31 replies to this topic

[Keiferr]

Magicks

Download (7.3Mb .ZIP)
Download @ YoYo Games

Features:

- Three classes.
- Six epic bosses.
- Immersive world.
- Multiple spells.

Controls:

- Arrow keys to move.
- 'Z' to shoot.
- Space to jump.
- Escape for menu.

Appreciate all forms of feedback ! This has been in production for a long time .. need some final comments before I go about finishing it up. Thanks.

Edited by Keiferr, 02 October 2010 - 04:42 AM.

[linx137520]

The graphics.... erm... you should post a request in the graphics forum .

Trying out your game now

Edit:
Eh what can i say. It wasnt bad, but this game feels like it should be more fast-paced. If you have a looking up feature, the camera should kinda go up away from the character instead of his sprite just changing.

Edited by linx137520, 02 November 2009 - 03:34 AM.

[Keiferr]

Thanks for the response.

As for the graphics, they may not be high quality, but I'd rather it be my own art then somebody's from the graphics forum. Now, if I could find a dedicated artist to help me out, that would be a different story.

And I probably am going to speed up the gameplay, good idea. The looking up idea isn't possible though.

[randydrew6]

I just tried it. I think you should jump higher, and the npc's go infront of the hud so that's a depth issue but not a bad start.

[fluidic ice]

Hello and thanks for your request!

On first impression this game looks like it's got a great future! Considering the great effects that you have created, I especially love the grass cyclone one! The icon for the game I thought was very nice as well, But the sprites do need a slight touch up to get them looking their best, A good idea would be to finish the basic game player and storyline then come back to fix up the sprites as this will be easy and most likely you would be better at spriting!

Apart from image, music and sound effects are another important aspect in a game, they control the players emotion and help immerse the player, i'm sure your going to add more music and sound effects later on in the game as if you place them too early, it will take a long time to load the game early on. So choose carefully what effects you add, and make sure they sound like what your going for. You could however try what I do: I create a "blank" sound and get any object that plays a sound to play this sound (which is silence) and when you want to add sound, you've already got the mechanism in place so you just change the sound to the one you want to play. While on the topic of music the background music was getting quite annoying looping over and over, try to vary your music so when you create the real version, the player likes it. When the player doesn't notice the music it's doing it's job, the same goes for sound effects.

I found the things on the ground to be very annoying, if you don't kill them they chase after you like crazy and hunt you down, which if your running your unable to turn around and shoot them due to being so close to them, if you do try to shoot them, they take some health and by then their on the other side of you and your fireball misses them. To not make them so annoying the larger objects could be slower than the player so you have a chance to escape from them. The enemies that throw fireballs and purple fireballs I found were very smart, they managed to hit my character quite a few times each time I passed them, being up high I wasn't able to hit them with my fireball though, so I had to run past. Their fireballs can go through the platforms, so why can't the players? Along with this, when the enemy shoots a fireball either left or right their fireball continuously keep going in that direction where as the players fireball stops when it's almost outside the view, why?

Jumping I though was difficult, i always kept trying to press the up arrow, I found it more instinctive to press the arrow them the space bar, so for those who like it the up arrow, you could maybe change it to that and have space to shoot a fireball, pressing up will still look up, but you will just also jump. Pressing the down arrow should let you fall through a platform, it would let players be more creative and new strategies can be formed when evading enemies.

While playing through the game I found a glitch, after fighting fael (and losing) at the starting screen again fael's leaves are still floating around, I don't think you destroyed them when you destroyed him, or you didn't destroy the particles if it uses them. On the topic of particles, I absolutely love those leaves! and pretty much all the effects! If the effects throughout the whole game are that good I'd play it from start to end in a few hours!

While playing the game I felt that I wanted to see what the new spells were going to be so I kept playing to see if I get another spell in this demo, keeping the player hooked and excited is a great thing to have in a game. To maximize this; instead of four spells (which there's only four spots up the top) you should add a large variety of different spells to learn and pickup throughout the game, such as after killing a boss or enemy.

