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Spirits & Spells (Game Boy Advance)

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Title Screen

Spirits & Spells

Also known as: Mahou no Pumpkin: Ann to Greg no Daibouken (JP), Castleween (EU)
Developer: Magic Pockets
Publishers: MTO (JP), Wanadoo (EU), DreamCatcher Interactive (US)
Platform: Game Boy Advance
Released in JP: April 24, 2003
Released in US: November 2, 2003
Released in EU: May 30, 2003


CopyrightIcon.png This game has hidden developer credits.
DevTextIcon.png This game has hidden development-related text.
GraphicsIcon.png This game has unused graphics.
RegionIcon.png This game has regional differences.
DummyIcon.png This game has unusual dummy files.


Spirits & Spells is essentially "Hallovania".

Build Info

Version ROM Address Text
Europe 0x3F89B0
HALLOWEEN
Sep 24 2002
18:10:13
US 0x3EAAF0
HALLOWEEN
Jan 30 2003
18:41:51
Japan 0x3F19D4
HALLOWEEN
Mar 11 2003
16:48:04

These strings are similar to other games by Magic Pockets. Notably, the European version was compiled two months before the original PlayStation 2 version was released.

Also of note is that all three strings use the game's original title of "Halloween".

Unused Graphics

Hidden Images

Present in all versions are a set of four JPEG-format images that are never used in-game. It is not known if there is any code that would cause the game to display these images.

The first two images also appear in Road Rash: Jailbreak, while the second image also appears in Baldur's Gate: Dark Alliance. The third and fourth images are unique to Spirits & Spells.

The first picture has クレモン (KUREMON) written in Katakana. Based on the game's credits and other hidden images from F1 2002, it may be Clément Cordé, an in-house programmer.

For whatever reason, only 21 of the game's 25 images can be extracted from the European version. The ones that cannot be extracted are the first three hidden images and, oddly, the menu background.

Title Screen Backgrounds

While these graphics are used, they can't be seen in full normally. The mountain background has a hidden portion that looks like the sky background.


Game Glitches

In the Endless Corridors level, if you enter the leftmost door and go to the bottom right of the area, the game will freeze if you do a regular attack move on the window. Applies to all difficulty levels and both heroes.

Spritis and spells GBA glitch endless corridor .png

Regional Differences

Company Logos

The US and Japanese versions have their respective publisher's logo before the Wanadoo and Magic Pockets logos.

US Japan
Spirits & Spells Dreamcatcher Logo.png Mahou no Pumpkin MTO Logo.png

The Japanese version updated the copyright date on the Wanadoo logo.

Europe/US Japan
Castleween Wanadoo Logo.png Mahou no Pumpkin Wanadoo Logo.png

Language Select

Castleween Language Select.png

The European version has a language select screen that is completely absent from the US and Japanese ones, which only have English or Japanese text respectively. While the background image is present in all versions of the game, only the European version uses it.

Title Screen

Aside from the logo changes, the Japanese version adds a sprite for its subtitle. This sprite is completely static, unlike the main title which has a scaling effect.

Europe US Japan
Castleween Title Screen.png Spirits & Spells Title Screen.png Mahou no Pumpkin Title Screen.png

Menus

Load Game and Options switched places in the Japanese version.

Europe/US Japan
Spirits & Spells Menu.png Mahou no Pumpkin Menu.png

The European and American versions use a password system for recording progress. The Japanese version changed this to a battery save.

Europe/US Japan
Spirits & Spells Password.png Mahou no Pumpkin Save.png

Training Mode Message

This screen is only present in the European and US versions.

Castleween Training.png


Cutscene Text

The cutscene text slowly appears and disappears in the European version. The other releases sped this up considerably.

Scrolling the text is much faster in the US version. It also avoids the minor graphical glitches in the font that are present in the other releases.

Collectables

Mahou no Pumpkin replaces the Sparks with Crystals to match the console version.

Europe/US Japan
Castleween InGame.png Mahou no Pumpkin InGame.png

Difficulty

The Japanese version replaces the Normal mode with Easy/Beginner, where you start with 5 lives instead of 2 and the levels have fewer enemies.

Europe/US Japan
Spirits & Spells InGame 2.png Mahou no Pumpkin InGame 2.png

Level Differences

"The Doorway to the World of the Dead" has a slightly different starting position in the Japanese version.

Europe/US Japan
Castleween InGame.png Mahou no Pumpkin InGame.png

"The Frozen Crypts" has a wall you can go through in the European version. This isn't possible in the other releases.

Castleween The Frozen Crypts.png

One platform in "The Tall Tower" has a missing tile in the European version.

Europe US/Japan
Castleween Tall Tower.png Mahou no Pumpkin Tall Tower.png