Wizordum

PC

I first played Slovenian indie shooter Wizordum during October 2023’s Next Fest. The enormous demo showed off a brilliant combination of Heretic and Wolfenstein 3D, and I was hooked. The game then went into early access, and I deliberately avoided it, because I wanted to return to it as a finished product. And oh wow, what a finished product this is! It’s tremendous, and far more engrossing and involving than I’d been expecting.

While Wizordum is absolutely a 2.5D FPS game, it’s not the boomer shooter I was expecting. Instead, this is a far more methodical game, closer to Hexen and Heretic, but with a calmer pace. While there are still busy sequences of battling hordes of enemies with an array of melee and ranged attacks, I’ve found that I’ve spent far more of my time exploring the epic levels, hunting down every last secret, often involving solving its environmental puzzles.

There is a plot here, and the storyline is delivered in impressively-voiced text dumps between chapters (as was traditional for the genre in the mid-90s), but honestly, it’s very secondary. There’s something about an ancient seal being broken, and the forces of Chaos are up to no good. You’re one of the last Mages of Wizordum, and as such you have to find out what’s what and put an end to all that noise. But what this is really all about is the absolute thrill of starting a new, expansive and unique level, and then wringing it dry of every battle, secret, puzzle and diversion.

New weapons and spells are added with excellent regularity, each of which can then be upgraded in the shop you visit between levels, using the piles of treasure you gather as you play. Treasure is everywhere, but the real troves are found in the game’s secret areas, and these are a constant treat to find. At first, you’ll be scouring walls to see which will slide aside, and looking for defects in others that means they can be bashed down. Later, especially in Chapter 2 onward, this gets a fair degree trickier, requiring you to notice stashes through windows or cracks in a wall, and then puzzling how to possibly reach that spot, searching the environment for clues. Wizordum has no jump, meaning that reaching higher platforms or lower spots requires seeking out stairs, ladders or trapdoors–but sometimes you’ll eventually spot a crack in a wall high above, blast it out your way, and perhaps cause the level to reshape itself.

At one point, I’d seen a really excellent stash of goodies hidden in a room, surrounded by explosive barrels, but the gaps I was looking through were too narrow to directly attack. I’d already found a secret in a nearby wall, that led to a corridor with some treasure, but what I’d missed was that the wall above the end of that corridor was weak. I broke it, which created a direct route to the stash, but not being able to jump or climb I still couldn’t reach it. And then I thought, “What if I throw one of these explosive blue ball bomb thingies over the top of this wall?” The game had never suggested this was a thing, had never had a core path route that required thinking this way, but yup, that was it, and the barrels blew open the path and I bathed in all that loot.

Those almost im-sim levels of thinking are not something I’ve seen in any of these retro shooters, and it was delightful. And the game wasn’t even started with its original levels. Later I was on a huge wooden boat, zooming down a river, the level all about exploring its many decks (right down to the enormous machinery below, and up to the fancy quarters above), working out how to manipulate the environment such that I could explore farther and farther. I finished the level with fewer than half of the secrets found, despite killing every enemy, and am determined to return.

Which, by the way, is a lot of the point of Wizordum. It’s a game designed to be speedrun-friendly, for those who want to approach it that way, and as such you can return to any level for another attempt at clearing it more quickly or proficiently. Each level has a page in the main menu, listing the challenges you’ve completed so far, and those still wanting. There’s a par time (which I’ve been utterly ignoring, because this is all about taking my time for me), as well as challenges to find all the secrets and treasure, and kill all the enemies.

I adore this game. Look, I probably shouldn’t say this, but I’ve got [very big name and as-yet unreleased FPS] installed and waiting for me to start on my PC and could have been playing it this whole time, but I keep loading Wizordum instead. That’s no judgement on the other game! I cannot wait. But it’s a heck of a compliment to Wizordum.

Oh, and I have to say something about the music. It’s extraordinary! Full, orchestral pieces, deeply atmospheric, adding so much to every level. The art is great too, the whole thing is so detailed, and the hand-drawn weapons look amazing. The only complaint I have, and this is so small as to be embarrassing, is there are very few save slots. I want a save at the end of every level, so I can return to treasure hunt in the cheatiest way possible, but I’m having to back up the saves so I can overwrite them. That’s the only negative thing I can find to say about this amazing game.

I wasn’t sure if I should be covering this on Buried Treasure, given that it’s published by Apogee, which you’d imagine would bring it more attention. However, in the week-and-a-half since its full release, Wizordum has received a single review. Which is crazy! If you’re reading and you work on a gaming site, trust me, this is great, you’re going to love it. And everyone else, you’re going to love it too!

• Emberheart Games / Apogee Entertainment
• Steam
• £17/$20/€20
• Official Site

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