The Thaumaturge Review | Better The Devil You Know (PC)

A Thaumaturge is a “performer of miracles” and that label is an interesting one to tie to The Thaumaturge, a brand new story-driven role-playing game by Fool’s Theory and 11 Bit Studios. Set in a dark, twisted version of our history where ethereal demons lurk to prey on our Flaws and failings, The Thaumaturge puts you in the shoes of a Thaumaturge, someone capable of controlling the dark and summoning secrets. Since the first few trailers, there’s been a good deal of attention on this game, especially with such a unique premise. After the smash-hit success of Baldur’s Gate 3 last year, many will be clamouring for their next taste of CRPG goodness, with a lot of those people eyeing the world of The Thaumaturge for their next meal.

The Thaumaturge is, in one word, quite the unbalanced final product. The world Fool’s Theory has created here – a unique merger of the underutilised early 20th century and the unfathomable abominations of Lovecraft and eldritch horror – is a captivating, if lopsided, setting, with both its story and gameplay succumbing to some steep hurdles. The narrative places far more focus on the game’s historical roots, with the eldritch nature of the salutors and the Thaumaturges taking a backseat for a large portion of the game. Then, for gameplay, exploration is repetitive and pacifying while the sheer amount of fights and awkward presentation often spoils combat.

However, despite its shortcomings, I only grew to enjoy The Thaumaturge more as I continued playing. While it lacks the supernatural punch I was hoping for and has more than a few missteps when it comes to both combat and exploration, The Thaumaturge is a streamlined CRPG experience that is sure to tickle the fancy of anyone still hungry for more of that genre.

The Thaumaturge releases on March 4th for PC (Steam and Epic Games Store), PS5, and Xbox Series X and S.

The Thaumaturge

Story | Into the Dark

In The Thaumaturge, you will step into the shoes of Wiktor Szulski, a member of the prestigious (and infamous) Szulski family in 20th-century Warsaw. Wiktor is also a Thaumaturge. These individuals can perceive the Flaws of man and see salutors, ethereal, otherworldly beings. Thaumaturges tame and utilise the dark magic of the salutors in both combat and social settings, using their eldritch abilities for their own ends.

After an extended stay away from Warsaw, Wiktor returns due to a family emergency, one which will quickly plunge him back into the murky world of politics, warring factions, rogue Thaumaturges, and the dark stain his bloodline has left on the city. Alongside your collection of fearsome salutors, you will decide how Wiktor deals with his own demons and those haunting the ones around him. Will you succumb to your Pride and walk down the same path as your father, or will you embrace the bonds of companionship to right a world bathed in shadow? 

Otherworldly Awakening

At any point, there are always two sides to The Thaumaturge fighting for dominance: one is the world of salutors, Thaumaturges and unfathomable monsters, whereas the other is a world of political intrigue, backstabbing and monsters of a more familiar variety. Both are, at different points, equally fascinating but depending on where your allegiance lies and which story captivates your interest the most, your experience with The Thaumaturge will likely be very different. 

The Thaumaturge feels like a slow-burn political thriller which happens to star Thaumaturges, as opposed to a slow-burn political thriller about Thaumaturges. There is a surprising lack of focus on the eldritch and the magical, with much more attention going towards the interwoven rat’s nest of politics and ideals under the Russian Tsar’s reign. To some, this may be a more intriguing tale but to others who were hoping for more Lovecraft and less history lesson, it will be a bitter pill to swallow.

Overall, I did enjoy my time with the story in The Thaumaturge, but I couldn’t help but yearn for more when it came to the otherworldly aspects of the game. Paired with a slow start and a pretty mundane Act 1, I can see more than a few people bouncing off of this before the more intriguing aspects of the story settle in Act 2 and beyond.

Speech and Subterfuge

Manipulate the Shape of History

The Thaumaturge is quite the robust RPG when it comes to story, with many branching paths for the narrative based on your morally dubious decision-making. While Wiktor is a rather set character in his characterisation and personality – no matter what choices you make, he’ll always be the prideful instigator – the choices he can make are in your hands and they can change the fate of the entire story. 

