Chibig’s Mika and the Witch’s Mountain looked like a cozy hit inspired by Kiki’s Delivery Service, but it’s more like a promising broom ride that barely gets off the ground.
If you’re at all familiar with my writing, then it should be pretty obvious that I would be interested in Mika and the Witch’s Mountain. I’ve long been a defender/believer in Chibig as a developer, and while they’ve had lofty ambitions in the past, a smaller, cozier delivery sim inspired by Kiki’s Delivery Service seemed like something they could’ve handled easily.
Playing Chibig games is like watching a learner driver stall their car—every time, you’re like, “Keep going; you’ve almost got a game here.” Mika and the Witch’s Mountain have some decent ideas but fail to really build on them, and this is over before it even starts—and I mean that quite literally.
Players take on the role of the titular Mika, an aspiring witch who is thrown from the top of the Witch’s Mountain as part of her training. Unable to fully control her broom, Mika crashes and splinters her means of flight. Luckily, the local craftswoman can fix it for her, but for a fee. Thankfully for Mika, the local delivery company is down a postman, so Mika steps up to the plate, running packages all around the Isle of Winds.
There are little bits of story delivered through the individual characters within the game—some of which are brought over from Summer in Mara and Ankora: Lost Days—but the overarching story is incredibly shallow, which is a real shame because there could have been a lot to work with.
Furthermore, as I said, the “main story” is appallingly short. The bulk of the game takes place over three “days,” with each day requiring a set of deliveries—starting with one or two and each one connecting to the next. The way it plays out both in story and gameplay, the player is made to feel like this is a tutorial; each day, Mika is given a new broom with a mildly useful flight ability, and players are being made to familiarize themselves with the island and its inhabitants. Then, by Day Four, you will climb the mountain, learn the lesson, and roll credits.
“Mika and the Witch’s Mountain has some decent ideas but fail to really build on them, and this is over before it even starts—and I mean that quite literally.”
I genuinely couldn’t believe it. I had figured with a game inspired by Kiki’s Delivery Service, and even the way certain plot elements play out, Mika would’ve established her own Postal company, and the game would’ve had an expanding story as you participated in its cozy day-to-day sim gameplay, but no. You can do some side deliveries and find things scattered on the island, but in terms of plot, there’s almost nothing.
There’s even an evil industrialist character that seems like they’re setting up to be an antagonist. He has one scene, and then you never interact with him again. After a fairly inconsequential-seeming delivery, you’re told that he was put out of business and good riddance. I couldn’t help but laugh at that line of dialogue—they introduced a bad guy and then realized this was a cozy game and immediately removed him from it.
The gameplay doesn’t really fair any better. Seeing a lot of clips of Mika and the Witch’s Mountain in development, I really thought the flight mechanics were going to be the star of the show. But in reality, calling them flight mechanics is a bit disingenuous. Mika doesn’t so much fly her broom as she does gently glide with it.
While moving around on the broom is faster than running around on foot, you’re still almost always bound to the ground. You can find semi-creative games to get in the air and try to stay aloft as long as possible, but it is really disappointing that you can’t just fly in a game about a little witch and her broom. Not only that but controlling the broom feels somewhat unwieldy and never as satisfying as it could with tighter controls. If for nothing else, the game really could’ve done with a hard stop function.
I don’t know if maybe the developers of Mika and the Witch’s Mountain felt it would break the game if you could just go anywhere at any time, but it’s incredibly bizarre because you can see how other parts of the game feel like they’re building to it. It makes sense at the start that Mika isn’t super experienced with the broom, and she’s slowly getting better—and getting nicer brooms from the town’s craftwoman. It’s a good way of slowly introducing players to the flight mechanics and letting them adapt to them before giving them more complex maneuvers.
Furthermore, despite Mika and the Witch’s Mountain being a cozy game, there is a degree of difficulty attached to the delivery system. Packages have little health meters and certain requirements to keep them in pristine condition. Some packages can’t get smacked around, while others can’t get wet, so it’s not like letting players fly around freely, which would’ve detracted from this.
“The gameplay suffers in other ways that make what should be an otherwise relaxing experience into a bit of a chore.”
There could have been ariel obstacles, or more characters to deliver to boats, or even little ways to make the flight more fun, like gaining speed by diving or having Mika do tricks on her broom—with the risk of dropping parcels.
When you make your central mechanic engaging, you encourage players to find unique ways to participate with it in fun ways. But as is the case with almost every Chibig game, the gameplay is a watered-down version of what it could’ve been which makes it feel very safe, but never as fun as it should be.
And the gameplay suffers in other ways that make what should be an otherwise relaxing experience into a bit of a chore. The lack of a simple compass can make navigating the island a bit of a hassle. I’m not saying the game needed to tell you exactly where to go, but knowing where you’re facing relative to the map would’ve been nice. Also, there were a few noticeable typos in the dialogue, which made the whole thing feel incredibly amateurish.
If Mika and the Witch’s Mountain has anything going for it, it’s the visuals. The Isle of Winds is brightly coloured with a beautiful cel-shaded aesthetic that really brings it to life. The game really wears its Studio Ghibli influence on its sleeve, with several characters looking like they could be characters in the films they were inspired by.
However, I find myself at a weird place with the Mika and the Witch’s Mountain’s music. In what’s been an occurring problem with Chibig games, there’s no understanding of how to transition blend music, so tracks just cut off and repeat in a very noticeable way. And while the soundtrack isn’t totally bad, there are a few tracks that are oddly similar to others—there’s a farm where the musical arrangement sounds like the Mini-Boss music from Super Mario World 2: Yoshi’s Island.
But there was one area in particular where the arrangement was so familiar, I could’ve sworn I heard the music before. And then it hit me, I recognized the music because it was from one of the best games I’d ever played, sounding dangerously close to the Tropos theme from Owlboy. Now I’m not saying this is plagiarism, but it is incredibly derivative in a way that really pulled me out of the experience.
Mika and the Witch’s Mountain could have been an amazing experience—it could have been a sweet tribute to Kiki’s Delivery Service with a satisfying game loop and intricate movement options to keep things interesting. Instead, it’s just a mediocre delivery sim with not much going and not much reason to play.
This is your last chance Chibig. I’ve tried to believe in you as hard as I could, but if your next game is as disappointing as this, then I’m afraid our dalliance will have to end.
