Write Your Own Prophecy
Howl, a turn-based tactical game developed by Mi’pu’mi studios, offers a dark fairytale. The Vienna-based boutique studio has a pair of other original IPs with distinct art styles under its belt: The Flower Collectors and The Lion’s Song. Howl‘s pen-and-ink artwork, well-designed puzzles, and intriguing storyline all served to capture and maintain my interest.
Howl drops you into a dark version of a Germanic fairytale. A terrible curse spreads, called the Howling Plague. Anyone who hears one of the preternatural howls transforms into a vicious wolf-like beast. A Prophet rises, her deafness granting her immunity from the Howl’s terrible effects. She must pen a prophecy that will allow her to find the source of the plague and stop it for good.
Grid Based Gameplay
As with most games of this type, the battlefield is a grid. The Prophet has a set number of actions she can take per turn, such as moving a space, shooting an arrow, or knocking an enemy back. Unlike most games of the genre I’ve played, the enemies don’t wait until you finish your turn to act. Once an opponent notices the Prophet, they’ll act after each action she takes, making the stages dynamic. That means that when you’re selecting your actions, you have to consider your enemies’ reactions.
Most enemies fall after one hit, making the stages fast-paced. The Prophet can only take damage twice, so the choices you make count. The punishment for failure is minimal, though, as you are just kicked back to the start of the level. The nature of the game meant that I ended up restarting the level when I made a mistake. As the battles were all bite-sized, it wasn’t much of a sacrifice. If that sounds irritating, there’s a feature you can turn on to show the enemies’ movements each turn so you won’t have to guess.
A Melancholic Tale
The minimalist story in Howl leaves an impression. The Prophet begins penning her prophecy, preparing to set out to end the Howling Plague. She hopes to find her missing brother along the way, who disappeared not long before the mysterious plague started.
Beyond the opening narrative, the story is told in a few lines in each battle. A wistful narrator relates the Prophet’s memories of happier times in the forests where she would play with her brother or visit neighboring villages. The memories are juxtaposed with the desolation all around her—beasts have overrun towns and the roads that connect them, heartbreaking reminders of the people who used to live nearby.
The Prophet does encounter others briefly, but she doesn’t stop to speak with them, giving the journey a lonesome overtone. Other characters’ names and their role in seeking to stop the spread of the plague and the ravenous beasts.
I very much enjoyed the narrative and the mood it set, but I wished there had been more of it. I tend to prefer story-driven games, so it won’t be a complaint for everyone. But the world Mi’pu’mi built was captivating, and I really wanted to learn more about it and its denizens.
Intriguing Puzzles
All strategy games are a series of puzzles, but Howl condenses the idea. Each level has two main goals: beating it quickly or defeating all the enemies. While completing a stage allows you to progress no matter what, there are useful rewards you get for doing them well.
Making it to the exit within a set number of turns grants Confidence, which can be used to level up special skills. Additionally, every enemy defeated rewards you with a skull, which can be exchanged to open up new paths. The game gives you the option of replaying stages in order to acquire these on separate play-throughs, which was very helpful in the later levels.
Yet managing to get both when beating a level made me feel terribly clever. I spent quite a bit of time planning out my movements before acting and felt a thrill whenever I predicted correctly. The enemies are easy to anticipate to facilitate this; it was rare that they did something completely unexpected.
Other aspects add further complications, such as destructible obstacles and strangers that need rescuing from the beasts before they’re killed or join their ranks. Special abilities, usable on your second, fourth, or sixth action, can also be unlocked, adding more calculations to the levels. Some levels require that you return with a new ability in order to complete all the objectives.
An Atmospheric Adventure
Howl has a beautiful art style, soft-spoken narration, and an understated soundtrack. All of it adds up to the sense of loss that pervades the game, making it stay with me long after I put the phone down.
I would improve a few things, like the fact that most of the levels had a certain sameness—the Prophet spends an awful lot of time in a boreal forest. I also would have liked there to be just a bit more to the story, as it glossed over so many details. But these problems didn’t take away from what the game does best.
There were enough differences in the maps, skills, and enemy types that it kept the gameplay fresh. The mood of the game remains consistent, and while I wouldn’t say the ending surprised me, I was pleased with the way all the threads were woven together.
And if you’re unsure if this game sounds right for you, there’s a free trial of the first few levels as a test before deciding to buy the full version.
