDM8’s Comment: Um… Are we just not going to talk about the fact that you’re using mind-control magic to force these things to fight for you? 👀
Blisscast’s Comment: Don’t worry, the game mentions that it only works on beings of lesser intellect, so it can’t be used to control people against their will.
EmeraldDM8’s Comment: I… I’m not sure if that makes it much better…
Blisscast’s Comment: Eh… Just go with it and try not to worry about it. 👀
The best aspect of the gameplay, in my opinion, were the battles themselves. In fact, Pieberry is capable of both attacking physically and with magic skills, and has many tricks up her sleeve; first of all, she can use an item without consuming her turn by calling Black Joe (who then needs to rest for 1 or 2 turns based on the type of the chosen item), plus she has a special skill which belongs to her chosen staff (which also needs to recharge), and as the story goes on, she gains “blessings”, which usually don’t use her turn up (but they can be used only once per battle, and they need to be charged first). Plus, if Pieberry manages to defeat an enemy by using a physical attack, she’ll gain a free turn, so it’s advisable to do that whenever possible. As an additional note; physical skills are sneakily pretty good, as if you use one just after having used magic, it will get imbued with that element and will be stronger as a result. Finally, Pieberry can also choose to spend a turn defending herself, in which doing so will grant her a stat buff.
As a result, by carefully mixing and matching these skills, you’ll be able to defeat enemies who are much stronger than you, and who’d normally defeat you in a couple of attacks; this is something that is, admittedly, more important than it may initially sound, as Pieberry is really quite weak, and will basically crumple into a pile on the ground if she gets hit with anything stronger than a gust of wind! My favorite staff ended up being one whose skill allowed you to heal every couple of turns, and it was extremely useful for limit-breaking your health (as otherwise, how do you resist an attack that deals 1000 HP when you only have about 800?). Additionally, my favorite item was the one to increase Agility, which makes your turn come around faster, which, in turn, means that you can have a bit more control over the battle; thus, I’d advise you to use both of these whenever you need them, but be careful when using the Agility Potion, because as soon as the effect runs out, the turns order graph displayed in the lower part of the screen will change without notice, and you might end up dying as a result (hopefully they fixed this in the following games).
I found this kind of gameplay both challenging and satisfying, as, in order to win, I had to carefully plan out each of my battles, instead of just spamming my best moves; Witchspring R is one of those games where it’s extremely easy to make the wrong choice and lose, but that doesn’t mean that it’s a frustrating title! In fact, if you do lose, you can simply just retry the battle, with minimal to no loading times; thanks to this, you can take all the time you need to observe your enemy first, and see what they do in order to counter them. I’m usually quite impatient (EmeraldDM8’s Comment: Understatement of the century), and as EmeraldDM8 often says, I’m also an extremely sore loser (EmeraldDM8’s Comment: Yet again, understatement of the century; you should have seen the difficulty I had teaching her Yu-Gi-Oh!), yet, I was never annoyed while playing this game, as losing felt like a normal part of the gameplay, and I wasn’t punished for making a mistake. Thus, don’t be scared by its difficulty, as it’s really not actually as difficult as it may first appear; of course, there are many ways for you to get more powerful, but I found they reduced the fun of strategizing, so I didn’t fully upgrade my weapons and skills (EmeraldDM8’s Comment: Don’t try to make an excuse for this; you literally never fully upgrade stuff in games. You never even bothered to unlock the Tiger Drop in Yakuza 5, which is literally the first Skill you can unlock by doing the optional training with Kiryu. 👀). For real, it’s an extremely enjoyable gem, and it’s sad that seemingly no one knows about this game.
Blisscast’s Comment: EmeraldDM8, if you’re just going to sass me, then get back to working on the site updates!
EmeraldDM8’s Comment: Only if you get back to working on some of our joint blogs; my poor blog about NPCs in Video Games has been sitting there for over a year.
Blisscast’s Comment: Gah!
I’ve also had a look at the original game, which was quite different; it featured a time limit of 100 days, and each turn in battle cost 1 hour. As a result, it was much harder, and sometimes you had to quickly kill enemies in one turn, or you’d run out of time; luckily, this release removed the time limit, and it’s much more relaxing as a result, but it also sadly removed the multiple endings of the original, so I guess both versions have their own perks.
Now, let’s spend a few moments talking about our lord-and-savior adorable Pieberry; she started as a bit of a self-centered, but cute, brat, who was fine with using Black Joe to fulfill her pie dreams, and would steal pie from the few soldiers who somehow wandered inside her forest. As time passes, however, she starts to understand how the world works, and she begins to care about her few human friends, and eventually even accepts to risk her life to save the world! It was endearing to see her grow up so much, and I was so glad to see how her character arc ultimately progressed! Fortunately, she isn’t the only character who I absolutely adored, as I also extremely appreciated Black Joe, as well as the knights Justice and Livya (for reasons I can’t reveal, as it would be spoilers). Thus, all in all, I would say that this game has a pretty good cast!
Moving on, I’ve seen that there are multiple sequels to this game, all of which are only available on Android and iOS (but you’ll need a slightly older device to play them, as you’ll need Android 11 or lower), save for the third one, which was remastered on Steam and Nintendo Switch; fortunately, none of them appear to have a time limit, and some even have multiple endings! I’ve seen that, before Witchspring R came out, it was strangely recommended that you could simply skip the first game and jump straight into playing the second one, before then, obviously, moving onto the third one (which I’ll figure out a way to do somehow, even if the second one is not currently available for Steam!); this is because it narrates some events complimentary to the first game, featuring a witch we often see in it, called Luna. While I don’t have definitive information on this, I suspect that they might have added some of those events in Witchspring R (especially because, according to HLTB, the remake is double the length of the original), so it might be possible to skip the second game.
Even so, I’d love to play that one, as well as the fourth game; hopefully my old phone is compatible with them! They’re even extremely cheap, so I’m sure they’ll be a lot of fun!
All in all, I don’t see any reason why you shouldn’t try this game, as I had an amazing time with it, and it’s such a hidden gem! I recommend you try the remake, especially as it’s easier to run compared to the original. Then, if after playing this you feel like you want to play more witch games, I recommend you try Little Witch in the Woods or Dragon Star Varnir, which were both covered here on this site! Plus, if you liked the crafting, I obviously recommend you try the Atelier games (either Ryza or Sophie).
Thank you for reading, and I hope I’ll see you in next Thursday’s Page or somewhere around the site!
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References
- Witch Spring Wiki: WitchSpring R – https://witch-spring.fandom.com/wiki/WitchSpring_R
- Witch Spring Wiki: Witch Spring 1 https://witch-spring.fandom.com/wiki/Witch_Spring_1
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