Castle of Magic, also known as Magic Castle Story, is a Platform Game released on mobile devices and DSiWare in 2009.
Wizzy and his friend Jenny are playing on the beach one day when they happen to come across a buried treasure chest. Inside the chest, Wizzy finds a magical book that turns him into a wizard... but unleashes an evil wizard named Nefastax, who promptly kidnaps Jenny and traps Wizzy inside his magical castle. Now Wizzy must brave the many mystical worlds hidden within the castle to find his friend Jenny! All of which sounds fairly typical for a 2D platformer, especially one in the classical style.
Then you realize that the game is made by Gameloft, notorious for their gaming Mockbusters. Except that, instead of copying one specific game, Castle of Magic seems to be copying all of them.
In contrast to many of Gameloft's other works, Castle of Magic is more of an Affectionate Parody/Homage to the bright, colorful 2D platformers of the 90s than a riff on any one particular work. Although it contains many prominent notes from Super Mario Bros. and its family of games, it also has numerous Shout Outs and mechanical "borrowings" to and from other classic games, The resulting game plays like a mad mishmash of Super Mario Bros., Sonic the Hedgehog, Solomon's Key, and every other platformer under the sun. It's extremely Troperiffic overall.
Contrast Eternal Legacy, another Gameloft title that pulls from a wider range of titles.
This game contains examples of:
- 1-Up: They resemble wizard hats. Or anything else you want to take a picture of.
- Airborne Mook: The bees, and the seagulls in the Pirate Ship world.
- Anime Hair: Wizzy's naturally.
- Attack Its Weak Point: Plantax and Tentaclax have obvious weak points. The later bosses, however, get more creative.
- Auto-Scrolling Level: The third levels of Green Labyrinth and the Pirate Ship are autoscrolling for... no real explained reason.
- Background Boss: Tentaclax attacks you from the back with his tentacles and his minions. However, you can jump up to hit him.
- Big Bad: Nefastax.
- Bonus Stage Collectibles: The stars. However, other that increasing your score, they don't really do anything.
- Bottomless Pit: Naturally.
- Bragging Rights Reward: Collecting the three hidden pickups on a level does nothing but increase your score for that level and show on the overworld that they've been collected. And since there's no reward for getting a high score, either, it's mostly just there so you can say you found them.
- Cap: You can carry up to a maximum of 99 lives. If you have 99 lives, you'll also eventually cap at 99 gems as well.
- Chest Monster: The monster that resembles a treasure chest can be distinguished from the real thing by its Gag Lips. However, it still yields lots of gems if you can beat it.
- Collision Damage
- Context-Sensitive Button: When you're next to an enemy firing snowballs, your basic attack button becomes a "snowman grab" button.
- Combat Tentacles: Tentaclax. It's right there in his name!
- The Computer Shall Taunt You: Nefastax likes showing up to mock you.
- Cranium Ride: You can ride across on the missiles shot by certain cannons, which, judging by their eyes, are enemies by themselves. You can also hop on seagulls in the Pirate Ship.
- Digitized Sprites: You the player have this power: You can take photos of things and turn them into objects in the game.
- Directionally Solid Platforms
- Double Jump: Two varieties. Wizzy can perform a straight up double-jump in air, but you can also hold down the jump button in mid-air to use his hat to glide with.
- Every 10,000 Points: You get an extra life for every 100 gems you collect.
- Excuse Plot
- Exposition Break: The first level of every world contains one where Wizzy will comment on the world.
- Exposition Fairy: The spellbooks you see littered around the world explain your abilities.
- Follow the Money: Following the gems will often lead you to the hidden pickups, or additional powerups.
- Floating Platforms
- Flunky Boss: Tentaclax and Nefastax both summon smaller enemies to hound you.
- Forced Transformation: In Space Land, the laser-spitting UFOs can sometimes turn you into one of the bee enemies. However, being able to fly, the bee is naturally quite useful for exploring.
- Gag Lips: A pair of these distinguishes the local variety of Chest Monster from a real treasure chest.
- Gelatinous Trampoline: Jellies serve as one (ahem) flavor of springboard, and are actually not exclusive to the game's Level Ate. Sprouts serve as another type in a not-quite Springy Spores situation.
- The Goomba: The small monsters, which are apparently just called "Small Monsters."
- Goomba Stomp: Many monsters can be stomped on, but not spiked ones.
