The best writing of 2024 so far belongs to a turn-based strategy game that blends wizards and Rainbow Six
Tactical Breach Wizards proves there’s no substitute for the dopamine hit you get from simultaneously ejecting three dudes out of a window. Defenestrations aside, Tactical Breach Wizards is a surprisingly deep turn-based strategy game that delivers some of the best writing I’ve seen in a game this year.
The world of Tactical Breach Wizards is very surreal — similar to our own, with similar problems, but distinct in its collection of nations, politics, and traditions. Also, magic is real. You control a squad of warlocks, wizards, witches, clerics, and druids whose talents and abilities make them uniquely qualified for working in various branches of the special forces. Instead of Navy SEALs, you have Navy Seers, and instead of boring normal medics, you have necro-medics that can raise the dead. I would love to pore over an encyclopedia or sourcebook for Tactical Breach Wizards; it’s that good.
The larger plot is like something from a Tom Clancy novel if he had also been handed a copy of The Silmarillion. There are plenty of coups, paramilitary groups, and conspiracies that go all the way to the top. The stakes are high, but the story refuses to take itself too seriously and always knows when to inject some levity into the situation and let off the gas.
The plot for Tactical Breach Wizards is good, but the professional banter between your squadmates is truly a work of art. Before breaching a room, your team will size up the tactical situation, make clever observations, and typically diffuse the tension with subtle jabs at one another.
The rapport between your squad isn’t solely based on jokes made at the other’s expense, though. Between missions, you’ll have the opportunity to engage in some optional conversations that help add some extra dimension to each character. Even without these extra bits of dialogue, the design of each squadmate tells you a lot about who they are. Zan, the retired Navy Seer, comports himself with a rigid professionalism, while Jen, your resident witch, is always displaying her private-eye badge while toting around a collapsible broom on her back.
Beyond character development and world-building, the wittiness of Tactical Breach Wizards also extends to its gameplay elements: My necro-medic is incapable of healing injuries, but they can bring people back from the dead, meaning they need to put a bullet in the skull of anyone they’re trying to help.
