Alright, The Spell Brigade, what sort of witchcraft did you cast on me? I don’t normally like this genre, but I find myself really enjoying The Spell Brigade. The genre in question is ‘Survivors-like’, which seems to have become an established genre behind my back. It involves very little input on the player’s behalf. Attacks are automatic, so you basically just need to run around and dodge enemies. It’s always been a little too hands-off for me.
The Spell Brigade doesn’t change that opinion, but it presents itself well enough that it breaks through my layer of general skepticism. It’s not any one thing, but a collection of gameplay tweaks and stylistic choices that mean it never quite sinks into tedium. It’s not flawless, by any means, and the transfer from Early Access to 1.0 has not been smooth. But it is my favourite game in a genre I generally dislike. For whatever that’s worth.
Fully Automatic Wizards
The general loop of The Spell Brigade is nice and simple. You pick a wizard (each with different starting spells and stat boosts), a level to tackle, and off you go. You’re plonked into the middle of the arena, with a big fat timer at the top counting up to the boss fight. Tiny spiders start assaulting you, and your wizard automatically blasts them. Over time the spiders get bigger and your spells start hitting harder. Your main job is just to survive, by weaving your way through hordes of enemies. The later hordes can be downright alarming when they come bearing down on you.
The Spell Brigade does a few things that make me warm to it. Firstly, the hit boxes are generally excellent. A game like this, where movement is your main survival tool, you need to be able exploit every gap in the horde. That feels quite natural here. Levelling up feels quite nice too, with the ability to infuse elemental effects changing up how you approach enemies. There also augmentations that enhance skills. In one successful run, I kept augmenting my ability to summon minions, allowing me to summon extra, then infused them with acid. So the horde was kept at bay by a pile of swinging, green imps. It was fun.
Objective Chaos
The best addition to The Spell Brigade, though, is objectives. These pop up at set intervals throughout the run, and focus your attention on set parts of the map. It might require you to kick things into a goal, or light braziers, or kill a big old crab. They help stop The Spell Brigade from falling into a routine, as completing them nets you powerful augmentations. Given that we have very little interaction with the world outside of running around, these objectives give a nice gameplay anchor to stop me from getting bored.
On the last positive note before I address my list of gripes, I will say The Spell Brigade is quite aesthetically pleasing. Bright colours and an almost Warcraft-like art style keeps everything looking pretty. Right, on to the gripes. While there are a lot of different spells, some feel better than others. The Boomerang, for instance, has no impact and gets lost in the chaos of effects. I’d also appreciate a bit more context to the world. Each wizard has a smatter of lore, but it doesn’t nit together well for me. Unlocking lore would be a great way to reward repeat runs, but it’s a bit thin on the ground. I guess we just tunnelled into the spider dimension.
The Spell Brigade – A Genre Exemplar
I do appreciate that The Spell Brigade has co-op, though I’m too anti-social to try it. Having up to four people blasting spells all over must be sheer chaos. There are a lot of different wizards to pick from too, so I imagine there’s a lot of variety. That said though, the progression has been reworked from Early Access and I’m not sure I like it. Previously, wizards unlocked based on feats, such as time survived. So every run usually ended in unlocking something. Now it’s all gold focused, which is a slow drip-feed.
That was a definite blow, as the new things unlocking every run was what kept me coming back. Gold is also used to unlock stat upgrades, so everything is going into the same pot. The necessity of grinding is a bit frustrating. Still, if you can ignore the progression and just embrace the gameplay, then you’ll find a lot of fun there. Even if this genre isn’t your cup of tea – and it certainly isn’t mine. It does enough to evolve the genre into a fun place. Either that or it really did hex me when I wasn’t looking.
