The Spell Brigade

Developed by: Bolt Blaster Games
Published by: Bolt Blaster Games

Apr 29, 2026$12.99

Survivors-like with ONLINE CO-OP for 1-4 players. Team up with your wizard friends to slay hordes of dark creatures. Complete team-based objectives, unlock new upgrades and create overpowered spell synergies. Friend nor foe is safe in this friendly fire bullet hell!

Consensus

C69.4/100

Steam players81.4% positiveVery Positive16,921 reviews

Metacritic ↗69/100

VG Insights estimate ↗≈1.6M copies · ≈$12.4M gross

What creators say

PepperHead

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The Spell Brigade is a top-down, movement-only survivor-like in early access, built around finding and upgrading spells and combining elements onto them. He finds it very satisfying and enjoyable at its core, especially for its movement feel and multiplayer, but wants more content (spells, elements, relics, maps, bosses) and balance work. He places it in low A for now and thinks it could climb as updates land.

Liked

Movement-only gameplay is a confident choice and the movement feel is excellent, possibly better than Brotato's
Elemental combos on spells (fire, lightning, frost, acid, dark) create chaotic, varied builds with unique visuals per combination
Randomized upgrade numbers based on luck
Exploding enemies chain reactions act as a catch-up mechanic for players behind
Revive system that works even in single player
Mini quests during runs add variety
Multiplayer is a blast and clearly the design focus; straightforward meta progression and many unlockable characters keep him playing

Disliked

Only four maps and they feel repetitive, with not enough to do on them
Characters feel too similar; unique stats are minimal
Relic chests are oddly designed, small and specific, and annoying to find in single player since looking for them costs XP
Mini quests are unbalanced, some trivial and some nearly impossible
Some spells are weaker than others, feedback on damage and friendly fire is unclear, and only two final bosses with uneven difficulty
Fourth spell choice feels useless and muddies the upgrade pool; wants a choice of spell count and more rerolls

What players say

A 3D survivors-like (bullet heaven) from Bolt Blaster Games where 1-4 wizards fight hordes together online, with friendly fire, team objectives and elemental spell infusions.

Steam players rate it Very Positive (about 81% of ~16.9k reviews; the live store page showed 86% overall and 81% in the last 30 days), driven mainly by co-op chaos, charming art and a satisfying core loop. The full 1.0 release on Apr 29, 2026 (after Early Access from Sep 16, 2024) sharply split the community: the most upvoted negative reviews blame a 3-5x increase in grind, costlier permanent upgrades and wizards locked behind gold instead of achievements. Critics are more lukewarm, with a Metacritic score of 69 (Mixed) from a handful of mostly PS5 reviews that praise the multiplayer but flag limited enemy variety and slow progression. Overall: a fun, friend-oriented co-op survivors-like that many feel is thin on variety and too grindy.

Players love

Online co-op for up to 4 is the standout; friendly fire, spell combos and accidentally wiping teammates generate the fun, and reviewers call it the game that makes or breaks the experience
Art style, animation and cute wizard designs with cosmetics and skins are widely praised as polished and welcoming
Easy to pick up, chaotic 'brain off' gameplay that works for chill sessions with friends; several groups report returning weekly
Elemental infusions, augments and spell synergies allow varied, sometimes overpowered builds
Team-based map objectives and quests add some structure beyond pure survival (Metacritic critics cite novel map design and quest systems)
Regular developer updates and receptive, community-oriented devs during Early Access
Runs well on Steam Deck and has cross-platform multiplayer, solo option and controller support
Low price (about $13) and a long-lasting time sink for some players, with several reviewers logging 100-280 hours

Common complaints

1.0 grind spike: gold rewards reduced while prices of permanent upgrades, enchantments, prestige resets and covenant unlocks rose sharply; reviewers say unlocking everything would take hundreds of hours
Wizard unlocks moved from achievement/challenge-based to gold purchases, removing a beloved mechanic and adding tedium
Limited variety: same enemies on every map, only a couple of bosses, and about a third of spells described as weak
Shallow progression: hour 30 plays like hour 1 with bigger stats, so runs feel repetitive after a dozen matches
Netcode and connection problems: no reconnect after a disconnect (a dropped player cannot rejoin), and lag with players matched from distant regions due to no region lock
Performance: endless mode gets very laggy as the screen fills up
Music is seen as basic, repetitive and poorly fitted to the game
Patch cycle perceived as fixing one thing while breaking another (e.g. controller problems after patch 1.1.4 reported on the Steam forum)

Can feel tedious

Gold grind needed for permanent upgrades, wizard unlocks and covenants; a single 45-minute multiplayer match may only afford one upgrade
Prestige resets and max-leveling a wizard repeatedly just to unlock one covenant
Some objective minigames (especially the football one) described as boring or impossible to complete with a swarm around
Quest/achievement difficulty is uneven; a third of achievements are pure time sinks, and some Early Access quests were RNG-locked (e.g. needing specific infusions without rerolls)
Hardcore mode outcomes hinge on early trait rolls (lightning/shadow good, acid/dark bad), forcing restarts
Endless-mode lag and the screen becoming unreadable as spells pile up

What's unique

Online co-op first design for 1-4 players in a survivors-like, with friendly fire so teammates can hurt each other
Team-based map objectives and quests (e.g. football/sheep/torch-style minigames) layered on top of wave survival
Elemental infusion system combined with spell augments for build crafting
Covenants as unlockable run modifiers with prestige-style resets of wizards
Full 3D camera with a colorful, cartoonish wizard aesthetic and cosmetic skins, unusual in a genre dominated by 2D pixel art
Cross-platform multiplayer, with a console release (PS5) alongside Steam

Players want

Reduce the gold/grind economy and restore cheaper or achievement-based ways to unlock wizards and covenants
Add more enemy types, bosses, maps and spells, and better balance across augments and elements
Add reconnect-to-session support and region locking or region filters for multiplayer matchmaking
Optimise endless mode and late-run performance; players also ask for split-screen multiplayer (a popular forum thread)
Add rerolls for build-defining traits and infusions, and clearer stat descriptions with exact numbers
Better teammate communication tools and deeper multiplayer synergy; Metacritic critics say co-op can feel like playing next to each other
More music and soundscape options

Summarised from Steam reviews and community discussion.