I like playing visual novel games because of their laid-back system and focus on storytelling. The Mildew Children, however, only includes the latter. I would lie if I said the game was anything but relaxing.

Ten hours later, as the end credits rolled, my feelings towards The Mildew Children were undecided.

The story begins with Kyrphel, a witch who lives in a village where pagan beliefs are strongly followed. She is accompanied by other witches and a priestess who together perform rituals to protect and save the village from a greater evil. However, when an untimely death happens right before an important ritual, Kyrphel is left with no other option but to find a way to complete the ritual, even if her decisions come with dire consequences.

The Mildew Children follows the theme of dark medieval fantasy with heavy dialogues and challenging minigames that are bound to invest the player with its story.

A Village Drowned In European Pagan Folklore

The entire story of The Mildew Children takes place in the village, where we also meet the inhabitants and get a glimpse of their insulting treatment of witches. Though the village’s gloomy atmosphere adds an extra element to the story, I can’t deny that the gorgeous 2D blended art style helps make the village feel more alive and dynamic.

The first few minutes of the game gave me the impression of how rich and inspired the pagan folklore felt behind establishing this tiny world in the game. The villagers are their own individual characters with different personalities, and sometimes, despite their ill-treatment of the witches, they approach Kyrphel for help or another. The thing that struck me the most during such moments was the hypocrisy of these characters and how this helped make the game feel more realistic and grounded.

The Mildew Children Review: A Dark And Complex Visual Novel - - News | | GamesHorizon — Kyrphel and The Priestess, Littlegrave in the village streets. Image by The Growing Stones

For a visual novel, the story is well-paced across eleven chapters, making it feel fleshed out. However, there is a heavy abundance of dialogues, and by later chapters, my eyes grew a bit tired of reading continuously since the game lacks voice acting. I wish they didn’t overdo too much on the dialogues, but given the game’s theme, sometimes I felt like I was reading a religious book. But despite this, I can’t deny that I wasn’t curious to learn more about the background and characteristics of the characters we interact with.

A Picturesque Art Style

There is not a single frame in The Mildew Children that doesn’t look hauntingly alluring. We follow Kyrphel in different locations, like the busy village streets, the greenery thickets of the forest, the burial grounds on the outskirts of the village, and the interior of battered huts and mansions. Each area felt vibrant and unique, making me not want to look away from my screen while exploring. This is where I felt a deep appreciation towards the artists who have carefully crafted such fine details to make the game look refreshing with its dark story.

In fact, the art style fits the story well, especially the changing day/night cycle and the lighting in certain areas. For example, the thick forest had a somber ambiance with a mix of dark lighting and lush greenery.

I recommend that players play this game with headphones, especially because of certain sounds, like the chatter and laughter of the villagers and children. The music isn’t anything extraordinary, but it does its job of immersing the players in the environment and the story.

The Gameplay Keeps You On Your Toes

I thought The Mildew Children’s gameplay was fairly simple until I was proven wrong. The basic exploration movement works like a side-scrolling game, but what was challenging were the minigames and, believe it or not, the dialogue selection. Let’s break this down!

Being a visual novel, the dialogues are a centric element of the gameplay, and with it comes dialogue selection. Some situations in the game might call for persuading another character into doing or agreeing with something, and you need to make the right dialogue choice to win them over. In such cases, a persuasion meter with a pointer pops up near the dialogue box, and selecting the right option will cause the pointer to move up, which is the yellow area, but selecting the wrong option will get the pointer to move down to the red area.

It is vital to pay attention to the dialogue while persuading another character and remembering certain facts. There was a moment when I had to remember a certain incantation and repeat a ritual process as told by another character. Since my memory isn’t so great for memorizing such things, I decided to take pictures of the dialogue on my phone to use as a reference. This was just one example, as there were many such instances, and sometimes, I forgot and messed up. The game really throws a lot at you during such cases, and it is easy to get overwhelmed.

Apart from the dialogue choices, there are also a few types of minigames. These act like quick time events, like one of them is to chat a spell on time. Since Kyrphel deals with her own illness, when she suffers from stress or tension, her pain meter with a pointer pops up, and when it does, it is important to maintain the pointer in the white area of the meter and not allow it to slide to the red side. If it stays too long in the red area, it leads to instant death. There were times when this pain meter suddenly appeared out of nowhere during a certain interaction, which meant I had to stay alert throughout the game.

These minigames were challenging, but the game has an option to disable them if they become too much. However, I recommend playing it in normal mode to experience the game to the fullest.

An Unexpected Dark Journey Filled With Surprises

I knew nothing about The Mildew Children before playing it, and by the end of my playthrough, it really surprised me. I have played several visual novel games in my gaming journey, but none of them are similar to this game. Kyrphel is an interesting protagonist as we see the world from her eyes. She is someone willing to get her hands dirty to get the job done, and we don’t see a lot of female characters in such a spotlight.

I still don’t know how I feel about this game because there were aspects like the art style and the story that I liked, but sometimes, the game did feel a tad bit overwhelming with its minigames and heavy emphasis on the dialogues. But I can definitely say that The Mildew Children is one of those games out there that felt unique and bold in its genre. Not many games do that these days.