Lock & Key: A Magical Girl Mystery

“All these characters blend in with the great storyline that flows so effortlessly and is accompanied by amazing soundtracks that invoke a sense of nostalgia for 2000s titles like The Sims 1 and 2, the mall vibes when those buildings used to be alive and festive, 2000s RPGs, jazzy coffee shop music, and most importantly 2000s mahou shoujo series like Tokyo Mew Mew, Shugo Chara, and Precure.”

“The music was fantastic and amazingly well placed throughout the game, and the visuals are so pretty and haunting.”

“The characters are instantly likeable, the music's lovely, and the art and effects used particularly in the game's bigger moments do an admirable job of bringing you into the action.”

“Despite its shorter length compared to the other visual novels by Studio Elan, it's still a fun time with many moments that made me giggle, made me scream "what the heck" so many times, and made me cry.”

“Finally, when your choices in regards to relationships with Ruby and Nina affect endings, I like that you can get various emotional outcomes.”

“What this transitioning point means for each of the adult characters, how they relate to their powers and their time as magical girls in a setting where magical girls are essentially child soldiers with the perks of cool costumes and superpowers, and how they interact with the youths as older millennials vs young zoomers, is the emotional meat of the story here.”

“The music was fantastic and amazingly well placed throughout the game, and the visuals are so pretty and haunting.”

“The introductory scenes had an amazing, striking feel to them that set the scene for the rest of the game, even if the art style is different (which I also really appreciate, I love it when a prologue has a different feel from the rest of the story).”

“The characters will hook you up throughout the story while the soundtracks and overall vibes from the visuals will keep you seated comfortably all the way to the end.”

“Having played the original demo, the updated sprites are such a cute improvement, with the added shading and rendering, and slight changes in some of the poses. The sprite work was also great and had me laughing my butt off a few times.”

“The game is also hilarious.”