Last week, I had the opportunity to visit BitSummit, one of Japan’s biggest indie game festivals, which takes place every year in Kyoto. Throughout the day, I got to check out a bunch of different Japanese indie games and chat with some of the developers and exhibitors.
Being a longtime fan of everything that could be put under the umbrella of “cute dark fairytale,” I was super excited when I stumbled upon the booth showcasing Mekururi: Dizzying Witch. The game is developed by SleepingMuseum, who has made multiple “creepy but adorable” titles for mobile and Steam, including the horror mystery game Matsuro Palette.
What first drew me to Mekururi: Dizzying Witch was its visual style. The art is rough around the edges, like a collection of doodles you’d find in the corner of someone’s notebook, which is what makes it extremely charming. The characters themselves are cartoony and adorable, flowers and mushrooms have faces, and the overall limited use of color is what gives it a nostalgic storybook vibe. However, despite the cute appearance, there’s still something slightly sinister about the game that you can’t really pinpoint (knowing the developer’s previous works, we might be in for some darker twists once the full game comes out).
At its core, Mekururi: Dizzying Witch is a puzzle-driven adventure game in which you have to help the protagonist navigate a perfectly circular world, made out of layers of rotatable disks. Skillfully lining up two disks will let you jump around between layers or trigger certain events that help you progress the story – kind of like opening a dial lock. To make things even more wonderfully bizarre, it’s revealed that the whole rotating world is literally the “iris” of the witch (our storyteller)’s eyeball.
At the end of each tale, the protagonist will have to face off against a boss monster, which is when the gameplay of Mekururi: Dizzying Witch starts leaning into action. Rotating the disk-shaped stage beneath the heroine’s feet will help her evade attacks, triggering the platforms she’s stepping on and dealing damage to the enemy. You need to pay close attention to the rhythm in which the enemy comes at you, because a small misstep could result in you taking a lot of damage.
That being said, the game is still in development, and it might take a bit longer until the release date is announced, but until then, you can Wishlist it on Steam. If you’re interested in what other Japanese indie games BitSummit had to offer this year, you can also check out our demo impressions of the Delicious in Dungeon-inspired survival game Abyss Kitchen.
Mekururi: Dizzying Witch is currently in development for PC (Steam).
