Wizard School Dropout - Be Mage Do Crime (Preview 3: 3/1/25 - Air Spells!)

[Rickton]

Excited to announce the initial release of my new roguelike, Wizard School Dropout! Available for Windows and Linux, currently for free:
https://weirdfellows.itch.io/wizard-school-dropout

You left wizard school in disgrace. Cast out of magical society, you have only one option to pay off your exorbitant student loans: crime.

Using the unlicensed but probably mostly safe portal generator you found in a mysteriously abandoned tower, go on heists where you infiltrate and steal from the rich and powerful.

Wizard School Dropout is a magic-focused, turn-based traditional roguelike featuring lots of environmental interaction and spell combinations for a wide variety of playstyles. Do you want to go in loud, blowing holes in the walls with fireballs and incinerating everyone who stands in your way, teleport into and out of safety, or just waltz in and use mind powers to make the guards forget you were even there?

Features

• Magic-focused gameplay with a wide variety of spells that can be upgraded and customized.
• Large amount of environmental interactions and effects. Light furniture on fire, freeze water to walk across it, spill all sorts of dangerous chemicals on the floor.
• Short heists and "dungeons" within a longer-term game: "coffeebreak" style gameplay mixed with a longer campaign.
• Varied playstyles. Blast everyone who stands in your way or sneak through in magical darkness. Terrify guards away or freeze them solid, Turn your enemies against each other or summon powerful creatures to do your bidding for you.

Other Things You Can Do

• Study magic books, artifacts, or materials in order to improve your spells and gain new abilities
• Become corrupted by forbidden knowledge and curses, or addicted to vampire blood
• Increase your magic power through insights gained from dreams
• Smoke hookah with and befriend chill wizards
• Trade secrets with cats

Current Status
The game is fully playable and winnable at this point, but still in development and much more content is planned.

This initial release features three magic types: Death, Fire, and Water, and two location types: Wizard's Tower (with variants for each magic type) and Vampire Crypt.

UPDATE 3/1/25: Air magic is now available!

Screenshots

[markemus]

This game looks really cool! Congratulations on your release.

[markemus]

I got an error trying to run it on Linux:

"dlopen(): error loading libfuse.so.2

AppImages require FUSE to run."

I was able to fix it by installing fuse, which apparently comes standard on most distros. I'm on Xubuntu.

In the "How does... 'Time' work?" dialogue, it says that vampires are seen outside during the day. I'm assuming that's a typo since another tooltip says the opposite.

I had a fun time playing and of course died opening a coffin before I managed to find any useful loot. My debt is worse than ever. Very enjoyable game, thanks for sharing!

[Rickton]

AppImages are supposed to be nearly universal for Linux, but I guess Linux wouldn't be Linux if there weren't edge cases haha. Glad you were able to get it working!

Thanks for pointing out the vampire thing, I'll fix that.

[getter77]

Looks to be full of potential and primed to realize it to boot---good to see you back at it!   

[aimexpress]

I've played it before, it's quite fun.

[helendam]

I've played it before, it's quite fun.

me too

[Rickton]

A major update to WSD today with Preview 3, the Air arcana is now available! It features a variety of air and electricity spells. Air-themed wizard towers are now available as a potential location, and added air and electric based items, creatures, and enchantments.

If you haven't played Wizard School Dropout yet, now's a great time to try it! https://weirdfellows.itch.io/wizard-school-dropout





In addition to air spells, there have been quite a few QoL and content changes as well, full changelog available here: https://weirdfellows.itch.io/wizard-school-dropout/devlog/894372/release-preview-3-electric-feel

And here's the list of air spells available:

[sabrina]

What specific mechanics or consequences are tied to becoming corrupted by forbidden knowledge or addicted to vampire blood, and how do they impact gameplay long-term?

[Rickton]

Currently, there are "corruption" values that are tied to specific magic types. As your corruption value increases, your power with that magic type usually increases, but you also acquire some downsides.
For example, the death corruption "Necrosis" makes your max HP decrease and you are more vulnerable to Rot damage (a damage type that undead are extra susceptible to).
It's on my list to expand and deepen this system though. So rather than just being flat modifiers corruption will cause you to gain mutations, some helpful, some harmful.

There are a couple of addictive substances in the game that grant benefits when taken, but have a chance of causing withdrawal when the effects wear off. For vampire blood, after using it you're stronger, faster, and regenerate HP, but while withdrawing from it you're slower and weaker. Withdrawal isn't a permanent effect, it can be waited out or mitigated by taking more (though that will lead you right back to withdrawal again once it wears off).

[gimox]

Are spells procedurally generated, or do they follow a set progression tree? Can players modify them beyond just upgrades?

[Rickton]

They're not procedurally generated. There are a wide variety of spells in addition to your basic damage spells, some with pretty unique effects, so I think procedurally generating them would actually make things less interesting because it'd force them more into a standard framework.

Right now it's mostly set upgrades, though the framework exists to expand beyond that so it may in the future. And actually, technically that is sort of in the game already - you can find damage/healing formulas you can apply to your spells that extend those values beyond what their built-in upgrades do, but I feel like you're asking for something a bit more interesting, in line with Rift Wizard's shrines or something.

[Rickton]

I've created a couple of surveys for people who've played the game. I'd appreciate your feedback!

The first survey (and the biggest focus, at the moment) is focused on debt and item value. The next release is going to feature mansions, which have a lot of valuable-but-not-useful loot, so I'm looking to take this opportunity to rebalance the values of items and the debt, and I'm curious what people's experiences have been with them so far in play.

Debt survey: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScU3Jp1TMIjd_OLSj3z-_vigCyYDScOlvhJD8_0TSiw2DQDKw/viewform

The second survey is more general questions about what you like/don't like about the game so far. It's less directed, but if I see that a multiple people saying the same thing, it might give me an idea of things to focus on that I might not otherwise have thought of on my own.

General survey: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSeZ2QNd6UilvPeeCzFhzY14dVrnB6d0W40GQ1NU7HX99mTQtA/viewform?usp=dialog

And here's some information about some new stuff! I'm currently working on adding a new location type: Mansions, full of expensive loot.

Mansions can of course be assaulted like other locations, but they're heavily guarded so that might not always be the best idea.

Instead, if you haven't managed to piss off the nobility yet, you might be able to walk right through the gate! Fancy nobles are always having each other over for parties and to show off their homes, so if you manage to get an invitation for one of them (or bribe the guards!), and you're dressed the part, you might just be allowed to wander around unimpeded!



Though you may be allowed inside, that doesn't mean you're just allowed to take whatever you want, though. If you're caught stealing, you will get a chance to put the item back, which will prevent everyone from becoming hostile towards you. This will also apply in most other situations where creatures who aren't already hostile towards you catch you stealing.



Once you've gained access to the mansion through peaceful means, there are a variety of nobles inside to talk to. Some may offer mini-quests you can do which will grant small rewards and increase your favor with the nobility, and may even lead to contacting a new faction with plenty of disposable income to throw your way...

[salimbl321]

I've played it before, it's quite fun.

Me too, I find it fun to play.