The Secret of Weepstone Preview

My party's fighter was lost in a tragic accident just minutes into the Secret of Weepstone demo. We'd stumbled into a filthy latrine, but the sound of running water could be heard from one of the bogs, so I thought, “Hey, why not toss a rock down there?” And it landed with a satisfying sploosh, so my next thought was, "Why don't I send one of my party members down there to check out the running water?" To my surprise, that was an option. And so my fighter climbed into the medieval toilet and promptly fell to his death. Elvis died ON the toilet, but my fighter died IN the toilet, so in a lot of ways, my fighter was Weepstone's king of rock and roll.

If I'm being honest here, the option to even stick my head into a poo-stained castle toilet hole is something I never thought I'd ever do in a video game. Which I realize now makes it sound like I've been whiling away the years hoping against hope that someone would finally make a game that lets me stick my character's head into an old-fashioned toilet hole. That's the case. I just like that Weepstone gives me the option. And then killed my fighter for it.

Sticking my head into a poo-stained castle toilet hole is something I never thought I'd do in a video game. The Secret of Weepstone is a game I first became aware of at PAX East 2026 in Bawston. It stopped me dead in my tracks. The black and white, hashed-graphic style immediately filled my brain with the dopamine hit you can only get from nostalgia. It was like the ratatouille scene in the movie Ratatouille, when he takes the first bite of ratatouille. Instead of being transported to the bucolic French countryside, though, my mind took me on a journey to revisit the old monochrome point and click adventures I used to play and build on my family's Macintosh computer. That was the first flash, at least. The second flash took me back to being a weird little kid with weird little friends, drawing out our own primitive RPG maps and playing them during breaks at school.

What I'm saying here is that, aesthetically, The Secret of Weepstone had me at first glance. I mean, just look at it! It's absolutely incredible, fantastic 3D art made to look like a pen-and-ink drawing come to life. The way the light is expressed through hatching, the unevenness to the line weights, the old-school character models. I honestly think you could randomly screen-grab any part of Weepstone and present it to me and you'd watch me kind of drift off into a daze.

The Secret of Weepstone had me at first glance. And that's just from what I saw. Playing it? I mean, it's kind of everything I want a game to be. I remember when I spoke briefly to the developer about it at PAX East I told him this looks like the kind of game I would try to make if I had any idea how to make a game. He politely laughed at my silliness and told me basically, yeah, that's sort of the origin story for this game. Just like every video game RPG, The Secret of Weepstone is strongly inspired by D&D, but in an overt way that somehow just makes it feel fresh and new while also feeling overwhelmingly familiar.

Yeah, pretty much every RPG out there has hit points and armor classes and experience points and a lot of that hides under the hood of a game engine. The Secret of Weepstone? My friend, the game IS the game engine. When a battle begins, you roll for initiative and it's not just some random occurrence that happens behind the scenes. No. Not even close. Actual… well, digital… dice roll across your screen and the results determine battle order. I love how the dice are colorful and give a nice contrast to the monochromatic graphics, I love the way they sound when they roll, I love the way they will sometimes teeter on the brink of a disastrous roll or a the tease of a nat-20 only to settle on the final number. There aren't any special tricks here: the dice roll just like real dice, but the addition of realistic dice makes the rolls all the more thrilling.

I love how the dice are colorful and give a nice contrast. And it's more than just battles. In Weepstone, I came across a few doors here and there that were blocked, and I was asked if I wanted to try to break them down with brute strength. Well, yeah, obviously. And so I had to roll a Strength check, which I failed, and then my character lost a hit point for it. Yeah. Bet you didn't expect that to happen. I might be projecting here, but I definitely didn't expect it. Thankfully the second time I tried I passed the check with flying colors and gained access to the next room.

The map for Weepstone is accessed in a pretty standard way: press M for map. But the way the map is displayed? Be still, my aged heart. The stark and foreboding monochrome of the play screen is moved out of the way to an old-school paperback game module, and your map is a simple grid with symbols for stairs and other points of interest. It's right there on the inside of the front cover and I don't know what sorcery they're using here to reproduce the texture of that old-school paper and the covers, but I swear I can feel it with my eyes. The slightness of the offset on the map symbols makes it look like it was printed instead of generated by a computer and the whole thing just feels, I don't know, perfect? It feels like opening up that classic second edition red box for the first time as a little kid, except now I understand how the math works.

It really is like playing a game on a tabletop with the homies and ripping yourself from the scene you've built in your mind to have a quick look at the map you've been plotting. It's all just so wonderful, and I really wished I had an opportunity to thumb through the guide, and now I want them to make an in-game core rulebook and bestiary book and yeah, I'm asking a lot of a small indie team. I'm sorry, I just get so excited sometimes.



The Secret of Weepstone wears its D&D roots on its sleeve, but when you're actually playing it, it evokes old-school dungeon crawlers – but it has the benefit of modern design. Not to say it's easy or anything like that. The challenge in the demo was decent, and the possibility of having a character die by falling into a toilet (willingly) is very real. It doesn't feel overly dense or arcane or unapproachable. It just feels good.

And to go back, once again, to my poor fighter lost to the devilish toilet, The Secret of Weepstone does something really cool when you lose a party member: it gives you a bonus. It all depends on which character dies, but in my case, after the fighter was gone, it unlocked his "Mortal Favor," which then allowed me to see adjacent rooms on the map without needing to visit them. Was I bummed I lost a character in such an embarrassing way? Well, yeah. Bro died exploring a toilet hole. But then I was able to get a little something extra for the trouble, something that improved the possible outcome for my party and it kind of made me wonder… what other secret abilities were hiding in my strong, healthy, living party members?

If I’m being honest, it made me think about tossing them into the toilet too, OK? I'm not too proud to admit it. Curiosity is a hell of a thing. But seriously, I really liked this take on perma-death. It took some of the sting away from losing my fighter and also made me think differently during battles where it looked like I might not make it through. Sure, I might be down a magic user or a thief, but what if the real treasure was the abilities I gained along the way? Really makes you think.

What if the real treasure was the abilities I gained along the way? The Secret of Weepstone demo is free and available right now on Steam. It took me around 40 minutes or so to complete, but I think that was more due to me wandering around with a delighted look on my face. It might take you less time. It might take you more time! I missed two doors right before the final battle, so I might go back and speedrun it. I also don't think I tried out every class and character available in the demo, and it would be cool to find out if any of them have the ability to climb into that toilet. Why would the flavor text mention running water if it weren't important? Stew on that one for a while.

Seth Macy is Senior Social Commerce Producer, and just wants to be your friend. You can find him on social media sites @SethFromMaine.