2 
0 The original Steam release of Spellcaster University was developed and published by Sneaky Yak Studio back in 2021. If you want to learn more about the PC release, why not check out our original review? But for now, four years later, we have developer Red Art Games to thank for this new console version. This latest edition is available on PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X|S. For this review I got my hands on the PlayStation 5 version.
I Wish My Time at University Was This Magical
Everybody has imagined having magical powers at some point in their lives, right? Whether it’s daydreaming about receiving a Hogwarts letter whilst you should be paying attention in school, or wishing that you could just disappear after a particularly awkward interaction, we’ve all been there!
Spellcaster University attempts to satiate these dreams by putting you in charge of your very own wizarding school. You are the newly appointed headteacher, and one of the world’s last mages. Your goal? To ensure magic is kept alive and well by imparting your knowledge upon the students. Oh, and keep the school safe from the Lord of Evil, no big deal, right?
Gameplay
Upon starting the game, you’re given two game modes: Campaign and Quick Play. Jumping into either gives a choice of five difficulty options, as well as six different game lengths. So, plenty of options to cater to all players! The campaign sees you set up a series of universities that, after a set amount of time, are overrun by the Lord of Evil’s forces. After this dastardly villain shows up at your seventh school, you have the chance to defeat him permanently.
Each time you find a new place to start building your school and educating students, there are different areas to select on a map that grant various bonuses and challenges. Starting near the village gives you a larger build area, for example. Whereas setting up in the forest may mean a troll comes looking for trouble. Building is simple, by using cards (which we’ll touch on shortly) you can add new rooms to your university. These allow expansions both horizontally and vertically on a 2D plane. Everything from classrooms to observatories, and more become available as you play, and no two universities are ever quite identical.
Once the students start enrolling, you’ll assign them to houses, and classrooms will need teachers to… well, teach! They’ll all go about their daily lives, be it studying, relaxing, working on their combat prowess, and so on. Speaking of combat, this is little more than automated battles that are mostly in optional dungeons. Tackling these can provide some good loot if you emerge victorious, though!
Events also arise frequently, each one a small snippet of narrative with a multiple choice option to decide the outcome. Some will earn the school some prestige points (higher prestige means more students will apply), whilst others allow you to contact local factions. These factions all need to be kept happy to reap the most rewards. Although, the balancing act of keeping everyone from the orc tribe to the king pleased could be tricky if you don’t have enough resources at the time.
Play Your Cards Right
Spellcaster University is a mash-up of genres that blends a management sim with deck-building. How does that work? Well, each card grants all sorts of benefits, from new rooms (such as dormitories and classrooms), upgrades for the school, or even new customisable houses to allocate students to. Six basic cards are given each time you start a new university, and more cards can be earned from one of six different decks. One deck mainly offers players new rooms and item cards that they can purchase with gold, whilst the other five each relate to a corresponding magic school; Alchemy, Arcane, Light, Natural, and Shadow. These grant more specialised cards and can be bought the more students study a particular magic.
Whenever you pick from a deck, the choice of cards is completely randomised, meaning you may not always receive something that’s helpful at that moment in time. However, you don’t need to play them instantly; instead, you can keep them in your hand to fully utilise their potential later on. It’s a fun system that sets Spellcaster University apart from other management sim titles. Thankfully, more often than not, at least one of the cards I drew was something I was in need of!
The Sights & Sounds of Magical Academia
I really liked the design of Spellcaster University. Each room is varied enough that they all look unique and relative to what their main purpose is. Having the option to zoom right in and watch classes taking place or see your teachers cleaning up all manner of disasters is genuinely endearing. Being up close and personal does reveal the lack of detail in textures and environments, though. Character animations look a little stiff and the models lack detail. Having said that, I felt that the low poly aesthetic added to the charm. It’s not a big budget title and isn’t one to showcase the power of the PS5, but it’s still appealing in its own way.
As this is originally a PC title, the controls can feel a little unintuitive at times. It’s far from the worst PC to console port I’ve played, but the lack of a mouse can be a slight hindrance when navigating all the in-game menus. Aside from some finicky controls, Spellcaster University runs really well! I didn’t encounter any serious issues such as slow down or hard crashes (which seems to be a rarity these days). In fact, the only thing to note would be the occasional bit of flickering on shadows.
The sound design was a slight disappointment, though. The relaxing mediaeval tunes heard throughout are serviceable, but do get repetitive over time. You can only hear smaller sound effects, such as the guinea pig’s squeaking (they’re much more efficient messengers than birds, apparently!) and students snoring away at bedtime, up close, but they make nice touches that bring the castle to life.
Longevity
Not only is there a great number of difficulty settings and game length options, but Spellcaster University‘s campaign also has optional challenges to tackle. These include extra layers of difficulties such as the evil forces reaching your school much faster or only being able to draw two cards instead of three. As an added bonus, completing each challenge unlocks a permeant rare card for use across all future games!
Without even taking all that into consideration, I felt like this was a game that I could revisit constantly. Seeing one campaign through to the end doesn’t take all that much time, but with so many outcomes and different factors such as locations and factions to befriend, each playthrough is varied enough that they always feel distinct.
Final Thoughts
In summary, I mostly enjoyed Spellcaster University. The random nature of the cards dealt meant that each “run” felt fresh enough to keep me playing. That said, there is only so much to do before you end up idling the game until enough money or magic has been saved in order to buy new cards. The events do alleviate the tedium when they appear, and despite the relative simplicity of the game, it was still fun to start a new university and see if I could improve upon my previous one.
So, that’s why the console version of Spellcaster University is getting a Thumb Culture Silver Award!
Disclaimer: A code was received in order to write this review.
Liked the sound of this game? Why not check out our review of another deck builder: Knights in Tight Spaces!
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