The Witch and the Hundred Knight 2 (Review)
By: RaeHaving never played Nippon Ichi's The Witch and the Hundred Knight, I was a little unsure what I was getting into with this second installment. It was definitely the art-style that drew me in first, though the plot definitely seemed right up my alley. If you haven’t played The Witch and the Hundred Knight, the good news is you don’t really need to to understand what’s going on in The Witch and the Hundred Knight 2. Most of my questions were answered by the game itself, and I only went to search up the original game to satisfy some general curiousity.But of course, the real question is – is it a game worth playing?
The Witch and the Hundred Knight 2 opens up on a stormy night in a small village, as a panicked Amalie searches for her younger sister, Milm. When Milm returns to the village, however, she appears to have been afflicted by the Witch’s Disease – evidenced by the appearance of a third, closed eye on the forehead. The townsfolk insist Milm needs to be killed, quickly, to prevent a witch from awakening, arguing that Amalie should understand this – her own parents having been killed by a witch. Amalie offers to take Milm into the forest, far away from the town, where they take shelter in an abandoned castle.Later on, Amalie has begun training to become a Holy Valkyrie – someone who hunts and kills witches – while Milm is about to undergo a treatment for her Witch’s Disease. When the treatment fails, however, Amalie is left with Chelka – the awakened witch who now shares Milm’s body. Amalie is sure there’s a way to get Milm back… but how?
While Amalie and Chelka are the main characters of the story, the player actually is in control of Hundred Knight – a magical being brought to life from a doll Milm kept with her. Because Hundred Knight is seen as a tool that moves back and forth between Chelka and Amalie, the player gets to fight battles on both sides of the story, which gives a really interesting perspective.
Your main base will be Durga Castle. Here you’ll find a store, your krafting center, a collection of the tips the game has given you, and many other useful things. You’ll also find a managland – large plant-like growths that allow you to warp around the map. These are extra helpful considering the way loot works in The Witch and the Hundred Knight 2. When you pick up an item, it goes to Hundred Knight’s “stomach.” This is a limited space inventory, and you don’t have actual access to the items until you complete the stage or return to base. Managlands are a great way to go back and recuperate before heading into a boss fight, or if you’re getting beaten up a little too much mid-level. If you die, you lose items you’ve picked up, but you’ll return to the beginning of the stage and be able to push on.
The game’s menus and moves are revealed to you by way of a very obvious tutorial as things unlock, which makes it easy to learn bits at a time. Hundred Knight has HP, AP, and Gigacalories. HP is exactly what you expect. As it runs out, however, it will be refilled using Gigacalories. Once your Gigacalories run out, you won’t be able to heal anymore. At each managland you’ll find a bird that you can defeat to restore your gigacalories, and you’ll also earn them back over time if you can stay alive. AP is used to pull off combo moves. You’ll need to keep an eye on all three of these in order to make it through challenging areas and boss fights, but the game’s display makes it easy to keep track of everything. It may also take a moment to get used to the multiple menus (items are in a different place than your stomach overview which is in a different place from your equipment setup, etc…), but it’s nothing too difficult.
Hundred Knight’s controls are pretty simple – something pretty much any gamer can easily adapt to. However, the gameplay is made a little more complex by the addition of a weapons lineup and “facets.” Each facet comes with different stats – some are higher on defense, while others increase magic damage – and allows the player to select up to 5 weapons to use in an automated order. Each facet also gets its own accessories and defensive gear. The player is also able to do krafting (yes, “krafting”) in the castle’s atelier. By sacrificing weapons and krafting collectibles, items can be leveled up for higher attack and defense. In this way, learning to effectively fight is less real-time combo hitting, and more strategizing whenever you’re back at the castle and can play around with weaponry and setups.Once upon a time, I played some of the Disgaea games, but was a little turned off by the immense amounts of grinding needed. The Witch and the Hundred Knight 2 is nowhere near the same level of grindy, but I did find myself getting annoyed with the sheer amounts of trash mobs in levels. Because you often find yourself surrounded by 2 or 3 types of enemies at a time with different weaknesses, it doesn’t make much sense to use the different facets, and it can quickly become annoying to spend so much time smashing smaller monsters. Bigger mobs will quickly murder you if you don’t make sure to keep leveling quickly, which is just a matter of killing as much as you can, as fast as you can. Mini-boss style monsters are mixed in with regular mobs, and range in difficulty, so the mindless button mashing does get broken up, but most normal stages don’t require very much strategy at all.
For the beginning, it’s absolutely necessary to keep your level up. Later, you’ll get the option to adjust your difficulty either higher or lower through the Witch Petition. I dropped mine to help me get further into the story on my review timeline, and actually rather liked the result. Trash mobs were easier to get through, though higher level areas still required some skill and quick thinking, while bosses still required some strategy and game knowledge. It didn’t feel like a giveaway difficulty – it just let me proceed a little more quickly while still requiring me to play the game and pay attention.Where the gameplay does really shine, however, is in the boss fights. Each boss plays very differently from the last. One might require you to up your defense and stay far away. One is impervious to magic, and another is weak to it. Some games add on gameplay features that don’t really matter – The Witch and the Hundred Knight 2 forces the player to become comfortable with facets and weapon types in order to proceed.
Storywise, I do wish the game would move a little more quickly. It’s essentially a slow-burn story with lots of level-crawling in-between scenes, but it is quite interesting so far. The characters are occasionally silly, but refreshingly different. There were even moments where I was surprised by a character’s decisions or developments – something that’s always enjoyable in an RPG, which is a genre that can really get caught up in clichés. Even better, I’ve been genuinely unsure of where the game is going. Obviously there are some things that players will be able to see coming, but there have been a lot of moments where I thought “Wow, is this really going to happen? Oh god, she’s going to…”Art-wise, The Witch and the Hundred Knight 2 is definitely likable. The game switches from a 2D visual novel-style setup to a slightly more nostalgic 3D style reminiscent of PS3 rpgs, but both styles are colourful with interesting character designs. I was a little disappointed that 90% of the female characters are wearing practically nothing (in before Isabel’s underboob shot in the castle fight), which is something I think a lot of female gamers in particular are kind of over. Still, there’s no denying that the art is eye-catching and fun.
Strangely, this doesn’t carry over so much to the playable levels. The forest (where you’ll be spending a lot of time) is mostly dark and dreary, as is most of the map that I’ve unlocked so far. To be fair, this is probably appropriate for the atmosphere of the game, which is much darker than I expected when I first turned it on. However, it can make levels feel quite long and unexciting – it’s a lot of slogging through similar-looking paths filled with the exact same monsters over and over again.The voice acting is mostly spot-on, with some characters being really well-acted and others at least being decent. You have the option of English or Japanese audio, both of which are plenty enjoyable. Added to that, the music is incredible – it opens with a rather creepy and complex bgm and never really disappointed as the game moved on.
While I haven’t beaten it yet, I’ve really enjoyed stepping into the world of The Witch and the Hundred Knight 2. The story is engaging, and the atmosphere is great. It’s easy enough to play without being too easy, and the issues I had with the gameplay and the grinding were at least outweighed by the fact that it is a pretty fun game to play. Fans of other Nippon Ichi games will likely enjoy this one, and I think anyone who enjoys fun JRPGs with a little humour and a lot of darkness will also be interested. As for me, I will definitely be playing through the rest of this one, and will likely be back with an update later on!Note: The Geekly Grind was provided a digital review copy by NIS America in exchange for our honest review. The Witch and the Hundred Knight 2 comes out for PS4 on March 27th
