Video Game / WitchSpring

WitchSpring (마녀의샘) is an Eastern RPG series by Korean game publisher and developer KiwiWalks and directed by its CEO, Suyoung Jang. Originally began as a Mobile Phone Game series but has also grown to include releases on both consoles and PCs.

Once humanity worshipped the gods who lived alongside them and were generous enough to provide them with miracles. However, their reverence gradually shifted into a lust for the power they covet and in finding out the deities drew their magic from the Springs they turned on those they once called gods. Humans soon emerged victorious, killing the Temple Lords governing the Springs and demonizing the rest as witches to the populace at large. Witch hunts sprang afterward, and the unlucky deities were often hunted down and killed though several managed to escape such a fate.

The protagonists are among these witches who are trying to make their way in a world that despises them.

Games in the series include:

• WitchSpring is the first entry in the series which released on July 12, 2015, for Korea and on October 16 later that year. It follows the story of Pieberry as she hunts for ingredients and trains to become stronger so she won't live in fear of humans. As she continues venturing outside she comes across the ruins of a temple and finds herself drawn further in. After making contact with the Spring and conversing with its slumbering deity she finds herself on a journey to revive the other Springs across the continent of Vavelia.
  • WitchSpring R is a remaster of the first game featuring not only updated gameplay and visuals but also a complete expansion of the story to tie it in with the world established by its sequels. The PC version was released on September 26, 2023 while the console release was announced for a later date.
• WitchSpring2 is the second game in the series and was released on June 30, 2016, in Korea and on October 21 later that year globally. It is a P.O.V. Sequel following the perspective of Luna whose peaceful life in Vavelia Village is turned upside down by the witch hunts. The game not only further expands upon the setting which future entries would continue to build upon but also sheds light on what caused her to be so cold and bitter in the first place.
• WitchSpring3 is the third game in the series and was released in Korea and globally on October 27, 2017. Rather than Vavelia, the story takes place in the continent of Derkarr where the Springs save for two have dried up which left a sizeable chunk of the land as a desert. The plot follows Eirudy who longs to make friends and whose lonely life in the Misty Forest changes after a chance meeting with a boy named Adrian. Adrian seeks a way to revive his ill mother and Eirudy's decision to help him spells change for not only her life but also the continent of Derkarr.
  • WitchSpring3 [Re:Fine] - The Story of Eirudy is an Updated Re-release of the game for the Switch and was released on December 12, 2020 with the PC port releasing later on November 2, 2021.
• WitchSpring4 is the fourth game in the series and was released in Korea and globally on December 19, 2019. This game takes place in yet another continent, Ürphea, and stars Moccamori, an orphaned girl saved by the deity Agamo who empowers Moccamori and makes her his successor. After conquering Ürphea for herself, her mission of collecting enough magic power to revive Agamo goes well until she meets a mysterious young deity named Ida and loses all of the accumulated magic. While on her journey to build back her power, she also has to contend with the other villages who oppose her rule.

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Tropes that apply to this series:

