Game of Watchcraft: Spawn of Squishy Preview

The term “demake” may not officially be a part of video game canon—yet—but it’s certainly growing in popularity and application. The demake of Plants vs. Zombies for the Sega Genesis that surfaced at PAX Australia was the most recent and bizarre entry in the pseudo-genre, but Game of Watchcraft: Spawn of Squishy officially has it beat.

Everything you wanted in a handheld title thirty years ago.

A demade version of World of Warcraft, Game of Watchcraft is modeled after Nintendo’s Game & Watch series of LCD handhelds from the early ’80s. With two static screens framed in a simulated plastic coating, Game of Watchcraft takes its inspiration from the Multi Screen series of G&W handheld. The top screen will be used for epic boss battles while the bottom depicts an explorable world of rivers, mountains, cemeteries, and even a couple of trees.

“

Our hero, Squishy, is a priest on a never-ending quest to fight goblins, nab loot, and level up. In the tongue-in-cheek announcement for Game of Watchcraft, we learned that he will battle a whopping three enemy types, go on four different quests, and interact with ten separate colors. Those trees are a costly shade of futuristic green.

Game of Watchcraft is the first in developer Clicker’s new series of “LCDemakes,” which will transcribe different modern titles into the retro format. While there’s no word yet on what future titles will be demade, starting with the monster MMO World of Warcraft indicates the potential is endless. Maybe Game & Heavy Rain?

“

While Game of Watchcraft has already won must-play points for its hilarious take on new-retro, the actual gameplay is an unknown quantity at this point. A virtual d-pad and action button will be used to simulate the Game & Watch feel of Squishy’s adventure, which Clicker assures “No seriously, it’s really quite good.” We’ll trust them for now, and find out for sure once it officially releases on iPad on August 14, 2013—not 1982.

Jillian Werner

Jillian will play any game with cute characters or an isometric perspective, but her favorites are Fallout 3, Secret of Mana, and Harvest Moon. Her PC suffers from permanent cat-on-keyboard syndrome, which she blames for most deaths in Don’t Starve. She occasionally stops gaming long enough to eat waffles and rewatch Battlestar Galactica.