Magical Break is a Bullet Hell taking place in a world where a magical girl is right on the footsteps of a demon king’s last line of defense. Her victories have left all but three evil monsters wiped out. Now here’s the twist. We don’t actually play as this magical girl. Instead, we must take control of one of the three monsters in a desperate final stand to stop her from reaching our king. Our character choices range from a frightened-looking Slime, an overweight Ogre, and a Venus Flytrap. Even when facing off against a literal plant, she will show no mercy.
This is an adult-oriented game in where her clothes rip off as we damage her until the heroine is eventually in the nude. If we manage to defeat her, we then get a unique sex scene depending on our selected monster. Doing so will be far from easy. First and foremost, it is centered around the Bullet Hell gameplay with no attempt to ease players into the genre. You are extremely unlikely to see any H content if you are not familiar with this genre. There are no cheats to unlock the Gallery, no difficulty settings, and no way to regain health. Taking five hits throughout your journey will result in you being tossed right back to the start of the title. I do not mean this as a negative. It is just something to be aware of if you’re only here for the lewd content or expecting little in the way of challenge.
Each monster at our disposal plays much differently from one another. At their most basic, they have different Attack, Range, and Speed stats. This title has not been translated and is purely in Japanese. That is all those that don’t understand the language will know about a character without jumping into the game proper. The Arrow keys are used for movement, Z to shoot, and Shift to slow down a bit to better avoid projectiles. Slowing down with Shift also activates our monster’s unique ability. As the Ogre, pressing Shift will summon spinning shields around him that destroy any projectile it touches. The Venus Flytrap, on the other hand, will be completely immobile instead of slowing down. In exchange for that, he is able to launch a heavy and continuous attack at our foe wherever you may be as long as you hold that key. Using the Slime will tighten his projectiles to better land shots compared to his huge spread when regularly attacking. He can still move while holding Shift, and quite a bit faster than anyone else as he is the most agile.
With the Slime and the Venus Flytrap, their regular attacks have a few homing shots. This allows you to attack your foe even if you are in no position to hit her with your main projectiles. The Ogre plays much differently. He has a very narrow attack with little in the way of range and no homing capability. You will have to be quite close to the magical girl in order to hit her. That is offset by the sheer damage that you do. Simply get in attack range and watch as her health whittles down at a rapid pace. His ability to summon shields to destroy projectiles compensates for his low speed and trivializes some of the barrage types the magical girl throws your way. I would not call him an easy mode kind of character, however. All three monsters have their own advantages and disadvantages, which end up making certain sections far more difficult than with others.
We only have one enemy to worry about throughout, that being the magical girl. She has seven life bars that we must shoot through and can only take five hits ourselves within this massive fight. Every time she loses a healthbar, she will switch up her tactics and use different attacks to catch us off guard. More of her clothes rip off as the battle rages on, but with the ever-increasing intensity, taking our eyes off the action for even a moment will more than likely prove fatal. After enough practice, you’ll be able to know what kind of attacks she’ll use on that phase of the fight. She never changes them up, so practice with one monster is still very beneficial when you swap to another one. Her attacks towards you are aimed, however. You know what to do and how to dodge it, yet it is far from easy. What will ultimately carry you to victory are reflexes and using your character correctly. It is a heck of a fun time, and there are no continues, meaning you have to clear it all in one go.
You’ve likely noticed by now, but the background never changes. You will always be seeing that grassy field as you fight. At most, it will get slightly darker as you get her down to her last health bar. It is a disappointing lack of variety, though it does make it easy to see the projectiles, making any hit we take our fault entirely. There are no bombs or get out of jail free cards. While boring to look at in pictures, the background greatly helps us avoid projectiles and is not something you notice while playing. Magical Break never lets up. From start to finish, it is a fight to the death where every second can be your last. Well, it’s to the death if we lose. If we manage to win, we instead opt to perform lewd acts on her. It is all vanilla sex, and there is nothing extreme. You’ll just have some vaginal penetration, whether it be by a penis or some tentacles.
The lack of an English translation affects us the most in these ending H scenes. It is all Japanese, so I had no idea what any of the text meant and just admired the multiple CG artworks displayed on the screen. It is all drawn rather well, though there is no voice acting or sound effects through the sex scenes. All you hear throughout is a sad-sounding music track as you read the text if you are able to. I wouldn’t call it a bad experience, far from it, but I certainly wouldn’t get it solely for the H content. I’d consider it more like icing on the cake of a great Bullet Hell experience rather than the selling point. Each monster has a unique scene exclusive to them, giving us a good reason to try out and beat the title as all three. If you do defeat the magical girl as every monster, you will be rewarded with a brand new fourth character to play as. The Demon King himself.
Once you select him, you will find that he very much lives up to the name. He plays much like the Slime, yet all of his projectiles home in on their target. Using Shift to slow down adds a stream of none homing shots to add to your already massive destructive power. You will absolutely annihilate the magical girl with this character without even trying. Now, this is the part that threw me for a loop as I was not expecting it at all. Defeat the magical girl as usual, and you’ll find that this is where the game truly begins. She will transform into a winged fairy-like humanoid and will gain four more life bars, all containing never before seen projectile patterns. As overpowered as you were initially, you have now met your equal as the Demon King. The attacks the two of you will fling at each other are far beyond what you’ve experienced before and is quite exciting as the screen is filled to the brim with attacks. You still can only take five hits, however. As powerful as both of you are, the Demon King is the one at a disadvantage here.
Something I’ve failed to mention as of yet is that pressing the R key restarts the game, and T brings you back to the character selection screen. I bring this up now because pressing R as the demon king takes you directly to the second-winged form right away. I loved that they didn’t make you go through her regular phase again, as it would have gotten boring fast with how easily you defeat her there. Her last four life bars as she is in that final form of hers is no joke. If you thought the game was challenging before, this will truly push you to your limits. It is not the most difficult the genre has to offer, yet it sure as heck isn’t the easiest. Magical Break pulls no punches and cares little if you ever see the H content it has to offer. It is a fine-tuned Bullet Hell that feels designed for fans of the genre first and foremost. I had a ton of fun each moment of playing this game. This really offered far more than I could have expected from a title that costs less than 3 US Dollars.
There is no controller support, sadly. In the read me file, it gives you instructions as to how to bind a controller using Steam’s controller input features. It is just an example they provide. You can use any third-party program that ties keyboard inputs onto a gamepad, such as Joy2Key. This can be done for almost any PC game, though it is no substitute for having native support in a video game. I found the keyboard bindings to be well thought out and didn’t bother setting up a gamepad myself. So, what did I think of Magical Break? Well, with all my gushing all through this review, you’ll find it to be of little surprise that I loved it. This is a tough-as-nails Bullet Hell with no filler. It’s just you and a magical girl in a massive battle that will decide the fate of their world. There are four characters to play as, finely balanced gameplay, and H content to signal your victory. It is an absolute steal at 330 Yen.
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