Whether it’s small ways of affirming your affection to a companion or larger, more impactful decisions, Wiktor’s words have consequences. If you know the right words to say – which are often made available either through exploration or the strength of your bonded salutors – entire new paths will open up, leading to drastic differences in the story. You can even lock yourself out of obtaining certain, powerful salutors for the rest of the game if you prefer the power of allies and kept promises to the strength of the dark whispers in your ears. This will stop you from using some of the stronger salutors in combat, making the game more challenging while preserving Wiktor’s relationships. 

Although there are a lot of impactful decisions to make in The Thaumaturge, for many the ramifications and ripples from these events will simply spiral far too late. During the very long and very drawn-out Act 1, there are few opportunities to make tangible, meaningful decisions, with most of the interesting dilemmas popping up in Act 2. As such, it can be hard to stay focused and harder still to remember every little choice you’ve made along the way, especially during the latter half of the game when super-high skill checks start popping up out of basically nowhere. 

The Thaumaturge has a lot of replay value and if you decide that you’d like to see how this world changes with each of your selfless or selfish decisions, you’ll be more than able to do so. 

Books, A Thaumaturge’s Best Friend

Gameplay | Two Worlds, Both Slightly Awkward

Exploration | Point and Click

There are two primary aspects to the gameplay in The Thaumaturge, with the first being exploration. The main exploratory gameplay loop in The Thaumaturge involves using your mystical Thaumaturge powers to sniff out secrets hidden in the mundane. As you’re wandering about the world, Wiktor can send out a bloody pulse of Perception which will mark nearby interactable items. A Flaw marks these items, giving you insight into whoever owns them: a broken piece of glass filled with the hate of the person who shattered it, a ripped toy overflowing with a child’s guilt. Wiktor will eventually make some conclusion once you find enough of these interconnected items that you can then use for your benefit to unlock new dialogue options. 

I hope you enjoy the sound of clicking – both of your right mouse button and of Wiktor’s fingers – because you will feel the gnawing urge to spam the Perception button at all times. Warsaw is stuffed to the gills with these cursed objects. There’s rarely a time when Perception doesn’t pick something up but that doesn’t mean they’re all useful. However, because some of them are useful, all become a mandatory pick-up, eventually leading to a sense of fatigue as you grow weary of reading emotionally charged messages over and over. 

Power of Perception

Furthermore, while the Flaws you find inscribed on these items are always quite well written and give a suitable emotive backlash in only a few lines, your lack of overall agency when it comes to piecing the clues together becomes equally frustrating. Wiktor will automatically make conclusions once you’ve found enough linked items in the proverbial spider web, leaving you feeling more like an errand boy than an active part of the investigation: you don’t get to deduce anything, you just need to wander around clicking on anything shiny until Wiktor decides that’s enough. 

The Thaumaturge’s exploration is best experienced if you see yourself as an invisible side character in Wiktor’s story, one who merely watches in silence before pointing out that haunted toothbrush he missed in the bathroom. You aren’t Sherlock Homes, you are John Watson. If you go in with that expectation, you’ll be able to enjoy the subtleties and delicacies of the observations and conclusions much more. If you want to take a more proactive role, though, this isn’t the game for you. 

Follow the Blood to Secrets Untold

Combat | Stand and Watch

The other side of the gameplay coin is combat. When forced into battle, Wiktor will team up with one of his salutors to deliver both physical and psychic attacks at his opponents. Only one salutor is summonable at any time, which forces you to think more strategically about the best ways to combat your foes, who usually use sheer numbers to try and overwhelm you. Every participant acts based on rounds, with certain moves trading longer cast times for greater damage, whereas others can strip enemies of their Focus and open them up for massive damage. 