In General

• Cutting Off the Branches:
  • Out of the nine different endings of the first game WitchSpring2 closely follows the ending of "A Peaceful Day".
  • Eirudy's appearance in WitchSpring4 alone would mean she followed either the Light or True paths. Luna also mentions wanting to see Robyn making her decision to not Mercy Kill his corrupted self canon.
• Early-Installment Weirdness:
  • The original WitchSpring takes place in the span of a hundred days with each action continuing the day and the ending depending on what Pieberry does or does not do in that time frame. Later entries including R do away with this game mechanic.
  • Training in the first and second games either cost HP or MP. Beginning with 3 they now run on a separate timer.
• Instant Runes: The style of magic in the games. Magical circles are also one of the many things the protagonists can craft either by making new spells or support circles that enhance their effects. WitchSpring4 is the sole exception to magic mediums which instead imbue spells with elemental effects with the main and secondary circles being built in.
• Pre Existing Encounters: All enemies are visible and for most of them upon entering their threat range you are given the choice to either engage or retreat.
• Rabbit Magician: While deities aren't rabbits one of their most prominent traits is their rabbit ears and they have the ability to wield magic while humans generally could not.
• Sinister Minister: Pope Celvis of Vavelia, one of the co-conspirators of humanity's dethroning of the deities.
• Summon Magic: A recurring element to the series is the ability to summon familiars to assist the protagonists in some way though the familiars in question differ between games. The first two games as well as R had Pieberry and Luna use pets, 3 had Eirudy's dolls, and 4 had Moccamori's minions.
• Villain of Another Story: Pope Celvis and Jude receive minor appearances/mentions in WitchSpring3 and WitchSpring4.
• Witch Hunt: After the deaths of the Vavelian Temple Lords and by order of the Pope the deities humans once revered are to be hunted down as witches. The hunts are over by the end of the third game and in the four they've been ended early by Moccamori taking over the continent for herself. WitchSpring R would add on that they were specifically were started to hunt for the Child of Prophecy aka Pieberry to aid in the Pope's own plans.

WitchSpring

• Blob Monster: Near Pieberry's house is the Pudding Cave inhabited by slimes composed of delicious pudding.
• Child Mage: While Pieberry's exact age isn't stated in-game her age before receiving Elysion's blessing designer notes state that she is 10 years old.
• Forced Transformation: Black Joe's true form is a Giant Flyer rather than the round, ugly bird he goes by. It's a result of being put under a spell by Elysion. In the endings where the Temple Lords come back and stop Jude's rampage she admits she's unable to dispel it from him.
• Given Name Reveal:
  • The name "Pieberry" was one she gave herself over her love of pie and berries. Elysion, her mother, reveals to her that her actual name is Lucia.
  • Before his Forced Transformation, Black Joe was called Ark.
• Multiple Endings: Sports the most of the games thus far totaling in at nine though only two of them grants access to the post-game.
• Pathetically Weak: Alfredo dreams of being a knight of fame and glory but is incredibly weak as Pieberry in the beginning defeats him with little difficulty.
• Playing with Fire: Pieberry's favored magic is fire due to how common and accessible it is compared to the ice and lightning spells which can only be obtained by one spellbook. In the case of the latter, it's only obtainable very late into the game.
• Plot-Relevant Age-Up: Pieberry becomes older after receiving Elysion's blessing and is given a newer portrait to reflect this.
• Robe and Wizard Hat: Pieberry and Luna’s clothing are both evocative of classic witches. Notably, this is a style unique to them and is something no other deity in the series shares.
• Solitary Sorceress: Fitting for the bitter and reclusive Luna she makes her home in the Icy Field. When Pieberry meets her there she

WitchSpring2

• Ascended Extra:
  • By virtue of being a P.O.V. Sequel, this game is one for Luna as her role in Vavelia's conflict is greatly expanded upon. She even gets to escape from her cell on her own and participate in the battles against the Pope and Jude with Pieberry and Justice.
  • Michelle was a minor character encountered at the near end of the game and a reason for Luna being so distrustful of people. Here, her relationship with Luna and its subsequent fall is shown in detail. She even gets a proper portrait this time around.
• Foregone Conclusion: As she mentioned briefly in the first game, Luna's relationship with Michelle is guaranteed to sour when early on the latter sells her friend out to the Palace Knights. Likewise, her being thrown into the dungeon to have her magic harnessed is also a certainty.
• Forgotten First Meeting: Luna turns out to have already met Pieberry when she was brought to her by Aimhard back when she was still called Lucia. She doesn't put two and two together until seeing her in prison at the end of the game.
• Giant Spider: Nessie the Sea Monster, contrary to its name, is a spider large enough to walk across the sea and attacks Sofia's ship as it passes by.
• Lunacy: Luna's Moonstone allows her attacks to be 30% more effective at night.
• P.O.V. Sequel: The game serves as one for Luna.
• Rewarded as a Traitor Deserves: Michelle selling Luna out to the Palace Knights at the beginning of the game inevitably bites her.

