Magical Delicacy [Switch] Review – Tedious Tastebuds – Gamezebo

A witch who owns a shop and cooks? Sign me up! In this Magical Delicacy review, I talk about my time with the game and my overall thoughts. Cook up your own magical dishes in Magical Delicacy, now available on PC and Switch.

Magical Delicacy Review

There’s so much that I like about Magical Delicacy, but there are a couple of things which ruin the fun of it at times. Since it first got announced during a past Wholesome Direct, I’ve had it on my wishlist, so I was more than excited to finally get my hands on it. Overall, it’s a cosy game, but you do need a lot of patience with it.

Cosy Cooking

The visuals of Magical Delicacy are what drew me in at first, and the concept of a witch that cooks, of course. The beautiful pixel art, the glow of the moon throughout the town at night, and the thoughtfully decorated building interiors all make for an absolute treat to the eyes. The bakery with its stack of bread behind the counter is a personal favourite of mine.

It wouldn’t be a cosy game without a relaxing soundtrack either. Magical Delicacy is a lovely game to play when winding down for the night, that is if you don’t keep messing up the recipes…

I’m a big fan of cooking in games and always have been. Owning my own little cafe or shop in a game is a one-way ticket to getting me to buy it! The gameplay cycle of collecting and growing ingredients to then use in recipes across various cooking appliances tickles my brain in the right way. Plus, you get a pet dragon, and anyone who knows me will know that’s a tick in my books.

There’s something so satisfying about using a mortar and pestle to crush some herbs and using the in-game oven to make a hearty soup. I have no issue with having to purchase recipes as they give me a helping hand when trying to fulfil requests, but having to track down certain NPCs gets tedious.

To and Fro 

Figuring out recipes yourself without buying them gets tricky. It’s all part of the experimentation of cooking, but some specific ingredients are rare to find. As well as expensive. Whenever I’d try to cook up a dish for a request that had strict rules, I’d often mess up trying to make a dish as I didn’t have the correct recipe.

This then led me to have to embark on yet another journey back to a faraway shop or desperately searching for a mushroom with the ‘Earthy’ trait. Fast travelling doesn’t unlock until you’re a couple of hours in, so the initial gameplay gets frustrating when having to go back and forth. The platforming is a unique touch to a game like this, but I did have to turn ‘Easy Platforming’ on to save myself some time with the constant travel.

You can buy an ‘elevator pass’ which allows you to traverse up and down, creating a semi-shortcut. But, that also costs in-game cash, which you generate by selling dishes and ingredients and by smashing pots.

Luckily there’s a way to save some time when gathering. You have a little garden at the back of your shop, so you can keep a constant stock of hard-to-get ingredients, as long as you purchase the gardening gloves. This pair of gloves allows you to harvest your crops without destroying them, so they continue to grow back time and time again.

Quality of Life

There are lots of characters to come across and interact with. By obtaining map markers, you can locate shops, but not the travelling merchants. The customisable map markers made it so much easier for me to remind myself of where I found NPCs who gave me requests or any other spots of interest.

Accessibility-wise, I was more than happy to see that the settings menu had lots to offer. You can turn off the reaction time minigames, turn on easy platforming (decreasing the challenge of the platforms), and adjust the reading font.

The ability to pin requests and recipes to the side of your screen is a smart touch as well, and one that I was pleasantly surprised by. While trying to conjure up dishes and checking my ingredients, having the rules of each request and the ingredients/appliances needed for recipes means I don’t have to fiddle about with the menus to jog my memory.

I’m thankful for the upgrades that you gradually unlock, but I fear that they’re a little far into the game, making initial players drop the game prematurely. If you’re happy to be patient with this cosy game, I say give it a go. I enjoyed Magical Delicacy, and respect that it has so many great ideas – but you certainly have to be in the right mindset to play it.

The good

• Lovely pixelated art for characters and interiors
• Relaxing music
• Intuitive cooking mechanics with upgrades
• Accessibility settings are a nice touch

The bad

• The start of the game is make or break as it can get confusing and frustrating
• It takes a while to unlock the quality of life upgrades, such as fast travel
• The map is tricky to understand at first
• It can get repetitive