So far in Touhou Reviews, we've seen stealth, Metroidvania, regular platformer, and puzzle platformer. Now, let's look at raw puzzle games! With a bit of jumping around but no real test of reflexes, just stretching your brain to the limits. For today, I'll be reviewing Maristice!
![[Image: ARg9JP5.png]](https://i.imgur.com/ARg9JP5.png)
Maristice gets it name from Solstice, the isometic NES game that I had literally never heard of until I first played this game and did some digging. In the NES game, you play as Shadax the wizard, assembling the legendary Staff of Demons to defeat Morbius the Malevolent. In Maristice... you play as Marisa, trying to put together her broom after Patchouli Knowledge took it apart as punishment for all the books she steals. Admittedly, it's much less dramatic, but it's still quite fun! Marisa has to make it around the isometic world, using various items and collecting the pieces of her broom, trying not to get done in by the reshaping of the Scarlet Devil Mansion.
![[Image: itxLLAr.png]](https://i.imgur.com/itxLLAr.png)
The basic gameplay is pretty simple - Marisa can jump, walk around, and use special items. She can push blocks, carry blocks, and collect keys. Where Maristice shines is in how it continues to apply the same basic concepts and items in more complicated ways. Start off with ice sliding and pushable blocks, and then push blocks on ice, or start with color-changing tiles and no-jumping tiles, and then make color-changing tiles that don't let you jump. By doing this, the puzzles naturally evolve, allowing you to ramp up in skill and difficulty without suddenly throwing inane nonsense in the last two rooms of the game!
![[Image: d7C1jN3.png]](https://i.imgur.com/d7C1jN3.png)
The items themselves are unique and useful, as well. Potions that reveal hidden items or blocks, swapping places with enemies, and of course power bracelet to push big blocks - despite this not being Zelda, sometimes we get influences from it! The items are all well laid out, really, and become easy to get the hang of. Greatest risk with those is accidentally forgetting you've got a potion set and wasting a use! Items are generally not the focus, though; environmental objects form the puzzle backbone in this game.
![[Image: 6yJthR6.png]](https://i.imgur.com/6yJthR6.png)
The big complaint? The perspective, combined with hitboxes, can be VERY lethal. You can easily, EASILY misjudge a single jump and land on the poison tiles. Sure, that only resets the room, but it's easy to burn through Marisa's lives, and end up having to start from the save point. And unlike the lives, those are few and far between! There's only three in the first area of the game, for example. That's probably the biggest issue - Maristice, for all the advantages of its perspective, has a disadvantage to it that hampers it a lot.
![[Image: QTs4Rrf.png]](https://i.imgur.com/QTs4Rrf.png)
Still, though... I like it well enough I've beaten it from scratch about three times now. Counts as a solid game to me!
THE VERDICT
Ultimately? Maristice is... surprisingly fun on repeats! I've played through it multiple times, once every couple years or so, and it never seems to get that old to start it all over and do all the puzzles again. The replay value (of sorts) is what keeps this game afloat for me, and the puzzles themselves are smart and well-designed - they never feel so obtuse that it counts as moon logic, you can always reasonably work out what to do. Even with the flaws, I still give it 4 Reimus out of 5.
Maristice gets it name from Solstice, the isometic NES game that I had literally never heard of until I first played this game and did some digging. In the NES game, you play as Shadax the wizard, assembling the legendary Staff of Demons to defeat Morbius the Malevolent. In Maristice... you play as Marisa, trying to put together her broom after Patchouli Knowledge took it apart as punishment for all the books she steals. Admittedly, it's much less dramatic, but it's still quite fun! Marisa has to make it around the isometic world, using various items and collecting the pieces of her broom, trying not to get done in by the reshaping of the Scarlet Devil Mansion.
The basic gameplay is pretty simple - Marisa can jump, walk around, and use special items. She can push blocks, carry blocks, and collect keys. Where Maristice shines is in how it continues to apply the same basic concepts and items in more complicated ways. Start off with ice sliding and pushable blocks, and then push blocks on ice, or start with color-changing tiles and no-jumping tiles, and then make color-changing tiles that don't let you jump. By doing this, the puzzles naturally evolve, allowing you to ramp up in skill and difficulty without suddenly throwing inane nonsense in the last two rooms of the game!
The items themselves are unique and useful, as well. Potions that reveal hidden items or blocks, swapping places with enemies, and of course power bracelet to push big blocks - despite this not being Zelda, sometimes we get influences from it! The items are all well laid out, really, and become easy to get the hang of. Greatest risk with those is accidentally forgetting you've got a potion set and wasting a use! Items are generally not the focus, though; environmental objects form the puzzle backbone in this game.
The big complaint? The perspective, combined with hitboxes, can be VERY lethal. You can easily, EASILY misjudge a single jump and land on the poison tiles. Sure, that only resets the room, but it's easy to burn through Marisa's lives, and end up having to start from the save point. And unlike the lives, those are few and far between! There's only three in the first area of the game, for example. That's probably the biggest issue - Maristice, for all the advantages of its perspective, has a disadvantage to it that hampers it a lot.
Still, though... I like it well enough I've beaten it from scratch about three times now. Counts as a solid game to me!
THE VERDICT
Ultimately? Maristice is... surprisingly fun on repeats! I've played through it multiple times, once every couple years or so, and it never seems to get that old to start it all over and do all the puzzles again. The replay value (of sorts) is what keeps this game afloat for me, and the puzzles themselves are smart and well-designed - they never feel so obtuse that it counts as moon logic, you can always reasonably work out what to do. Even with the flaws, I still give it 4 Reimus out of 5.
![[Image: s2n7oi.png]](https://files.catbox.moe/s2n7oi.png)
