ENDER MAGNOLIA: Bloom in the Mist Review

ENDER MAGNOLIA: Bloom in the Mist throws its hat in an incredibly busy ring. Definitely one already occupied by its predecessor ENDER LILIES: Quietus of the Knights, a Metroidvania that asked, “What if your powers and progression mechanics were tied to fallen spirits?”

Ascribing narrative and mechanical progression to a revolving door of new abilities is old hat at this point. The foundational classics that begot the genre have been iterated upon hundreds of times. Why then, are they so attractive, regardless of their seemingly repetitive nature?

ENDER MAGNOLIA is by no means a revolutionary Metroidvania. It won’t convince droves of players exhausted by action platforming and piecing out their sense of direction. In the past several years I’ve dived into a number of games in the genre. But I also find them to be relatively enjoyable, especially when providing me with something unexpected. Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown is an undeniable high watermark for the genre, incorporating complex, fluid platforming with challenging and worthwhile progression. Then there are games like Mars 2120 that come from a deep love and appreciation but fall short in scope and execution.

Unsurprisingly, a great game is simply that. Mimicry is a cheap path towards greatness but an inability to differentiate will always leave the better taste of a classic in your mouth. ENDER MAGNOLIA is undoubtedly recognizable. Not only because it echoes the accomplishments of ENDER LILIES but because it strives to iterate like the hundreds before it. But thankfully, that well-tread path bears the fruit of an incredibly polished, moody, challenging, and entertaining Metroidvania.

What is most entrancing about ENDER MAGNOLIA is its moody, gloomy atmosphere. Passing through FromSoftware’s school for dilapidated kingdoms, the game takes place in the Land of Fumes. In this world magic is used to create Homunculi, artificial beings that can look humanoid or like machines. Lately, a poisonous gas has been spreading from the underground, not only corrupting Homunculi but spreading a blight capable of transforming the Homunculi into terrifying mutants.

As the Attuner Lilac, players are capable of cleansing these Homunculi and will use their powers to understand the deeper nature of the corruption, while resolving the mystery of Lilac’s amnesia. ENDER MAGNOLIA deploys its narrative through a series of post-boss cutscenes and conversations. Flashbacks seen through the eyes of the Homunculi being cleansed are meant to build questions in the player’s mind as the game goes on. And while I appreciate the nebulous nature of piecing the puzzle together, it can be somewhat hard to follow. The story is relatively simple and has enough intrigue for those invested in the characters but is primarily focused on the growing horrors inflicted not only on the Homunculi but the Land of Fumes itself.

But much like ENDER LILIES, ENDER MAGNOLIA drenches the atmosphere of its world in gothic architecture, rainy cobblestone streets, steampunk laboratories, ethereal forests, and haunting piano music. There is a definite clash between fantasy and science fiction here, stitched together with a grim mood that permeates every section of the map.

Throughout the numerous zones of the game, I soaked up the eerie dread of a potential new horror. Players traverse an abandoned research facility and make their way into a decimated village where inhabitants are eking out a living. While developers Adglobe and Live Wire imply that this is a world worth saving, only a few dozen sane people seem to exist in the confines of the Land of Fumes’ main locales. Much of the game is covered in deep blues, blacks, greys, and browns, evocative of a land shielding itself from the ominous drizzle of the Rain of Death.

Often it is important when a game takes recognizable locations and transforms them in unrecognizable ways. I think of the magician’s school that players arrive at about halfway through the game. After crystalline depths and corrupted woods, Lilac arrives at the institute and is attacked by mutated magic wielders. The zone is claustrophobic, encased in a number of rooms contained by walls, eventually leading to stark white fields of flowers punctuated with reds.

ENDER MAGNOLIA is quite beautiful. It employs a hand-drawn style, allowing the segmented map to almost act as panels in a comic book. But where Lilac’s pale skin, white hair, and blue attire almost pops off the screen, each zone strikes a thematic chord that pushes them past a simple “video game location” typecasting. And when the action and visuals are coupled with the music, it creates an aesthetic experience where I could instantly match soundtrack moments with locations and vice-versa.

To continue emphasis on ENDER MAGNOLIA‘s map, it houses a fairly standard Metroidvania interpretation. In the first few minutes of starting the game, players will encounter a door that can’t be opened, only to acquire its key several hours into the experience. Growths impede progress in numerous ways, waiting for a new power to finally be the thing to break past them. Smartly, players can expand the map with a click of the right stick, superimposing it over the playable space with enough opacity to not be distracting. Finding everything in a section of the map will highlight it entirely blue. If there’s still secrets to be found, it will remain grey.

A simple choice, yes, but it helps players maintain a sense of place and not truly be confused as to where to go. Only once did I wander around aimlessly in ENDER MAGNOLIA, wondering where I should go next. I thought I was in the correct location but got the impression I was missing something. I agonized over the next step, running through previously tread terrain but found no new path. And then I realized the shaft I was trying to go up had a wall I could cling to and wall jump on. What threw me off was that this spot had an obvious grapple point for a skill I had yet to acquire, seemingly implying that I needed it to progress.

