Mado Monogatari: Fia and the Wondrous Academy Review - Quirky Personality
Back in 2021, I reviewed Puyo Puyo Tetris, a simple but vibrant puzzle game where everything is a bit chaotic and a lot of fun. In 2025, I got to review the very first Western release of Mado Monogatari; the game that created the Puyo characters. Though I’ll admit, it took me a little bit to realise these two titles were connected, the vibes they give off are the same: colourful, comedic and a whole lot of silly.
Mado Monogatari: Fia and the Wondrous Academy (MM: FWA) is the first Mado Monogatari game to be given a Western release, and considering these games have been around since the 80s, this is a pretty huge deal for anybody who’s a fan of the series. Without knowing anything of its storied past, I jumped in blind, ready to meet Fia and make my way through this ‘Wondrous Academy’.
From the very first second you enter the game, the humour and comedy of the title slaps you in the face. Fia’s first moments at the Academy are a comedy of errors, and this is a comedic trope that continues throughout the whole game. The chaos starts during Fia’s entrance ceremony, when her pet Carbuncle gets mistaken for a monster, causing everybody to freak out. Spells get thrown, people get hurt, a dragon maiden starts breathing fire at everybody… You know, just Mage Academy things. You realise pretty quickly that MM: FWA isn’t a game that takes itself seriously, and if you can vibe with that, you’ll enjoy the quirky humour that’s evident throughout the game.
The characters in MM: FWA are all greatly exaggerated; almost caricatures of real people. There are four additional party members outside of Fia (the main character), and all of them have their own unique personality, backstory and quirks. My favourite is the budding hero who spends most of the game randomly yelling heroic phrases and trying to name his special moves, but the dungeon maiden who spends half the game trying to eat the main character is also a lovely addition to the group. Though none of the characters are deep enough to warrant a dive into who they are as people, they’re written well enough that it’s fun having them along on adventures.
Gameplay-wise, MM: FWA is a dungeon crawler, with the academy and school mechanics built around it to provide a medium for character progression, levelling, skill gains, etc. The gameplay loop is pretty simple: go to school, get an assignment, go to a dungeon, complete the assignment and repeat. To supplement this, there’s also fishing, cooking and gardening you can take the time to do, but I never found that this had any real application in dungeons or other gameplay.
So what about the ‘dungeon’ part of this ‘dungeon crawler’ game?. Dungeon layouts are randomly generated, and no two dungeons will ever be the same. You’ll encounter random battles and bosses as you venture forward, with the aim being to get to the top without dying or losing all your energy. Every time you ascend a floor or smash open a box, you lose energy – and if you spend too much time exploring, you won’t have the energy needed to get through to the end of the dungeon. I’m someone who will spend all my time in dungeons trying to explore every nook and cranny and smashing open every box and chest, so I HATED this. Having to leave some of the boxes behind, never knowing what wonders they held, actually hurt my little treasure-hoarding soul.
As far as the battling goes in these dungeons, it honestly felt a little clunky, and I struggled trying to navigate the battlefield. Combat is action-based and (mostly) in real-time. You can’t use ‘skills’ until it’s your turn, but you can run around spamming auto-attack if you so please. In some of the later battles and on higher difficulties, trying to manage my character’s health whilst avoiding enemy attacks, plus timing and aiming my own attacks, was a micro-manager’s dream- but my personal hell. Levelling my skills and getting access to more kick-ass spells was pretty cool, and I enjoyed the fact that I could swap my class and try out new things whenever I felt like it, but ultimately, the battle experience was a little bit stale.
Mado Monogatari: Fia and the Wondrous Academy has so much personality, and if you’re familiar with the series or this style of game, I think you’ll have a lot of fun. The upbeat, quirky sense of humour is a real selling point for me, and though I found the gameplay loop a little repetitive, I was laughing and smiling all the way through it. Much like an actual university, the Wondrous Academy taught me absolutely nothing, but the chaos I created with my idiot classmates will stick vibrantly in my mind.
Mado Monogatari: Fia and the Wondrous Academy was reviewed on PS5 with code kindly supplied by the publisher.
