Maria the Witch Reviews
Cute visuals can't prevent Maria the Witch from being anything other than an incredibly lazy port of an already mediocre and generic mobile clone. A derivative, boring and regularly frustrating experience that has had no care applied in bringing it to Nintendo Switch. The laborious gameplay and obtuse controls, combined with bland, uninspired level design and by-the-numbers progression, reduce it to being one of the most disposable titles on the system. Don't let the admittedly pleasant art style fool you - Maria the Witch really isn't worth taking for a spin.
Maria the Witch may feature some interesting visuals but once the dust settles, it becomes obvious that there is nothing in this game that makes it worthy of spending any time and attention. Due to completely nonperforming controls that would drive the most experienced player to despair, Maria the Witch is an experience that is not recommended to anyone.
Review in Portuguese | Read full review
All in all Maria The Witch has some good points, like the art style and the colorful settings but, ultimately, it's pretty hard to recommend a game as frustrating as this one. At first glance, I thought it would be a good looking and relaxing platformer, but it is a shallow game that is challenging just for the sake of being challenging.
Keeping in mind price, presentation, and the amount of content in Maria the Witch is appropriate and even pretty compelling. What it will likely come down to to the individual player will be the control and the pretty unforgiving big picture level design. Controlling Maria’s thrust and momentum, in particular, when needing to pause or maneuver can be a bit maddening, especially when paired with her pretty wide turn radius when looping. It just never feels very tight, though I’d imagine that’s the idea. Pairing that with a checkpoint system that can be hit and miss in sections you’ll either enjoy and embrace the challenge Maria the Witch presents or just move on and find something else to play since that’s all there is to the game.
While Maria the Witch seems slightly more complicated than your typical game, a better button outlay may have made it a lot less frustrating. I just wanted to be in control, or to feel in control, of Maria far more than I did. Now to go and lie down before I have nightmares of flying my broomstick into yet another wall...
Maria the Witch is a decent mobile to console port, it works just like the mobile and the Steam version and holds up well with the enlarged graphics. The game can get challenging and be frustrating at times but that's all part of the package - with it's quick respawns and fast gameplay, the game wants you to give it 'just one more try'!