Tactical Breach Wizards

TBW is definately one of the best tactical turned-based puzzle games out there. There is quite a bit of variety in the skills and the missions, each of which require some degree of spatial and temporal planning and the weighing of consequences. So far, being from what I can gather about halfway through the campaign on default difficulty, none of the missions have felt unfair or impossible and none have felt utterly without challenge. There seems to be a lot of love involved in making this game, a love of attention to detail as well as a love for chaos and encouragment of thinking outside the box. Like a game of comparable genre I also really enjoyed -- "Invisible Inc." -- TBW goes very light on the strategic level: While there are some choices to make between tactical missions, these are mostly for flavour. TBW prioritizes mission design and character differentiation over graphical and auditorial variation, but that's ok: graphics are decent (and run on a potato) and the sound is nice enough that I haven't turned it off yet (which I usually do soon enough with most TBS games). Sometimes the situation is so complex that I bump into mild cases of analysis paralysis, which speaks for a great deal of choice. My only minor complaints is that it looks like I will have completed all the content once on default difficulty after about 15 hours, and I'm really taking my time. I'm not yet convinced that TBS is enchanting enough to have me do it all again on a higher difficulty, but we'll see. All in all: wholehearted recommend

Love the writing, it's funny and keeps me engaged with the world; there's optional conversations and just tasks to do for world building purposes. Mechanics are fun and challenging, thankfully don't need to do the optional objectives for getting through it, but definitely want those for unlocking the skins. Works well-ish on Steam Deck, assuming you turn down the graphics all the way down. Some of the smoke is quite demanding it seems. Controller support is almost perfect. I guess one complaint might be that I'd really love for the skins to have custom models each, but makes sense that it's a bit costly to do all that. Definitely recommended.

Lured in by the hilarious trailer, I did not really expect much from the game, but I was pleasantly surprised by almost every aspect of it: • The story was unexpectedly big and well-written. The first two acts, focused on introducing Zan, Jen, and Banks, were absolutely fantastic. The humor, character chemistry, intriguing setup - it was a perfect opening. Acts 3 and 4 were more serious, with noticeably fewer jokes and some new characters I didn't like much, but still, they were solid overall and led to a satisfying finale. • The gameplay also turned out to be surprisingly deep. There are plenty of unique, interesting abilities and upgrades for them, some cool combinations and interactions with the environment. As a result, levels often have multiple ways to “solve” them. TBW is engaging, fun, sometimes challenging, and sometimes goofy, has a well-paced progression - I never felt bored. What I also liked a lot is the ability to rewind actions within a turn: the game encourages experimentation without punishing the player. A bit of criticism: • There is a certain character I won't name to avoid spoilers who uses far too much weird slang. As a non-native English speaker, it was a nightmare trying to understand what the ♥♥♥♥ he was trying to say. • An optimal choice of upgrades makes the game far too easy, even on the highest difficulty. Early on, I enjoyed the gameplay so much that I decided to complete all confidence goals (extra objectives on each level tied to specific characters). While this was fun at first, it became tedious toward the endgame. My party was so damn strong that I could clear almost everything in one turn, leaving enemies with not enough manpower to pose a threat. The early progression felt much more balanced: a satisfying mix of challenge and fun, with a steady introduction of new mechanics to keep the gameplay loop fresh. All in all, Tactical Breach Wizards is an amazing game with memorable characters, fun dialogues, a bunch of jokes that will certainly make you laugh, a solid story, and engaging gameplay. If you enjoy puzzle-based games, do not miss out - it's really great.

Yes

Love this dev and this game. I've had so much fun just in terms of approaching the scenarios, but the presentation is wrapped in wonderful visual design for the characters as well as impressive dialogue and worldbuilding. If the grid- and turn-based nature of Into The Breach appealed to you, this will scratch a very similar itch. It even has Breach in the name!

A fascinating set of puzzles with a surprisingly heartfelt and genuinely funny story. Develops its ideas fully, but does not overstay its welcome.

Fun gameplay with lots of different ways to solve the puzzle, and plenty of optional objectives to make it harder for those who want. The dialog is well-written and enjoyable, and the characters are interesting and charming.

This is easily in my top 10 games of all time. It is for the exact kind of pervert I am. The gameplay quickly builds from "oh, this feels neat and tight" to "♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ I am the god of death and the game expected me to break it in this way." The dialogue at the very beginning of the game felt like it was trying like 10% too hard to be funny, but it quickly settled into delightful (and surprisingly touching) banter between well-defined characters. I even cried during the epilogue. Also, I'm a sucker for a narrative device that justifies tactical gameplay. I recommend this game to like everyone I talk to but only a proud few are sick enough to truly appreciate it. 10/10