Quantum Witch review and interview – video game development as therapy

After escaping a cult, whose members included her parents, and learning to program an indie developer explains why Quantum Witch is such a personal project.

With its pixel art graphics, bucolic setting and status as a solo creation by developer NikkiJay, you could be forgiven for imagining that Quantum Witch is offering yet another slice of cosy gaming. And in its initial moments, it coyly plays with that illusion. On the outskirts of an unnamed, rural village, you take control of a woman called Ren, living happily with her wife Tyra. Your first task is to find the couple’s sheep, who have escaped from their pen.

So far, so comforting. But it doesn’t take long before Quantum Witch’s apparent idyll takes a darker, and infinitely more thought-provoking turn. Humour is in evidence from the start; at the market, for example, you meet characters from well-known video game franchises selling what is essentially merchandise. You soon find a pool area, where the villagers go to conceive children in huts – a mysterious process, since there appear to be no male inhabitants. And on the far side of town lurks a church occupied by a religious cult dedicated to a lampshade god.

You’re given a crash course in melee combat and platforming at the local dojo, but it soon becomes obvious that Quantum Witch isn’t an action game. NikkiJay describes it as a ‘plotformer’, which means that while it may superficially resemble a platform game it’s really all about the storyline which emerges as you explore, interact with people, and amass objects.

The village has its own mad scientist in the form of Lev, who will become Ren’s most useful ally, and pretty soon a critical change occurs when Ren meets a woman called Hannah, trapped on the edge of the village by roots which have clearly been magicked into existence to keep her immobile. When Ren frees her, she acquires the crucial ability to temporarily shift background objects into the foreground plane, allowing her to get to places that others can’t reach.

Soon, Ren is spirited off to other locations which, she learns, are mere destinations in the multidimensional Qverse. In the first, Riverhome, Ren encounters a population of people dedicating their lives to praising Riverhome’s creator, known simply as Her, and when she starts questioning their blind faith, things soon go south. Back in a sepulchral Qverse hub area, Ren attempts to restore any damage she is perceived as having caused, while working towards a showdown with Her.

Many games have promised differing outcomes according to the actions you perform while playing them, but few have delivered on those promises. Quantum Witch, however, emphatically does. It’s a game you would be a fool not to navigate multiple times. With a playthrough time of roughly three hours, and a large number of possible outcomes, it offers up storylines which diverge to a striking degree – from quite an early point when you go back to it for a second time.

Its themes remain the same, though. Overall, it is a game about breaking free from coercive control, and the tortuous logical thinking required to slavishly surrender all responsibility to a higher power. It’s very wordy, but never preachy. Ren is by no means a saintly type and her determination to challenge those she finds herself up against can lead to dilemmas and some dark places. If you value nuance and intelligence in our games, you’ll love it – although if you crave non-stop action, you’ll be disappointed.

To understand where Quantum Witch has come from, you have to understand NikkiJay’s background. I spoke to her while working on this review and she describes a childhood which is beyond nightmarish: ‘I was born into quite an extreme religious group which was very high control. My parents and my grandparents on both sides were also in it.

‘It was one that doesn’t allow you to have friends outside the group, so your entire social structure is just the people in the group. They regulate what information you have access to, what activities you’re allowed to do, what sports you’re allowed to get into, what medical treatment you can accept. I had a friend who died from not accepting medical treatment.’

From a young age, NikkiJay realised she was gay: ‘Anything LGBT was banned; it was of the devil. Those people, they said, were depraved and controlled by demons. Not a very nurturing environment for me sat there as a young baby queer.’

But one thing came to her rescue: the acquisition of a Sinclair ZX Spectrum 3+ and a SNES: ‘There was a summer when I was about 11 when I sat with the Spectrum +3 manual and taught myself how to program.’

Living in north-east England, she acquired a weekend job working at a video game shop: ‘When I was around 18 or 19, I decided that I had to leave, I had to get out. Because I had a job in a video game shop I had a few friends outside the group that nobody in the group knew about, so I was able to sofa surf, although I was homeless for a while.’

Harrowingly, she talks about what might have happened had she not discovered video games: ‘I don’t know how you want to present this to readers, but I’ll be honest. I would have ended up killing myself if I hadn’t had that escape. The first time I thought about doing that was when I was eight, and I realised that I was never going to be good enough for God.

‘But there was teaching with the group that said if you died, you instantly paid for all your sins and then God would bring you back, because you’d paid for your sins. So in my eight-year-old mind it was like: Well, if I kill myself now, I’ve paid for it all, and I’ll be fine with God. That’s a dark thought for an eight-year-old.’

Having escaped the cult and honed her games development skills, NikkiJay’s decision to solo-develop Quantum Witch shows she’s still seemed determined not to take the easy path through life: ‘I kind of made it as difficult as possible for myself without realising it. Because not only had I chosen a retro look – which hardly any games do now; there are only about 100,000 out every week – but I also wanted to create something that wasn’t really in an established genre.

‘A plotformer: what’s that? Who knows? I created an engine that allows me to construct these intertwining narratives, and I think the script comes out at about 32,000 words in total. It’s totally choice driven, and no matter what choices you make, you get a coherent story. You get to the end, the credits roll, and that’s your story. And if you play again, you can make different choices and get quite a different story.’

NikkiJay admits that making Quantum Witch offered some catharsis: ‘In terms of getting all of this stuff out, I’ll be honest: there was some stuff that came out that I didn’t realise I still had to deal with. But it was a great experience. It almost has been like therapy.’

And there should be more to come; NikkiJay envisages Quantum Witch as the first part of a trilogy of games: ‘In my mind, the first game is about breaking free of control and gaining your freedom. And taking control of your own choices, even though it’s revealed in a couple of the endings that you’ve also been manipulated by this character who appeared to be friendly.

‘The second game is a much bigger story in a much more expansive world, because now you’ve tapped into the multiverse and you can explore more. It’s again got the trademark ‘let’s make fun of the horrors’ humour, but it is about the horrors that come with freedom. That feeling that nobody is coming to save me: I now have to do all this myself. And the horrors that people do to each other when they have that unchecked freedom. And then the third one is a close to the story about bringing harmony. Much nicer endings in that…’

NikkiJay took Quantum Witch to various publishers, including many that specialise in indie games, but none of them committed to it. However, she persisted and was able, virtually unassisted, to get Quantum Witch out on Steam and Itch.io, the indie-centric platform. Hopefully, the next two instalments of her unique vision will be given the backing they deserve. In the meantime, if you crave a game that engages your brain, Quantum Witch is simply a must buy.

Formats: PC
Price: TBA
Publisher: NikkiJay
Developer: NikkiJay
Release Date: 24th June 2025
Age Rating: N/A

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