WitchSpring3

• Ain't Too Proud to Beg: Once Eirudy bests her with Bernick, Velita had no trouble dropping to her hands and knees to beg to let her go despite having arrived at her own home with warriors prior.
• Archnemesis Dad: Regal, Adrian's father. Not only is he cold and uncaring towards the other villages of Derkarr but is also distant towards his son and dying wife though he wasn't always like that and did genuinely try to save her. He is also complicit in humanity turning against the deities.
• Big Damn Heroes:
  • Adrian comes to help save Eirudy when the original path in Lehert Mine collapses.
  • After being lured to Shubeth Village and imprisoned in Shubeth by Regal, Adrian comes to free her and Johannes from their cells in the Light Path.
  • Eillen, Lukas, Pieberry, and Luna come help deal with the remaining Ancient Dragons following Regal's defeat.
• Draconic Humanoid: Monnet is an Ancient Dragon but her current appearance is that of a dark woman in armor. Her human appearance can be chalked up to her father, Jude, getting together with her human mother.
• Emotionless Girl: Eirudy starts off as one owing to her sheltered life in the Misty Forest and her original nature as a doll. She slowly grows out of this as the story progresses.
• Karma Houdini Warranty: Zig-Zagged. At the very end of the Light/True Paths Johannes awaits his judgment from Monnet before cutting away with the implication she'll kill him which will serve as his comeuppance for stealing the Dragon's Nest from under her nose as well as tricking Eilleen and Eirudy into going inside the Springs. Fulfilling Judith's quest will have her show up to drive off Monnet. The post-game then reveals that his manipulations cost him his position in the Royal Palace.
• Marionette Master: Replacing the Pets of the first two games are Dolls which Eirudy can animate and enhance by injecting them with Vitality. Most of her Dolls are already available in the Marionette Chamber while others are acquired in the world or by progressing the story.
• Only in It for the Money: Velita’s motivation, what with being a mercenary from Vavelia and all. While she was hired to watch over Adrian her orders shift to accompanying Shubethian Warriors to Lehert and detaining Adrian. On the Dark and True Paths she also follows Eirudy right to her doorstep. And in the Light and True Paths she also ends up rooting for Adrian's revolution to succeed and asks him to hire her again.

Adrian: Well, she's a mercenary so she's always been neutral.

• Previous Player-Character Cameo: [Re:Fine] includes an inversion by including an additional scene of Moccamori, the next game's protagonist, talking to Shubethian warriors brought before her lobby.
• Til Murder Do Us Part: Armed with the knowledge that the Dragon's Nest sucks in nearby vitality, Adrian assumed his father was attempting this on Esther when he gifted her the Dragon's Nest. He's wrong, Regal genuinely wanted to save her illness and was convinced by Jude that leaving the Dragon's Nest with her would help with that while also keeping the thing that controls dragons safe with her. Regal only realizes Jude tricked him before his death.
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: Johannes reveals themselves to be one at the end, being the one responsible for pushing Eilleen and coaxing Eirudy into the Springs in an attempt to revive them. They do so having grown up in the poverty of Lehert and seeing firsthand the suffering wrought by the encroaching desert.

