“Clef, armed with her motorized javelins, rises to shatter the chains of oppression. Each step deeper into the Bastion reveals buried secrets, deadly guardians, and the heavy weight of hope. The path is perilous, but the reign will break—and with it, a new dawn will rise.”

Reignbreaker is an action roguelike developed by Studio Fizbin and published by Thunderful Publishing. Released on March 18, 2025, exclusively on PC via Steam, with controller support, it marks the final game by Studio Fizbin following the studio’s closure, as reported by Game Developer. Reignbreaker immerses players in a dystopian ‘medievalpunk’ world. As the game’s Steam store page describes, players will “Step into the boots of Clef, a fearless rebel ready to rid the world of the Kingdom’s oppression, take down the Elite and lay siege to the Queen’s grand Bastion.” The gameplay features fast-paced combat with motorized javelins, customizable builds, and levels filled with traps, secrets, and treasures. Players will face hordes of high-tech medieval machines, uncover hidden truths, and rise stronger after every defeat, embodying the spirit of rebellion and resilience.

A Glimpse into the Functional Quality Assurance Process: 

Altagram played a pivotal role in Reignbreaker, collaborating closely with the developers to deliver the highest Text Localization and Function Quality Assurance possible. 

“The journey was filled with challenges and achievements, reflecting our dedication to excellence. But numerous issues and many suggestions later, Reignbreaker comes out on top a better product.” - Kurtis Brash (Senior Test Lead), 2025 

Max Testers: 4 
Platforms: PC Only 
Timeline: 1040 hours of testing over 40 business days 
Bugs: 496 reported issues within JIRA 

Main Challenges and Intricacies: 

Reignbreaker is a roguelike that challenges the player’s skill, creativity, and endurance through repeated runs, ultimately becoming more powerful and knowledgeable as the game goes on. One of these aspects is the randomized perks, weapon types, and upgrades that can add a differing flare through each run, which inherently is related to many issues that may come up with certain combinations among many others. 

These types of issues require precision, skill, luck, and a very deep understanding of mechanics and their intent to test each specific attachment. This required an approach to testing which necessitated hand-in-hand work with developers and producers regarding specific designs to maintain accurate measurements and intents throughout testing. 

When it comes to functionality, often small issues can turn game breaking quite quickly. You can never truly tell until something is tested to its full capacity. Many of these issues, although not exclusively these types, caused much grander problems based on certain combinations. 

For example:  

• Crashes, freezes, or FPS drops, mostly due to entity/effect/calculation quantity.

• Application issues, effects, and others not affecting certain enemies in specific situations.

• Visual bugs like screen tearing, floating weapons, issues stopping the player from having the ability to see, etc.

Stuck in Random: Life of a Bug 

Like the punk and rebellious attitude of Clef, some bugs don’t die. It’s merely going through a phase. 

In game development, certain persistent bugs are like cockroaches—difficult to squash and seemingly immortal. They spread through interconnected systems, resisting fixes, and resurfacing in unexpected ways. Even after multiple patches, remnants may persist, often signaling deeper structural flaws in the code design. 

Although Reignbreaker has had some of these issues, no major residual can be found as of today within the build. Bugs have a life of themselves, going through steps until eventual fix. 

 
1. Issue is found. 
2. Issue is researched and tested for additional info and possible causes. 
3. If a design question or intent seems likely, the developers are contacted for questioning. 
4. Issue is edited on said information and possibly even closed due to being well known. If the issue is a problem: 
5. Issue is formatted and sent to be fixed via database with additional attachments. 
6. Developers send the issue back to the testing team to respond with the issue state (fix verification, need more info, won’t fix, etc.) 
7. Issue is updated as a successful fix, or additional information is provided regarding status. 
8. See step 6 again if the issue is residual. 
9. The issue is fixed/acceptable. 

Example Case 1:

While a video would illustrate it more clearly, the image above highlights an issue in the battle against the boss, the Overseer. The boss simply follows the player without dealing damage again. This same situation was triggered multiple times in different ways, resulting in the very same issue. The causes and steps to reproduce may have changed, but the issue was still present regardless of the build.  

This issue specifically was bugged and reproduced many times on multiple occasions. It was even closed and reopened as an issue due to it being fixed and then popping back up again in later builds. This was a major issue. And one that could affect the player’s outlook on the game as they work hard to get to these boss battles, only to ultimately have it ruined by a potential scripting error for the boss. Luckily, this kind of issue is just part of a day’s work for Altagram’s testers.  

Example Case 2:

The above image depicts an issue where an enemy spawned out of bounds where it couldn’t be killed. This proved to be a major issue within the game as killing the enemy was linked to progressing further in the game. This basically meant the player would be locked in a combat area and out of a run, where the only quick fix would be to restart from a save. This bug kept popping up in a couple different areas. Overtime, however, Altagram, Thunderful, and Fizbin were able to get to the bottom of it. And this success was only possible due to the seamless cooperation and collaboration between Altagram’s testers and lead and the client’s teams. This project would have been difficult to properly assess between intentions, to complete, and may have even resulted in a lower quality without the immense support of Thunderful Publishing and Studio Fizbin, who provided daily calls, consistent answers, and thorough investigations for all types of issues.

Here are some of the Day 1 reviews from players who’ve purchased and played the game:

Translation: “RB is a roguelike that doesn't innovate but does everything it sets out to do! Amazing visuals, incredible music, fast and fun combat, with cool upgrades and a progression system that's not too punishing. It's definitely not a roguelike that's impossible to finish and it's a great entry point into the genre. 

But it's not perfect, it lacks optimization, v1 doesn't have customizable graphics options, and although it runs fine here for me, it might not be stable 100% of the time on older hardware. Despite this, I've had no problems with bugs of any kind. 

At the launch price, it's an easy recommendation, and if you get it on sale, you can buy it and you won't regret it. 

Video of me playing the first hour here” 

Here is a comment from an anonymous tester: “Inspired by Hades, Reignbreaker has a good set of strong bones. The game had many fixes, some affecting the end user in a major way, however, are now completed thanks to our cooperation! Things like audio overlaps, getting out of bounds, progression blockers, invincible enemies, crashes and freezes, etc. The game is a good roguelike, and Rat king is my favorite character!” – Anonymous Tester 

As Altagram continues to support great games across all platforms and companies, Reignbreaker stands as one of our prideful releases. As proof of our commitment to quality, we strive to ensure that your game meets the highest standards, delivering the best possible experience for players. 

 
Stay steadfast, keep breaking the chains, and vanquish thee who reigns o'er us. 

(Stay strong, keep breaking, and defeat those who reign over us.)  
- Kurtis Brash (Senior QA Test Lead)