Indie Game Spotlight: Witchery Academy (@witcheryacademy)

Get your wands at the ready for this week’s Indie Game Spotlight! Witchery Academy is a game where you live the adventures of being a wizard student with your spirit companion. Spend your days learning spells, growing mysterious plants, meeting other students, and exploring the world outside the academy!

Witchery Academy is Cubenary’s second commercial game, after Fantasy Little Jobs. We chatted with Bee (AKA @blue_bubble_bee), the voice of the two-team indie studio, who is also a programmer, designer, and does the PR/Social media as well! Read on to hear all about gameplay, potions, and more!

What are some gameplay mechanics incorporated into Witchery Academy?

There are many activities and adventures to choose from and enjoy every day. You might want to attend classes and improve your wizard skills: In botanic class, for example, you’ll take care of your garden and learn how to plant, grow, and harvest all sorts of plants; in potion class, you can brew new potions using different ingredients, some of them from your garden!

Your cat companion is an essential element in the game; you can chill and bond with them, give them treats, and play games.

You can decide to go outside of the academy, take a stroll and catch some bugs, or relax while fishing.

Quests and relationships with other students also play an important role in the game: You’ll be able to explore the academy and its surroundings with them, forming great relationships as you go.

What types of spirit companions can we have?

What better companion than an adorable fluffy cat? When you start your journey in the academy, you are given your cat spirit companion, which you can name and customize, and which will help you on your adventures!

The game has beautiful visuals. How long did it take the team to land on an “a-ha” moment when designing the game’s art style?

We experimented for two months—at first, we tried to go with an art style called chibi, where the characters would be less detailed than they are now. But soon we realized that it would be more appealing to the players if we use a more stylized look, with realistic but colorful elements.

Who are some characters we can expect to meet?

You can expect to meet other students wandering in the academy and becoming future wizards and witches, some of which will have a major role in your adventures, with their own background stories and companions. The headmaster of the academy is a powerful wizard who also happens to be a giant lazy toad! You will also find magical creatures and spirits, like the happy scarecrow who provides you with seeds.

What’s one potion or spell in the game that you wish you had in real life?

We want to incorporate a variety of spells and potions that you can use in different moments, for example, a spell to fix broken things to help a villager. A very interesting potion I would like to have would be one that makes you able to understand animals.