Mandragora: Whispers of the Witch Tree Review: Short of a screaming success

The Metroidvania genre has had its fair share of variations over the years that continue to give us different ways to explore new worlds, tease us with areas we can’t access just yet, and challenge us with some platforming and combat. Now, if you mix in some Soulslike elements and crank the difficulty by a lot, you’ll get a game like Mandragora: Whispers of the Witch Tree that becomes a punishing adventure where your only staying power is your own curiosity.

Mandragora is a game that wants you to uncover all its secrets, but how far you get will ultimately depend on your patience and willingness to push through questionable boss fights, uneven platforming, and a story that quickly fades into the background. It tries hard to win you over, but frustrating design choices hold it back from becoming a true standout.

An Inviting World with a Story That Puts You to Sleep

One of Mandragora’s strongest points is its atmosphere. From the very beginning, it sets the tone for a dark fantasy adventure filled with castles, crypts, undead monsters, and witch hunts. The game’s beautiful backdrops do an excellent job of maintaining this grim mood throughout its 25-hour journey, as you traverse through dreary, ominous landscapes populated by zombies, werewolves, and fireball-slinging hooded bandits—all constant reminders of the dark fantasy world you are in.

Unfortunately, while the setting is strong, the story doesn’t live up to it. Mandragora suffers from a lukewarm plot that never quite finds its footing. Whether it’s the predictability of the narrative or the inconsistent voice acting, the story struggles to leave an impression. You play as a character who gains magical powers after sparing a witch during an inquisition and is then tasked with hunting down others. Conveniently enough, he is then guided on his mission by a mysterious voice that pops into his head.

The story never really hooks you, and its so-called twists are more predictable than surprising. Oddly enough, the world around you feels far more alive than the main plot itself. Towns and taverns buzz with background chatter that gives the setting a sense of life and authenticity, something your own character lacks. Instead, he often mutters to himself—especially when locked doors block your way—delivering repetitive quips that amount to little more than reminders to revisit the area later. Sadly, that's about as much personality as he’s given.

Soulslike Exploration Meets Metroidvania Level Design

As a Metroidvania-style game, Mandragora features solid level design and a map that steadily opens up the more you explore. You won’t always know where a new path will lead—and that’s part of the fun. Along the way, you'll encounter Witch Stones, which act as checkpoints, letting you respawn after death, replenish your potions, and use the essences of fallen monsters to level up—standard Soulslike elements.

Exploration itself isn’t the issue—the real challenge is surviving long enough to reach that next checkpoint. Unfortunately, Mandragora can be overly stingy with its Witch Stones, and while that could have simply added to the challenge, the sheer number of enemies thrown at you often crosses the line from challenging to frustrating. After dying too many times in certain sections, I found myself resorting to simply rolling past waves of enemies to reach a checkpoint first. Then I would come back and kill them for experience—a tactic that started feeling necessary when all I wanted to do was explore a new area.

Making matters worse, later levels introduce enemies that exploit the game’s platforming mechanics. What begins as fun, demanding platforming quickly turns aggravating, as monsters hurl spells at you while you’re clinging to ledges or mid-jump. Traps like wall-mounted crossbows also mean one poorly timed leap can send you plummeting to your death. Granted, there are plenty of treasures and goodies that await after a good amount of platforming, but getting to them often feels more unfair than rewarding.

Plenty of Class-Building Choices

Combat in Mandragora starts off feeling fun and satisfying, but soon loses its luster after too much of the same. Early on, enemy encounters between Witch Stones are exciting and dangerous, but over time, they become more of an annoyance than a real threat. You’ll learn their patterns quickly, and before long, it feels like you’re just fighting to get past them and reach your next destination. Boss battles initially impress with their unique attack patterns, but after facing your umpteenth rat-themed boss, the formula starts to feel stale. Don’t get me wrong—Mandragora does throw a fair number of unique enemies your way—but it reuses even more, making many battles feel tough, yes, but also a bit redundant.

On the bright side, the game offers robust character-building options. From choosing your character’s gender to deciding what type of magic-wielding warrior you’ll become, there’s plenty of freedom. With six classes to choose from, I chose the Wyldwarden, a nature-based fighter who can summon roots from the ground and unleash lightning projectiles at enemies. As you level up by collecting essences, you earn talent points to spend on a sprawling skill tree, unlocking stat boosts like more health and mana, as well as new spells. New offensive spells are somewhat rare to unlock, but crucial upgrades to stamina and defense are essential if you want to survive the game’s tougher battles.

Eventually you can also unlock spells from other classes or gain items that give you access to talents outsides your current class. This really lets you build the kind of character you want if you are willing to invest the time and money in finding these spells and relics that allow you to cast them. Going through the trouble of unlocking a whole new skill tree is also costly, but allows you to mix and match spells and abilities for unique combinations.

Crafting is another way Mandragora lets you customize your experience. You can visit vendors to forge new weapons and items by investing gathered resources. However, crafting often feels like a mixed bag—sometimes the upgrades don’t significantly impact your build, making the grind for materials feel a bit unrewarding. For those willing to fully explore the world, though, Mandragora offers plenty of treasures and hidden items to discover, but you won’t be able to access everything without finding special map fragments that unlock new areas. Treasures and other crafting items reward you for the trouble so it’s not a bad investment if you are looking to collect everything the game has to offer.

Final Thoughts

While Mandragora reads well on paper and boasts an intriguing premise, it stumbles in execution, delivering a game that needs more polish to truly shine as the next great Soulslike Metroidvania. Its stylish design does a fantastic job of setting the mood and building a world you want to dig deeper into, but frustrating, overly difficult, and sometimes repetitive enemy encounters drag the experience down—especially when you often have to travel back to certain areas to open up paths you couldn’t access before.

When everything clicks into place, Mandragora: Whispers of the Witch Tree offers a rewarding class-building system that lets you craft the character you want and immerses you in a somber world begging to be explored. More focus on whom you are fighting and why you are running around everywhere would have made it truly special.