Tactical Breach Wizards News

Update: the keys are all gone now - if you missed all three batches, follow us on Twitter and get on our mailing list, we'll announce any future tests in both places. Or if you just want to be told when the game's out, wishlist it!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1043810/Tactical_Breach_Wizards/

Original post:
We've just opened sign-ups for our second batch of keys to our ongoing beta. To opt-in, you need to be on our mailing list. If you're already on it, you'll have a link to 'Update your preferences' in any recent mail from us - we sent one on Monday, or you'll also have it in your sign-up confirmation. Click that and you'll see a new option to opt-in.

If you're just signing up now, you'll see the option to opt-in on the sign-up page.



The beta is Windows-only. We'll remove this option once all the keys are taken, so if you don't see it, that's why.

If you missed this batch, we'll be giving out one last batch soon, and this time we'll put the notice out on Twitter, so follow us there for your best shot: @BreachWizards

If you did manage to opt-in, and it was before we ran out of keys, you should receive it in about a day. The beta will last around two weeks.

More info on what's in the beta in our original announcement.

Update: the keys are all gone now - if you missed all three batches, follow us on Twitter and get on our mailing list, we'll announce any future tests in both places. Or if you just want to be told when the game's out, wishlist it!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1043810/Tactical_Breach_Wizards/

Original post:
We're about to start our first ever test of Tactical Breach Wizards outside of the dev team, and we're going to give out Steam keys for it in three batches, so that followers in different places all get a chance.

• The first batch will go to folks on our mailing list; you need to be on this anyway to get a key
  
• For the second, we'll be telling those who Follow the game on Steam first - you'll get an e-mail with instructions if you are
  
• And for the last, we'll be tweeting when they're available from @BreachWizards on Twitter
  

In each case, it'll be first-come first-served, and if you're on all three you've got three chances to grab one before they're gone. A few more details about how it'll work at the bottom of this post.

[previewyoutube][/previewyoutube]

This test is a short, spoiler-free prototype with 3 missions of combat that let you play with various combinations of 3 different wizards. The early encounters are small and puzzle-y - we present you with a tricky situation, and you figure out how to use your character's unique talents to solve it. Later encounters become messier and a little more dynamic, with new enemies arriving each turn. One of the main goals of this test is to learn what kinds of encounters players like and want to see more of. The only dialogue is silly placeholder stuff, just to show where the real dialogue will go.

This prototype also comes with a level editor and Steam Workshop support, because why not. The level editor is the same one we use, and it's very quick and simple to build a room and test it. Workshop support is something we'll want eventually anyway, so we did it early to let us also see what kinds of player-created stuff people make and like most.

So, when we have a batch of keys ready, we'll announce it on the relevant channel, and you'll be told how to opt in. All keys will ultimately be sent via our mailing list, so you need to be on that to participate. We won't give one person more than one key. Beta keys don't get you the final game. It's Windows only for now. We'll probably close down the beta at some point, not sure when, we'll see how it goes.

While you wait, perhaps you should wishlist the game!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1043810/Tactical_Breach_Wizards/

At the start of the video we put up yesterday I said you'd be breaching 'drug dens and terrorist hideouts' - that's actually not a great characterisation of what we have planned, and a few comments made me realise it might have given the wrong impression. So I thought I'd go into some more detail about our current ideas for who you'll be fighting and why. It's all very likely to change, of course, but it might give a better sense of the tone we're going for.

You're a team of rogue agents - you don't work for any government or organisation, and you've all left your various jobs to deal with urgent personal crises by breaking into rooms and knocking people through windows. The two characters we've shown are the cop-like ones, but the other four have backgrounds in guerilla resistance, military, medicine, and 'ambiguous', respectively.

These are the ideas we have for who you might be fighting:


My favourite idea so far for a main antagonist is not one villain but a whole rogue team just like yours, but more ruthless. They do kill, and the bloody wake of their operations is what motivates some of your characters to join your team and help track them.


A major global power, a state with a strictly enforced national religion, which has invaded and occupied various other countries around the world. Riot Priests are their enforcers, and yours turned on them to save her (adult) daughter in a protest. Her daughter survived but was captured, so she joins your team to get your help fighting the Chapel to break her out.


Witch Cop comes from a less oppressive nation than the Chapel, but the realities of the police force she joined there left her conflicted. 'By the book' vs not was probably not the right term for their differences - I think it'll be more that their book does not fit her own ethics. You'll sometimes be fighting her former colleagues to bust someone out of jail, and sometimes because, you know, everything you do in the game is illegal.


This one is still in flux, but I like the idea of druids in expensive suits using their plant magic to out-produce rival drug cartels, cutting their cocaine with unicorn bone and corn starch. What's your beef with the Druid Mafia? I don't know yet, but it won't just be to stop their operations - you're not law enforcement, your missions are more personal.

The enemies shown in the video, by the way, aren't from these factions (except the Riot Priest obviously). We just needed to start making enemies before we had any concrete concepts nailed down.

In general we want to pit you against people who have power, and abuse it. Your team, of course, are inherently powerful, and questions of whether you're abusing that power are something I'd like to feature - if you've played Gunpoint, you've got an idea of how complicit I like the player to feel.

But we'll need to be careful, when borrowing the trappings of real-world armed authorities, that we don't glamourise real-world violence with how we depict it in our dumb game about wizards. We'll be keeping that in mind more as we make the game, and in how we choose to show it.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1043810/Tactical_Breach_Wizards/