This week is an immediate departure from what I said last week: “January is slow, and I will be playing games from 2024.” I saw that this week’s game had come out, and while I was playing the demo, I forgot about it. It was not until I rewatched the gameplay and the trailer that I knew I needed to play the full game. This week I played a game that reminds me a lot of A Short Hike and, as my wife said, “a Kiki’s delivery service feel.”

This week is Mika and the Witch’s Mountain.

Mika and the Witch’s Mountain is an adventure game from Chibig and Nukefist. The game was released onto all modern game consoles on January 22nd, 2025, and retails for $20. I received a free review copy of this product from http://www.game.press

Thank You, Chibig and Nukefist, for the key!

Just as the title of the game states, you play as Mika, a little girl who has been “accepted” to a witch’s school at the top of an island mountain. Though a little arrogant, Mika is tasked with ascending the mountain again with her broom and is promptly kicked off. Mika ends up breaking her broom and requires someone to repair it. Mika then has to tuck tail and work for a delivery service to make enough money to ascend the mountain again.

The narrative of Mika and the Witch’s Mountain gives vibes of the “coming of age” that A Short Hike had, where the protagonist is portrayed as a child, and there is a moment within the game that seals their transition into maturity. The “coming of age” narrative is never easy, like in A Short Hike, but the takeaway is sometimes positive, and Mika and the Witch’s Mountain navigates it well enough that I could relate to it.

It’s hard asking for help and being berated for mistakes that weren’t your own.

Just like A Short Hike and A Hat in Time, Mika and the Witch’s Mountain is clear in its gameplay. You are to deliver packages to the island’s people on your broom. Flying is mapped to the analog stick accompanied by a boost on the face button. Packages come in a variety of forms, and a lot of them have conditions that allow them to get the “green stamp” for ultimate customer satisfaction. Packages sometimes cannot be damaged and will degrade when Mika hits an obstacle hard enough or it cannot get wet.

It is not the items themselves that are important, but it is the stories behind the packages. A fisherman loves his father and wants to go out on his own but wants Mika to deliver a radio so they can stay in contact or someone who has sent their violin in for repairs but was hoping that it was damaged beyond repair so she wouldn’t have to play it again because they were afraid of failure.

The main gameplay loop is that Mika does the deliveries to make enough money for the +1 version of her broom so that she can get closer to flying back to the top of the mountain. If you would like to take it slow, there are other packages to deliver that are not part of the main mission to learn more about the island and its people.

Mika and the Witch’s Mountain is a cute game; the island is colorful, and the islanders always smile upon your arrival. The island has distinct sections because of the story that make it feel like a genuine place. The people relied on wind power to run the electricity, and a dead zone was created on the other side when the factory showed up. Conversations happen with hand-drawn images, and you will see them a lot as Mika and the Witch’s Mountain is a talky game, that adds to the game’s cuteness.

Mika and the Witch’s Mountain is a cozy game for cozy people. It does not push you to do anything story-related. If you want to fly around and collect stuff for the stray cats, you can do that. If you want to deliver the extra packages left by the previous delivery service employee, you can do that too. The game does not usher you to leave its world. The story is fun, real, and sometimes difficult to accept. The learning curve is low, the game is colorful, bright, and short. I rolled credits in about three hours, and I really feel like that length is perfect for a game like this.

If you want a relaxing, fun video game, then Mika and the Witch’s Mountain is for you.

8/10