While that annoyance was primarily my fault, I can point to other factors that also applied to other moments in my time with ENDER MAGNOLIA. Take for example, the fact that it was a dark grey wall in an industrial area compacted with dark greys and black representing steel and mechanical constructs. It wasn’t entirely readable. Elsewhere in my journey there was a lightly nauseating portion referred to as the Crimson Forest. The Crimson Forest area is pieced together my multiple small instances of maps that require players to traverse it by either hitting warp spots or interacting with the background or foreground to transport to a new part of the Forest. The Crimson Forest is a nightmare for those wanting to see and do everything in a minimal amount of visits. The warp zones are disorienting and players must reach specific points to get where they want to go. Non-linear is the bread and butter of Metroidvanias but primarily because players have yet to require the means to go elsewhere. The Crimson Forest is entirely non-linear in execution and, while that may be its purpose, clashes with the rest of ENDER MAGNOLIA‘s methodology.

My other point of frustration with becoming lost deep into the game was that it exacerbated the game’s infrequent but punishing difficulty spikes. The section I was lost in had only one checkpoint, right at its beginning. To get to the point I needed to go, I had to pass through numerous enemy mutants, traverse a section of conveyor belts and flamethrowers, and avoid other traps and opposition. Death meant having to pass through these forced moments, even past an area where I encountered a boss.

Strangely, ENDER MAGNOLIA is quite friendly about plopping a rest point right before a boss. About an hour into the game players have the ability to fast travel between these respites, setting an incredible precedent. At them players can adjust equipment and abilities at the cost of resetting all enemies defeated.

Difficulty is mildly subjective and ENDER MAGNOLIA does allow players the option to make the game easier or harder. Enemy health, attack tells, enemy strength, and the frequency of attacks can all be adjusted if the player wishes. Harder settings reward more Fragments, which can be used to unlock cosmetic items and art. Playing on Normal, the game didn’t pose much difficulty initially. I survived the first several boss encounters on the first try. But when the player unlocks the upper half of the Land of Fumes, enemies start firing off more projectiles and the bosses have harder patterns to avoid. Adding more sting is that there are virtually no invincibility frames. If Lilac is caught in flames, a beam attack, or some other persistent assault, health will be shaved off.

Fear not, this is not Hollow Knight. But if the player wishes, it can be similarly brutal when the difficulty sliders are dialed up. But at some point in my journey it became more rewarding and less time consuming to simply dash past enemies to get to where I needed to go. Though bosses are gorgeous and their sprawling attacks are a spectacle, if players find themselves constantly dying the option exists to artificially make it easier.

However, I did find success when grinding through lesser Mutants, allowing me to spend currency at the store to unlock more slots for Relics. Relics add buffs to Lilac’s capabilities, allowing her to do more damage, earn more experience points, increase damage or defense at less than 50% HP, or make her… lighter? Combat doesn’t leave room for significant experimentation but Relics are one of the first methods of crafting certain playstyles.

As players unlock Homunculi, they will earn new powers to be used in combat. Outside of its aesthetic, these Homunculi attacks are a major draw of ENDER MAGNOLIA. Lilac moves independently, double jumping and air dashing quite early on. But to attack she summons a Homunculi, a press of the Square button causing the spirit to appear and slash forward with a sword. Players gain the assistance of Homunculi that fire projectiles meant to “suppress” enemies and chip away at their break damage, which when depleted will temporarily stun the enemy or boss and open them up to increased damage. One Homunculi is used to counter enemy attacks, doing a sweeping circular slash with a chain. Other Homunculi will follow Lilac around, attacking periodically.

Four Homunculi can be assigned to buttons. Outside of the primary attack, the suppression attacks, and the persistent companions, each Homunculi attack is on a cooldown. These powerful attacks are spectacular to see but have very specific utility based on what the player desires. Lilac is defenseless but new upgrades will change up the functionality of a Homunculi. What was a punch in a straight line becomes an upward diagonal rocket fist that applies ice instead of burn. The counterattack is still triggered by parrying damage but instead applies a debuff.

Using these skills in harmony with each other is key to advanced gameplay in ENDER MAGNOLIA, making Lilac a death-dealing Attuner that can account for any scenario. Keep dying to a boss or a particular section? Maybe you just need to hit a respite and try a different loadout. Of course, killing key Homunculi also leads to new powers. A super jump and the ability to dash through barriers in the water aren’t particularly exciting. But when unlocked, do provide players with the ability to go back and clean up the map or make it much easier to quickly zoom through rooms they simply don’t want to fight in.

When viewed as a whole, ENDER MAGNOLIA reaches past passable and dabbles with greatness. My personal experience is one of admiration primarily based in how absorbing its world was from an aesthetic point of view. Clocking in close to 20 hours I did reach a point where I delighted more in zipping around the map than actually engaging in combat, knowing that bosses would simply be difficult puzzles I would eventually master. While its story has allure, it contains a great deal of lore in item descriptions–an increasingly reliable crutch for games of this type.

ENDER MAGNOLIA: Bloom in the Mist does not wholly transform the Metroidvania genre. It undeniably improves upon the precedent set forth by ENDER LILIES but primarily dabbles in the realm of pitch-perfect platforming. This genre is a hard nut to crack and with so many entrants, it becomes increasingly challenging to differentiate from the pack. In ways, Adglobe and Live Wire succeed. But on a third attempt they will hopefully deliver something truly different and unique based on lessons learned.