This game has great potential in it!, just keep thinking of new ideas and spells to add, and you'll be there in no time!
Thankyou for Reading!

If anyone wants me to take a look at their WIP please message me.

An In-Depth Critique By. . .
~Fluidic Ice~
"Game Designer, Programmer and Studier"

[Keiferr]

@randydrew6

Well, you can double jump, but I may change it so there's no double jump and you can just single jump higher. And I hadn't noticed that about the HUD. Thanks for the response.

@fluidic ice

Thanks for the in depth review man, almost everything you suggested I'm probably going to be looking at. I took out all of the spells I've made for the demo, but trust me they're looking really nice. As for sfx, I have no idea where to go to start collecting some. I found one good site but you had to pay for them all. But I won't need those for quite awhile anyways.

I've slowed down the enemies and make them pause for a second after they hit you. And I'm thinking of destroying the enemies fireballs when they hit platforms. The enemies in particular are my main focus right now, since a good AI can make a good game. Thanks for the suggestions.

I sort of like the idea of different controls, but only as an option of course. Maybe when I get around to making an intro level I'll include an option between the two for the player to pick. And great idea about pressing down to drop through. Right now you have to press down + jump which is sort of awkward.

I'm glad to hear that you were excited about new spells, because I can't wait to start adding more and creating more.

Thanks again for the review.

Edited by Keiferr, 02 November 2009 - 12:56 PM.

[fluidic ice]

Your very welcome =]

I like hearing the feedback on the reviews as I can alter them and create better feedback next time! Glad it gave you some ideas and I hope the game creation process is a lot of fun!

~Fluidic Ice~

[Keiferr]

Well I uploaded a new version but the only real thing I changed was the movement. So if you play this new version tell me how you like it. It was an attempt to make a good single jump, but I liked the double jump better.

[GameDevDan]

The game is looking good so far, and about this:

The graphics.... erm... you should post a request in the graphics forum

Now, if I could find a dedicated artist to help me out, that would be a different story.

The original quote where you said "As for the graphics, they may not be high quality, but I'd rather it be my own art then somebody's from the graphics forum. " is the right way to go here. I never let anyone make sprites for my game when I first started out, and now I'm way better at spriting than I used to be. It helps to join a friendly spriting forum like Nation of design or tSR to help get constructive criticism and get better.

[Keiferr]

Very large update. It's been a few months, but the game is really starting to come together. Everything new is in the OP.

Looking forward to comments !

[Keiferr]

Could really use some plays/comments. I mean, everybody can, but perhaps I'm more desperate.

Thanks in advance.

[Vulhar]

fun game. For some reason after I beat blaze in the volcano, i ended up with two wizards that i controlled, and then the game crashed... but other than that really fun.

[GermanComposer13]

Hmm... seems good thusfar. The only new problem I see with it is what Vulhar said. Good work

[Zeddy]

Hm, quite. This isn't bad.

I started out as a Water Mage because the character selection screen promised this would be more difficult. I'm not really sure that's the case yet. Usually defensive types are easier, aren't they?

The platforming physics are okay though the double-jump could use some 'oomph'. Overall, I wouldn't mind if the whole game moved a bit faster, actually. But the jumping in particular. The game's kind of easy, overall. Also, I got the disappearing Vahl-bug so I started over as a Wind mage. Vahl, by the way, is an enormous pushover.

It would be neat if the basic projectile was different in more ways than just the visuals between the three classes. Or, at least, they'd be even more different visually. The water mage could shoot a slow-moving, giant bubble whereas the wind mage would shoot a lightning bolt that hits instantly. That sort of thing.

I went for the double-projectile as my first level perk. It seemed the wrong choice because enemies can only take one hit at a time and as such I wasn't doing any more damage to them. Sure, the other projectile could hit a different enemy but this is better achieved with piercing. The description for the perk is false, by the way. It claims to launch an extra projectile diagonally while what it actually does is replace the basic attacks with two projectiles spinning around eachother. The perk would probably be more interesting if it had done as advertised.

The next attack I got was... pretty interesting. I like the idea. Tried using it at Blazh (am I recalling these names correctly?) but it did jack crap against him, even when I stood up in his face to make it connect.