WitchSpring4

• Always Identical Twins: Averted. Ethan’s brother once bore a resemblance to him but Uris hardly looks like him in the present. This is justified by him having to survive in Kabanes wild and Mariena’s doing a poor job of healing his face. In the post-game he gets it fixed to the point that Moccamori was confused as to why Ethan looked older until he explains himself.
• Aw, Look! They Really Do Love Each Other: Despite Ethan years of building up resentment towards his brother thanks to her mother focusing on him he was genuinely distraught at Uris wanting to sacrifice himself if it meant bringing back Mariena and begged Moccamori to not do it.
• Be Careful What You Wish For: Part of what motivates Moccamori to recuperate her strength was to get back at Ida for humiliating her at multiple points throughout the story. In the post-game she ends up being forced to face his shadow, Deep Dark Ida, and ends up killing him in combat with Ida following shortly after. By this point, however, she had long since abandoned her hatred towards him and is saddened by the act especially since Ida wanted such a thing to occur thanks to his guilt towards creating the Shadow World in the first place.
• Big Guy Fatality Syndrome: Following Adlai's revival in Moccamori's body, he consumes the magic of Varon causing him to drop dead on the spot. It is subverted later when he is brought back to defend the Ancient Land against Moccamori but is double-subverted when he is once again slain and has his soul sealed in Adlai's soul stone. He remains absent from Moccamori's list of Minions from here on
• Break the Haughty: Moccamori endures several through the course of the story from being bested by other deities, falling into the traps of her enemies, and being turned into an ugly bird. Still, Moccamori never lets it beat her down for long and all the hardships help shape her into a better person by the end of her story.
• Driven by Envy: Cecilia's motivation for conspiraing against Moccamori. While they didn't start out this way, they grew dissatisfied with how she handled things and how she had it easy with being Agamo's chosen while they had to pick after her shortcomings.
• Fake Defector: In Chapter 3, Cecilia seemingly convinces Ethan to go along with her plans of deposing Moccamori after exposing that she was likely the one to have killed his missing brother. After kicking Moccamori out of the sap trap, he strikes Cecilia and reiterates that he grew to resent his brother and knew not to trust her as he’s familiar with backstabbers like her back in Vavelia.
• Forced Transformation: Moccamori gets turned into an ugly bird by Laura so that she can see things from the perspective of those weaker than her. Unlike with Black Joe, she turns back quickly after calming down. It's confirmed that Laura was the one who created the ugly bird magic in the first place, something that was mentioned by Black Joe himself in the previous entry's post-game.
• Forgotten First Meeting: The boy who discovered Moccamori and her parents and was thought to have been killed when she awakened Agamo’s power was Uris all along, one of her most persistent threats to her rule.
• Iron Butt Monkey: Libro frequently is on the receiving end of Moccamori’s ire. This becomes pivotal when confronting Cecilia during her betrayal as no amount of damage inflicted on him compares to what Moccamori does to him on a daily basis.
• The Maze: To find her way enter Varnado Garden and into Mirac's Spring, Moccamori must traverse through the Fairy's Maze and find the exit that teleports her to the garden's entrance. The maze is covered in a magic fog and transport magic is unable to work within the maze. Its sole inhabitant is the Maze Wanderer, a black-hearted deity who desired the garden's power for themselves but lost their body sometime in the past and is unable to leave for that reason. Thus, they attack Moccamori to steal her body for themself.
• Pride Before a Fall: The game begins with Moccamori losing all of Agamo's accumulated magic power while defending herself from Ida and Uverstan, forcing her to start from scratch and train to get back to where she was before.
• Prefers the Illusion: Varon's motivation for opposing Moccamori is that he gets to see his home of Varnado pure once more within Adlai's dream and enjoy the sights with his lost friends. Even if it was false, he preferred it over the reality laid before him, and its strong enough to oppose Moccamori forcing her to cut down one of her first Minions and seal him back in Adlai's Soul Stone. Tragically, it revealed in the post-game that the Purity Flower Varon planted in an attempt to purify Varndo has begun to bore fruit, and given enough time it could realize his dream. Moccamori points this out to his Shadow and promises to make that dream into reality before continuing her journey through the Shadow World.
• Roaring Rampage of Revenge: Upon waking from his near-fatal poisoning, Justice proceeds to use the magic Pieberry gifted him in her sacrifice to hunt down Moccamori and wrecks her castle in the process. Eirudy, Black Joe, and Luna arrive not too long after him and agree to taking revenge on Moccamori.

