Rogue Wizards

I have a soft spot for games that exist because a single person refused to stop. Colin Day built Rogue Wizards from personal savings, started in 2013, ran a Kickstarter to pull in help with art, and shipped something genuinely interlocking. That origin story matters because you feel it in the craft: the cartoon-and-cell-shaded art style, the clean isometric grid, the little sound effects weapons make when they connect. This is handmade work, and the seams are visible in ways that endear rather than embarrass. The loop itself is turn-based dungeon crawling on a grid, closer in feel to a board game than an action RPG. When enemies appear the game shifts into tactical mode: each turn grants one action, whether that is moving a square, switching to a staff, casting a spell, or consuming an item. Positioning genuinely matters here. Enemy attacks paint the floor with ice, acid, and fire, so standing still gets you punished. Six schools of magic are available to master - chain lightning that arcs across groups, meteor strikes, ice shards - and layering those alongside swords, bows, and chakrams gives combat more texture than the modest scope suggests. Gear also levels up the longer you use it, which is one of those quiet design ideas that makes parting with a favourite weapon feel like a real sacrifice. There are two ways to play. Story mode runs roughly ten to twelve hours, follows your Banlit character through the world of Rilfanor against the predictable-but-serviceable villain Hosperak, and gives you a home base - the town of Antarit - to expand. Building out Antarit unlocks new shops, recruitable companions, crafting options, and reagent brewing. It is town-building light rather than deep, and a couple of critics fairly noted that it never quite reaches the ambition the Kickstarter pitch implied. Gauntlet mode strips the town away, adds permadeath, and sends you into endless procedurally generated depths with only whatever a roaming merchant happens to carry. That mode is where the real replayability lives, and where the game earns its roguelike label honestly. The warts are real and worth naming. The soundtrack sits in the background without ever landing a memorable theme - a genuine miss for a game this mood-driven. Difficulty spikes arrive unevenly, and the story mode blocks you from replaying earlier areas to grind past a wall, which can feel punishing rather than fair. Inventory management gets cluttered, and the field of view can feel claustrophobically small. The final boss of story mode reportedly goes out with a whimper rather than a roar. These are not deal-breakers, but they are the reasons the Metacritic score lands at 67 rather than somewhere warmer. For the right player - someone who likes their dungeon crawling tactical and their sessions self-contained, who does not need a showstopper soundtrack to stay engaged - Rogue Wizards lands in that honest, satisfying tier of indie games that reward patience. It works best in shorter sessions rather than marathon runs, and Gauntlet mode gives it a longer tail than the story alone would justify. One person made this. It shows in the best way most of the time.

Kai · Scout Team

Indie & narrative

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