Other than that I had the same problem Vulhar did.

Edited by zeddidragon, 07 April 2010 - 07:40 AM.

[Keiferr]

Thanks for the feedback guys.

I apologize that your experience of the game was plagued by all of these bugs zeddi, as an honest review like yours doesn't come along very often.


The difficulty, flexbility and damage indications are more reflective of what I thought the classes would be like, but they deserve some updating. I do like your idea of changing the basic attacks around, as soon as I can get a lightning attack do look half-way decent.

All of the other bugs I'll address as quickly as possible.

Thanks for the support.

[FtalX]

Actually its kinda nice that you maded your own sprites!
Great game too!

[Keiferr]

Appreciate it FtalX.

Uploaded the new version which fixed the Fael bug, so you can play through longer. I still haven't pinpointed the bug after Blaze, as it doesn't happen for me. Could use some more plays. Thanks.

[fluidic ice]

Guess who's back!
And I've got another review for you! So here goes:

The first time I reviewed you game it was fairly basic, the player only had one spell they could shoot and there was multiple problems with enemies, and it was also a little rusty around the edges. This time from the first second I clicked on the game I was extremely impressed, There's a nice picture when the game loads which leads into an elegant title menu, which I thought was absolutely brilliant! The flame coming from his hand changes as you move over the different options and there's a nice charcoal-style looking castle and mage in the background. The second thing I noticed was the nice medieval style music which seemingly fitted in perfectly, but was a little repetitive.

When I began to start a game some very professional text boxes appeared, asking if I needed help and advising me on what my selections would do. After a few more text boxes the tutorial started, which was very simple and easy to follow - which is perfect for a tutorial! The NPC characters are always facing you, which is a nice little touch I found. The music however was getting repetitive by this point, but I couldn't find anywhere to turn it down or off, which is something you might like to add in future releases, or simply add more music and let the player change tracks at their own will. During battle I found the bigger creatures to be fairly annoying because you can't hide from them even if your on the higher ledges. The reason I don't like this is that you will almost always take damage unless you kill it before it arrives at you or you jump and let it go underneath you. *Expanded upon see two posts ahead*

While shooting fireballs I found that if your on a platform and trying to shoot small creatures, by ducking and shooting, you'll fall through the platform and not shoot at all, this got fairly annoying after awhile so you might want to change it so you only fall through a platform if you hold the key for half a second, or double tap it, this would make it easier to shoot. The controls were a little hard to get used to at first also, I kept trying to shoot with space and jump with the up arrow key, but this would be hard to change as you've arranged your game mechanics around using the up arrow key for other purposes such as teleporting and shooting up. I was just wondering who you were targeting this game for as well? If it's younger kids you should really change the wording of some text such as "damn" after you kill the tutorial boss, as some parents might not be pleased. On the topic of the tutorial boss, I found him to be a tad hard for a tutorial and almost died, but I take it I would have died if I reached 0 health? (Some tutorials you can't die in).

Finally, I still love all your graphical effects you put in there! They are spectacular, keep it up! This game has come a long way since I reviewed it first and I love seeing it evolve and become greater with each review, so keep it up!

Looking forward to see what's next!
Thankyou for Reading!

If anyone wants me to take a look at their WIP please message me.

An In-Depth Critique By. . .
~Fluidic Ice~
"Game Designer, Programmer and Studier"

Edited by fluidic ice, 08 April 2010 - 08:56 AM.

[fluidic ice]

Oops double post, I thought flood control was enabled to stop this lol

Edited by fluidic ice, 08 April 2010 - 06:27 AM.

[Zeddy]

During battle I found the bigger creatures to be fairly annoying because you can't hide from them even if your on the higher ledges. The reason I don't like this is that you will almost always take damage unless you kill it before it arrives at you or you jump and let it go underneath you.

Whoa whoa whoa whoa!

Battles against bigger creatures are annoying because you need to dodge them? I... I'm not even sure what to say about that, but I knew when I read that I couldn't just let it go by.