Unfortunately it took a while for me to get to reading this vn, and now it's far from christmas... But even out of season, i enjoyed it! The idea of Santa Claus being a magical girl is Genius. The story was very sweet, and the scene direction and action was sooooo good. The battles especially looked amazing (also, and actual magical girl transformation sequence!!! omg!). The vfx were also great and did an amazing job bringing the atmosphere in.
And in regards to your devlog about writing a shoujo magical girl story in a post-Madoka era - I do genuinely appreciate that you chose this direction. Even though it feels a little weird to say this as someone who is working on an edgy shounen-y/seinen-y magical girl vn herself :"D As much as I loved Madoka, lots of titles that were inspired by it almost feel like they have a very cynical view of the genre and seem to look down on their more shoujo-leaning predecessors. Which is a great pity, because there is much to love about these classics, and much to learn from them too! So it's nice to see authors who embrace it instead. Oh, also, making the characters university students (and a university professor) isa nice touch too - I'm so starved for magical girl stories with a more adult cast!