Every so often, a game comes along that I didn’t know I needed in my life. It’s a rare moment, but one that sparks a curiosity I can’t seem to shake, compelling me back to my PC to delve back in as soon as humanly possible. Witchspire is one of those games. It didn’t surprise me that I liked the concept. It also didn’t surprise me, as an open-world adventure player, that I’d like the expansive exploration.
What I didn’t expect was a game that’s so incredibly cozy and wonderfully enchanting that it almost formulates a whole new genre altogether. Witchspire feels like a magical hybrid with the pacing of a rollercoaster, ebbing and flowing between relaxation and stress, combining the whimsy of a life sim with the exhilaration of an action-adventure.
This is developer Envar Studio’s debut title and while it’s coined as a survival game, it feels like it’s intentionally turning the arguably stagnated genre on its head. Most importantly, there’s no need to tend to hunger or thirst, which is an element the survival genre has a tendency to lean heavily on. In Witchspire, your survival instead tilts towards discovery and exploration, aided by the magic that you summon.
You’re the ‘Chosen One’ battling to save your friends and put a stop to the corruption spreading over the magical lands. For this, you’re not alone. Far from it. While your friends feel a world away (unless you’re playing Witchspire’s co-op mode, of course), there’s an unexpected companion in your midst. You can bond with the creatures around you, called Familiars, inviting them (or perhaps forcing them) to become part of your team. If you’re thinking this sounds like Palworld, it does, but it also doesn’t. Namely, you don’t have to look after them.
These creatures, with endearing names like Lamloof, Rockling, and Locto, are abundant throughout the open-world. Some are friends and some are foes, though you can battle with all of them to gather specific resources, dependent on type. At one point, I stumbled upon two creatures fighting each other. I almost felt like David Attenborough, observing nature in its rawest form.
And, in a Pokemon-esque twist, you can also capture these creatures upon defeat via their spirits if they linger around long enough for you to do so (this can be helped with a luminary perk and/or incense). They come with their own levels of uniqueness, their own special abilities, and even their own skill tree which makes them much less of a mundane companion and much more of an unwavering asset.
Everything in Witchspire is drenched in magic from casting spells with your wand or spellblade to omitting an astral projection to untether yourself from gravity to build your base camp. But, what I found particularly inspiring for the open-world landscape in Witchspire was the way you move. On the ground, you can spirit jump your way across the map, blinking to avoid enemies (or just using it to move faster). I’ve said on the ground because you can also take to the skies with your very own broomstick. Yes, Envar Games takes crafting a witch game incredibly seriously and you wouldn’t be able to call yourself a magical practitioner without your shaft of wood and tufty fibres, right?
This is one of the elements of the game that I didn’t realise I’d like so much. Sure, Hogwarts Legacy let me sample some broom action, but in Witchspire it’s a significant part of the way you get around. If I had to grumble, I’d wish it was a little faster, though Envar Games has included speed-boosting rings sporadically. They don’t just let you fly anywhere, though. Certain regions will steal your ability to fly up and down, though you’re welcome to float along the floor until you hit some rough terrain. Instead, you must activate a certain number of pillars in the area to unleash flying freedom, which prompts deeper exploration and an added layer to the game that is most certainly welcome.
While you’re not strictly alone with your Familiar(s) by your side, you can also play Witchspire as a co-op game with up to six players (if your PC can handle it, the recommendation is up to four). As an Early Access preview, I played alone, creating a server that I rather uncreatively called Magicshire. In Magicshire, the open-world felt as if Breath of the Wild and Studio Ghibli had a baby, which is totally the intention of the game’s devs (in conversation with PCGamesN), seeking inspiration from both whimsical and soft-natured design styles.
In true adventure survival fashion, I found myself foraging from the get-go. And, predictably, finding a need to craft chests to store all my wares inside. Alongside building chests though, there’s a multitude of crafting opportunities from levelling up your Hearth, that also operates as a healing base and fast travel point, to cooking up special recipes ahead of a big battle. These are mechanisms you’d expect from a survival game, but remember, they’re steeped in magic.
As I mentioned already, Witchspire strips away the need to focus on survival at its rawest and replaces it instead with magic and whimsy. It’s by no means easy out there though. Yes, exploring the vibrant mountains and sweeping grasses is the calm before the storm, but when you face increasingly punishing enemies, you need to be prepared. There’s nothing cosy about the humbling you’ll get from the corrupted creatures that feel like they’re taking a particularly bad day out on you.
Everything that you do though levels up a certain skillset from broom-riding to battling. Each time you take on a creature, whether boss or random attack, you’re getting better. And as you navigate the world, you also unlock luminary points to use on your skill tree, aptly named Luminaries. This is a sweeping constellation of stars that allow you to unlock a plethora of skills and perks. It’s also a place that taught me that there’s more to do than first meets the eye. A look ahead of the skill tree tells me that I’m also going to be sewing up outfits at some point.
Exploration feels joyous in Witchspire, not only because of my wonderful broomstick. If I felt I’d ventured too far from my goal, I could use the settings handy ‘unstuck’ feature to get me out of trouble. I wasn’t always stuck, but it helped me with fast travel. Okay, sometimes I was stuck when I tried to Skyrim up mountains and failed. Map navigation though could be a little easier with quest points showing up a touch erratically and an inability to set waypoints had me missing its usual crutch.
I also noticed an eerie quietness. Perhaps, in part due to its time in EA, there’s no background music unless I’m engaging in a fight or entering a particularly dangerous area. All I was able to hear was the incessant cooing of my Familiar. I felt myself missing an ambience (and increasingly bothered by the coos) when heading out on my own self-prompted adventure, away from the main quest.
Where it wasn’t quiet though was in the game’s narration. There’s no cutscenes in Witchspire, Envar Games instead opts for a narrative that weaves in through a mystical voice guiding the way. Akin, once again, to Breath of the Wild. The story told in such a fashion is rich and compelling, as well as appearing through diaries you can read littered around the map. For me, this felt like something bigger was operating within my world.
There’s also some glitchy bits, as to be expected in an EA, but most frustratingly I found my Familiar getting stuck when I’m trying to fight or just getting stuck on corners. But you can easily summon it back when you’ve got a broomstick handy. In the middle of a boss fight, it’s a little less forgiving. So, a boost on pathfinding and a quick cauldron polish could definitely improve matters here.
Ultimately, from boss fights to building your perfect sanctuary, Witchspire invites you to get lost in its genre-bending world and it’s an invitation I’m more than happy to accept. There’s potential here for heavy expansion and even more potential for viral-soaked adoration for the game’s creatures (here’s looking at you, Lety). I came for the floppy witches hats and magical wands and stayed for the rich story, overflowing magic, and endless opportunity to explore.