WitchSpring R

• Adaptational Early Appearance:
  • Luna appears much earlier than either the first and second games:
  • Livya and Kate are no longer characters exclusive to the post-game and are interweaved into the game's plotline. The former's corruption by Dark Magic Stones and the latter return as a vengeful wraith is adjusted to being made into becoming apart of the Pope's Executors.
• Adapted Out: Panda Kum and Alflady were introduced in the first and second games respectively but remain absent in the game.
• Advertised Extra: Ethan is among the prominently advertised characters and receiving not only his own dialgoue illustration but also a place on the Evolving Title Screen and "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue. His role in the story, however, is minimal and only amounts to how he leaves for Ürphea which leads up to his role in the fourth game.
• Age Lift: Since the beginning of the series the Pope is an elderly man. R depicts him as a far younger man instead.
• Ascended Extra: Livya and Kate have more prominence in the main story as opposed to being relegated to post-game events.
• Dies Differently In The Adaptation:
  • Berto in the second game perished during the final moments of the game after a Dual Boss consisting of himself and a corrupted Robyn. Here, Berto meets his end in Aimhard's temple as he and his men fall to a vengeful Anna binds their souls, sending them careening into the Shadow World.
  • In the first two games Kate's ghost is defeated by either Pieberry or Luna. Here, Livya recovers from the Pope's mind control and is one to deal the final blow to her just as she traps the party in restraint magic.
  • In the original games the Pope perished from being corrupted by the Dark Magic Stones before being purified by the Spring. In R, Jude runs his sword through his body instead. However, the Pope uses his last remaining strength to use restraint magic on him and gives an opening for Verstein to return the favor while also pinning him down so he can't escape Piebarry and Luna's attack.
• Heroic BSoD: Anna's sacrifice to dispose of Berto leaves Pieberry despondent. She's too distraught to eat anything, let alone leave the confines of her bed. It takes Black Joe's distress from being eaten by a Nuuk to get her to leave her house. Afterwards, she yells at Black Joe for almost getting himself killed.
• More than Mind Control: As a stark contrast to Miro and Livya, Kate retained her personality despite being tortured in the process of being turned into an Executor and her loyalty to the Pope is of her own volition. If anything, being turned into an Executor brought the worst of her into full-force.
• Paper-Thin Disguise: Pieberry's idea for her first "disguise" to sneak into Lalaque Village is simply putting on a knight's helmet. Said helmet doesn't even fully hide her ears. Needless to say, she gets busted quickly once Justice sees her. She thankfully uses a much better one later on that allows to freely enter and explore human settlements as she pleases.
• Reforged into a Minion: After Livya's meeting with the Pope and she is tortured and transformed into the Hunt Executor when the Pope notes that she and her men couldn't have possibly stopped and detained Kate by herself..
• Sir Not-Appearing-in-This-Trailer: Anna is hit with this despite being the person whom Pieberry quest for pie of her dreams leads to while also being a Red Herring as Pieberry's mother. She later goes on to sacrifice herself for Pieberry, and her late daughter is later revealed to be the identity behind the Scythe Executor. Interestingly, while she is left out of promotional material the same can not be said for Verstein, Reina, and Airene, all of whom have a place on the game's website but have their names and description obscured by question marks. They are apart of the Death Squad, a legion of humans who are against the Pope's authority and serve as major allies in the latter half of the story.
• Too Unhappy to Be Hungry: Following Anna's death, Pieberry refuses to eat anything Black Joe gives her even as entire days pass.
• Trailers Always Spoil:
  • Generally promotional material for the game does not shy away from showing Pieberry's older form after receiving Elysion's blessing.
  • The third trailer shows Jude's dragon form, the Final Boss of the game, on a rampage following his defeat.
  • The trailer for the game's release brazenly show the first appearance of Kate's Curse Executor form.
• Wounded Gazelle Gambit: Kate's Establishing Character Moment is pleading for Pieberry to go rescue her non-existent brother from the Flying Squirrel Bandits in the hope's of getting rid of both. When that fails, she decides to blow up the cave with a gunpowder stockpile.

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