Mahokenshi is essentially Slay the Spire with samurai wizards, and that's already a big selling point. It's a deck builder, a game where you start with a bunch of lousy cards and accumulate better ones as you reach your goal. In addition, you receive a katana.
Mystic warriors and secondary Japanese folklore
The theme turns out to be the least influential part of Mahokenshi - a thin layer of recycled Japanese folklore on top of familiar elements. The Mahokenshi are mystical warriors who make deals with divine spirits to gain power, and there are four of them, each with their own deck. The one who made a deal with the spider receives cards with poison and stealth effects, and the one whose power comes through the spirit of the turtle receives increased defense and damage-dealing spikes. Between battles with goblins, bandits, and cultists, the four occasionally encounter oni, and the item that allows them to discard useless cards is somehow a kimono. Japaneseness is pretty superficial, that's what I'm getting at.
Game Structure and Mission Objectives
Structure is what really sets Mahokenshi apart from other deck builders. You play on a hex grid, spending action points to maneuver your samurai around the floating Sky Islands in search of treasure, quests, power-ups and so on. Instead of the randomized Spire or the chaotic Hell of Monster Train, all 18 missions have predetermined layouts and objectives, each telling their own little story. One of them began with a tense chase: four ferals chased me through the forest to the castle. This affected the decisions I made in the deck, making movement cards more valuable than usual and changing the way I played.
In other deck building games, you just want to find a super powerful combo and then remove all cards from your deck that don't help you achieve that combo. Missions in Mahokenshi, whether it's protecting villagers or sealing portals, add an extra layer of things to consider beyond finding the most egregious set of cards to pair.
Mahokenshi: the game is easier than other deck builders
Another difference is that Mahokenshi is much simpler. Only one mission gave me trouble, and that was my own fault. What seemed like a race against time, with four cultists buffing the Oni King in the center of the map, was actually much simpler. I should have followed the path of the turtle spirit, slowly and steadily, rather than in a hurry.
Since King Oni doesn't attack until you kill all four cultists or click by mistake and stand on a hex that is too close to it, as I did once, the best approach was to kill three hooded morons and then explore every corner cards in search of altars to increase strength, markets to buy cards, dojos to upgrade cards, and gold to pay for purchases and upgrades. After boosting all the stats and creating the perfect deck, he didn't stand a chance, even though he was taking magical steroids at the time. Even if the mission has a clear time limit, in Mahokenshi it is always better to spend as much time as possible to build up strength.
How to earn xp and upgrade characters
Mahokenshi earn xp and level up individually, which encourages you to stick with one character. However, you'll quickly reach the level cap, and every story mission you unlock comes with a side mission or two that are even easier and can probably be dealt with with the help of a newly unlocked lady with a level one fox power. Then there are buffs, which you pay for with crystals earned from completing optional tasks—like meditating at every altar on the map or winning before the three peasants you're supposed to protect die—that apply to each character.
Mahokenshi: a brief overview of the game and my impression of it
While I was playing Mahokenshi, I had a good time, but I can't imagine ever thinking about it again. It's a small game that I completed in 20+ hours and didn't linger too much between sessions. The backstory is almost non-existent: a magical sword that needs to be reforged, evil cultists planning to open portals to the underworld, and basically nothing that can't be washed away and replaced with a completely different cast of fantasy heroes and monsters. Combined with a frivolous lack of complexity, this is about as filling as a single Pocky stick. Nevertheless, for these 20 hours she captivated me.
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