- Gravity Screw: Space World is full of them, where you must become charged in order to walk on the ceiling in certain areas. Even the boss, Trax, must be fought this way.
- Ground Pound
- Harmless Freezing: Getting hit with a snowball just turns you into a snowman. This won't make you drop your gems, and it can be broken free of.
- Helpful Mook: Most monsters can be turned into blocks, which can be stood on or pushed into other enemies. The bullet-shooting monsters' missiles also make useful platforms for you, and, in Space Land, the laser-spewing UFOs can turn you into a rather useful bee form.
- Hub Level: The castle, from which you can access all the worlds.
- Kevlard: "Yummy" Wizzy is totally invincible, not just to enemies and hazards, but also to sticky floors.
- Mook Maker: The swirling portals continuously spawn enemies, either just to get in the way, or so you can turn them into platforms. ZAZING!
- Mutually Exclusive Power-Ups: The red "Power Up" form appears in all worlds, while each world (bar Space World) has its own unique powerup. However, becoming one form will get rid of the other.
- No "Arc" in "Archery": The arrows Wizzy shoots in Hunter form travel straight ahead.
- Painfully Slow Projectile: Slow enough to use as platforms. So slow, some of the regular Floating Platforms move faster than they do.
- Path of Most Resistance: Following one usually leads you to a bonus stage, frequently with a secret pickup in it.
- Piñata Enemy: The Chest Monster fights back, unlike real treasure chests. But it still gives out tons of gems if you can beat it.
- Power-Up: In addition to the standard power-up, literally known as just "Power-Up," each world has its own unique powerup. The Green Labyrinth has the Hunter, whose arrows can be used to make your own platforms. The Pirate Ship has the Swordfish, who has an underwater attack. Cake Land has Yummy, which turns you fat and makes you invincible. Ice Land has the wall-climbing Inuit form. And Space Land has a Bee form.
- Power-Up Food: Collecting a cake turns you into "Yummy" form, and eating strawberries while in this form keeps you in it for longer.
- Puzzle Boss: Beeg Mamamax. You have to figure out how to make her vulnerable.
- Reference Overdosed: We'll just leave this here.
- Ring-Out Boss: Snowmax can't be hurt normally; all you can do is throw snowballs to push him back. But naturally, there's something you can push him into... Doubles as Boss-Arena Idiocy.
- Robe and Wizard Hat: Wizzy's wizard outfit.
- Save the Princess: Or rather, your friend.
- Saw a Woman in Half: This is the first thing Wizzy wants to try doing with his newfound magical powers.
- Scoring Points: You get scored on each level, depending on how many lives, gems, and secret collectables you have.
- Score Screen: At the end of every level.
- Sequential Boss: Nefastax, as the final boss, naturally has several stages to him.
- Silliness Switch: The game allows you to take photographs with the Nintendo DSi/3DS camera and turn them into sprites in the game, replacing items and several characters. It serves no purpose other than to be fun and/or silly.
- Spikes of Doom: All over the place!
- The Spiny: Both the basic enemies and the bees have variants with spines on them. They can't be jumped on, but are still vulnerable to your wand attacks.
- Springs, Springs Everywhere: Both gelatin molds and plant sprouts serve as springboards.
- Stage Fatality: Snowmax is defeated by pushing him into a giant flame.
- Star-Shaped Coupon: The bonus pickups hidden in the levels.
- Super Not-Drowning Skills: We guess it's all part of being a wizard.
- Temporary Platform: The "sinking" variety, with some shape similarities to Super Mario World's Donut Lifts. Some clouds also vanish after being landed on.
- Theme Naming: All the bosses have names ending in "-ax": Plantax, Tentaclax, Beeg Mamax, Snowmax, Trax, and Nefastax (who presumably named all his minions after himself).
- Throw the Mook at Them: Mooks can be turned into blocks, which can be shot at other enemies to damage them.
- Video Game Flight: In Space Land, certain laser-UFOs will turn you into a bee, allowing you to fly through the level as long as their "curse" lasts.
- Villainous Harlequin: The small monsters are these in Waddling Head form.
- Wall Crawl: The Inuit transformation can scale walls with its ice pick.
- Written Sound Effect: Portals spawn enemies with a "ZAZING!" Defeated enemies also vanish with an "AAAAH!"
- Waddling Head: The basic small monster is one of these. Although they don't have hands, they can still operate cannons, apparently.
