Disclaimer: I received a free pre-release copy of SpellKeeper by Silesia Games on the Nintendo Switch through Indie Gamer Chick's #IndieSelect event. The game was given and accepted without promise or expectation of a positive review, only that the game be talked about and images shared through social media channels. All of the words in this article unless otherwise noted are my own from my own experiences playing the game.
The story in SpellKeeper is a combination of quaint and silly. The setting has something to do with butterflies either captured in crystals throughout the kingdom, or you have to help the princess release the butterflies, all the while using "spells" to set the butterflies free from their crystals.
You are given a set number and type of spells to use in each stage, with each type of spell casting a different pattern of light on the board, further allowing the player to work their way towards the crystals/butterflies. There are also semi-optional keys that the game will remind you about if you skip over them. Keys are used to unlock additional stages in each of the four levels.
As the game progresses, the puzzles become more and more complex, and you are introduced to spells that allow different patterns to be used, as well as different patterns for the board allowing for more complex and combinations of ways to use the spells. While SpellKeeper is not designed or executed as a stressful game, I have at times found myself relieved after finding the solution to a puzzle (key included) only to have that little ball of stress grow a little bit more at the start of a new level. I think, for me at least, part of this stems from being afraid that I will not be intelligent enough to not use any of the hint options in order to solve the puzzle.
Perhaps it is the bright color palette and the kid-like fantasy style art work that implies that the solutions should be easy enough for an eight year old to solve, and then I come across a puzzle that seems to stump me. It probably also means that I should not be playing while I am in the process of falling asleep. I also recognize that because a lot of the levels are designed symmetrically, my brain wants the spells placed on the board to be as symmetrical as possible and when that symmetry is disrupted, that is partly when I begin to get lost.
Overall, I think my main critique of the game is its visual aesthetic, which I fully recognize I was not the target audience for. The occasional words of encouragement and interjections of the flimsy story come across as childish in a way that I do not find endearing, as opposed to the approach that I thought worked very well in One Eyed Kutkh or even Where Are My Friends. SpellKeeper has a fairly well balanced learning curve (although having frequent tutorial levels that last beyond the initial one where the new mechanic is introduced might have been over doing it a bit) and the inclusion of what seems to be about 72 stages spread out across four levels is a pretty decent amount of content for its $5.99 package. That being said, I do not know if I would, on a normal day perusing Nintendo's eShop, decide that SpellKeeper would be a game that I would plunk down $6.00 for, but I feel that that just boils down to personal preference.
I just want to close this out by saving what I think is the most satisfying aspect of this game, and I did not start doing it until I was already through the first level. The chain reactions. Being able to watch an entire board be cleared by placing just one spell, after you solve most of the board, you remove the first spell and finish placing any remaining spells, only to put the first spell back. It is just so incredibly great to watch.
~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
Glowing Dim as an Ember
Perhaps it is the bright color palette and the kid-like fantasy style art work that implies that the solutions should be easy enough for an eight year old to solve, and then I come across a puzzle that seems to stump me. It probably also means that I should not be playing while I am in the process of falling asleep. I also recognize that because a lot of the levels are designed symmetrically, my brain wants the spells placed on the board to be as symmetrical as possible and when that symmetry is disrupted, that is partly when I begin to get lost.
Overall, I think my main critique of the game is its visual aesthetic, which I fully recognize I was not the target audience for. The occasional words of encouragement and interjections of the flimsy story come across as childish in a way that I do not find endearing, as opposed to the approach that I thought worked very well in One Eyed Kutkh or even Where Are My Friends. SpellKeeper has a fairly well balanced learning curve (although having frequent tutorial levels that last beyond the initial one where the new mechanic is introduced might have been over doing it a bit) and the inclusion of what seems to be about 72 stages spread out across four levels is a pretty decent amount of content for its $5.99 package. That being said, I do not know if I would, on a normal day perusing Nintendo's eShop, decide that SpellKeeper would be a game that I would plunk down $6.00 for, but I feel that that just boils down to personal preference.
I just want to close this out by saving what I think is the most satisfying aspect of this game, and I did not start doing it until I was already through the first level. The chain reactions. Being able to watch an entire board be cleared by placing just one spell, after you solve most of the board, you remove the first spell and finish placing any remaining spells, only to put the first spell back. It is just so incredibly great to watch.
~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
Glowing Dim as an Ember
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