There’s an awkwardness to combat that I just couldn’t shake, no matter how many of Warsaw’s drunkards, guards, or thieves I went through. Watching Wiktor and his Lovecraftian demon face off against three regular dudes, all of whom are just standing around with their fists raised, always managed to drag me out of the immersion and atmosphere. It isn’t because The Thaumaturge is turn-based, either, but because of some underlying unwieldiness that permeates throughout the entire combat system: from the stilted idle animation to the uneven weightiness of the attacks, there was just something off in the presentation department when it came to combat. 

Teach Them A Lesson

Fortunately, combat is pretty fun and engaging to make up for this. Each of your salutors has a unique role to play, allowing you to focus on the kind of playstyle you like. I gravitated towards the Bukavac as my main salutor because their kit revolves around Suffering, a damage-over-time effect which lets me bleed my enemies dry without even having to attack directly. This distinct playstyle exists for all of the salutors and with more than one salutor for each of the available Flaws, you have a lot to choose from when it comes to playing your way. 

Additionally, enemies quickly begin to adapt so that you can’t just rely on one tactic. Often, enemy units will have special Traits which give them meddlesome modifiers such as healing at the end of a round or reducing the damage they take. You can only break these Traits by attacking them with a salutor who matches that Trait’s Flaw. This encourages you to switch through your salutors each battle, letting you explore the capabilities of each creature without forcing your hand. Paired with the varied kits of the salutors, you have a pretty decent combat system which kept me hooked during my entire playthrough. 

Wiktor’s Salutors

However, what often spoiled the combat in The Thaumaturge was just how relentless the game is in forcing you into unnecessary combat encounters. Between bored guards who just want a scrap or thieves you just happen to stumble across, the lead-up to combat encounters is frequently silly and unnecessary. It feels like the developers are worried you’ll get bored without a combat encounter every few minutes due to the constant interruptions during the story or exploration. Certain battles – such as the salutor encounters – are well built up but they are a rarity. This leaves combat often feeling like a chore instead of something you want to partake in.

In the end, The Thaumaturge’s combat has quite a compelling base with many factors that keep battles feeling fresh and interesting, but they are often undone by factors outside of the arena. You will likely have fun fighting alongside your eldritch Pokemon in The Thaumaturge but it will also likely wear thin fast. 

Looming Shadows

Art, Audio and Design | Unsettling City, Unsettling People

Lastly, let’s go over the overall audio and art design in The Thaumaturge which, like the rest of the game, is a bit uneven. Undoubtedly the best part of the game’s presentation is the salutor designs. Each of them exudes this familiar unfamiliarity, an alien knowing like the best creatures from Lovecraft’s mythos. Every time they appear, you feel your heart skip a beat, and every time a new salutor appears on screen you’ll scrutinise them for the gritty little details.

In a way, the people of Warsaw also exude this same uncanniness and, whether intentional or not, the unsettling visage of most of Warsaw’s inhabitants adds to the overall feeling of discomfort. Each character looks almost human but there’s always something just off about them that makes your hair stand on end. This also results in some of the awkwardness when moments of tenderness or tension are ruined by an odd moment of jank.

Meanwhile, the environmental design of The Thaumaturge is remarkably authentic, even if that does make Warsaw somewhat difficult to navigate. Ripped straight from the often-overlooked 20th century, the architecture, signage and fashion are all a little slice of history. While my heart was always more drawn towards the eldritch, Fool’s Theory has done a great job of recreating a genuine snapshot of the early 20th century… well, a genuine snapshot with magic and monsters, that is.

Lastly, audio was never at the forefront of my mind (except, of course, for the constant snapping of Wiktor’s fingers) but it does a good job of setting the tone and atmosphere. Between the high-pitched battle music which oozes that same eerie feeling as the salutors to the unique sound effects attributed to each of Wiktor’s otherwordly marvels, there’s a lot that can immerse you here. Outside of that, though, there aren’t a lot of memorable sounds or songs in The Thaumaturge.