Unfortunately, myself and others hit a game-breaking bug. Apparently some of you did not and have managed to finish the game. Good for you! But I cannot recommend anyone take the risk. (I've detailed the bug in the discussions page; spoilers, obviously.)

Otherwise, it seems like it could be a fairly decent casual point-and-click adventure. The story and characters are rubbish, below the already quite low standard for this genre. But there are quite diverse scenarios and interesting puzzles.

Short, easy, and inexpensive HOG. No cards or achievements so far. Lots of "trace this figure without crossing an used line" type puzzles. The graphics are pretty without being lavish (hello Artifex) and the HOG scenes are not difficult except for when language issues arise, using hairbrush instead of comb for example. The last part of the game has you solve riddles to access areas AND to figure which item to find in the HOG scene, a rather enjoyable change of pace. There is no bonus content, but it's only @$5.00, which is very economical nowadays (hello again Artifex, and hi Big Fish.)

The story is pretty standard and shallow, as is the norm in HOGs. One plot point I'm not sure of could be due to a translation error ...or did they really imply the Crow Witch was not just the Feline Wizard's sister but his love also (before their transformation?!) If so, WOW, HOG's are getting rather telenovela! xD

So a 7/10 due to no cards, cheevs, or bonus content.

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Witchcraft: Pandoras Box:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Buying a house is one of life’s thrills. Some of us decide to build it from scratch, while others buy from a plan (mostly units), and yet others purchase pre-lived-in houses. In the latter case, let’s say you fell in love with a property without having a single idea who had lived in the place before you. What if the old, spectacular house you were about to purchase had been the home of a witch who was in search of eternal youth? That would be very creepy, wouldn’t you say? Well, you might hit the jackpot in Witchcraft: Pandoras Box!

Witchcraft: Pandoras Box is a casual hidden objects game developed by Meridian93 Studio and published by HH-Games on Steam on the 3rd of January 2020.

After choosing your mode of difficulty between Casual and Expert, you’ll receive the key to your new house. As you start unpacking, you’ll discover Pandora's Box. While your daughter is satisfied to sit and draw, you manage to open the box and the nightmare unfolds. The witch kidnaps your daughter and escapes to a fantasy world through Pandora’s box. All you think of from that time onwards is to save your precious little girl.

As you would expect in this genre of game, the interface will have a map showing where you are, which locations you have and haven’t visited, a book to record your progress in term of the story, and a hint button.

I found all the illustrations very colourful and well made. There are various types of puzzles, including matching, sliding and more. At several stages within your progress, you might wonder how to move forward. When you hit these spots, you might need to use the magic runes from the Lilliputian you saved early in the game. That will trigger another puzzle where you have to trace the symbol lines without using the same line twice. In terms of hidden objects scenes, there are not many.

The main issue I encountered during my gameplay was that the game froze a few times during both of my playthroughs. These occurred randomly both at the start and the end of the cut scenes with the witch and the young girl. It’s a shame because the game is actually quite good and can be enjoyed by all ages. Unfortunately, the final score has been heavily influenced by these issues. On the good side, you won’t lose your progress when you restart the game.

It will take you around 1 hour and 30 minutes to finish the game in casual difficulty and slightly longer on the other difficulties.

Positives:
~~~~~~~

+ Colourful graphics
+ Nice variety of puzzles
+ Light a casual story
+ Fun for all ages

Negatives:
~~~~~~~~

- No achievements or trading cards
- Several freezes

Witchcraft: Pandoras Box is a short, very colourful game of puzzles and hidden objects!

5/10

Key provided by the developer/publisher for review purposes. Any opinions expressed are entirely my own!

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I usually like HH-Games' products; however, this is surprisingly unpolished, as if it were rushed out the door without any quality control whatsoever.

The art and HOS are decent, but the game is unfortunately riddled with translation errors, buggy puzzles and UI interactions, and poorly communicated objectives.

With so many HOGs and HOPAs to choose from nowadays, it honestly doesn't make sense to recommend one that fails to meet baseline genre standards.

(Also, the user-defined tags are misleading. This contains no match-3 elements. It is a casual hidden object adventure with an additional line-tracing minigame gimmick.)

PROS
-The rune tracing minigame is kind of fun
-The section with riddles is a nice change of pace from typical HOGs
-The hint/skip button tells you exactly how many seconds are left until you are able to use it again
-The art is pretty

CONS
-A full hour shorter than most hidden object games
-The game often feels less like you're building or using things and more like a string of fetch quests
-The character "animations" are just still images moved across the screen, while the environmental animations take far too long to complete
-Lack of voice acting
-Basic grammar issues and misnaming that should have been caught before the game's release such as "you'll must help us" in the dialogue, "comb" for a hairbrush in one hidden object scene
-Subpar hint system and map showing of active areas:

• Sometimes the name of the rune doesn't make it clear what you should use it for. For example, I got stuck at the mountain station with the sunflowers. I knew I was supposed to press the sunflower seeds for oil. I had the empty oil can. I had no way to press the seeds, though, and the hint just kept circling the sunflowers without further direction. That was the only location on the map lit up, so if I was missing equipment, it wasn't telling me where to find it. Finally I realized I was supposed to use the "Transformation" rune to press the oil from the seeds, which made absolutely no logical sense.
  
• Towards the end of the game, I was expected to retrieve a rune through a telescope. I had already picked up the 'Diminish' rune from the table in the Mage's study, and thus my runestone was full. I could not get rid of the Diminish rune, and thus could not obtain the new one through the telescope. I could not progress in the game any further. I found I was supposed to use the Diminish rune on the mirror in the mage's study, but the hint never told me I had an action available there, and again, there was nothing in the game to point to such an action.

Really nice game, has great artwork and specially the hidden objetcs scenes are very fun to search. Really enjoyed it :D

gamesense

Sound: 5
Graphics: 7
Story: 4
Gameplay: 6
Commands: 7
Fun: 6
Time to load / lag: 9
Bugs / Problems: 6
Final score: 5

There is a bug in the beginning of the game. You can't zoom on runes you need to progress.

https://youtu.be/13fljnspDyA

Using a time travel hook to justify the collection of puzzles and locations serves this game well as a way to hang a lantern on the fact that nothing will try to follow logical structures.