Mage's Initiation: Reign of the Elements

[h1][b][u]BottomLine at the Top:[/u][/b][/h1] Diet Quest for Glory. Low calorie, but leaves a weird aftertaste in your mouth. Good enough that I'm interested in a sequel. [h1][b][u]Intro:[/u][/b][/h1] This is one of those games that I started then stopped then picked up again way later. ------------------------------------- [h1][b][u]Pros:[/u][/b][/h1] ------------------------------------- -Decent background art and overall style. Best comparison is to QFG 3. -Some quality of life features (double click fast run, quick travel by hitting esc, some fast travel points, ability to chose different control setup styles) -MOST voice acting is done well (more on this in a bit). -Good sound track - ------------------------------------- [h1][b][u]Meh...:[/u][/b][/h1] ------------------------------------- -AGS setup headaches... Fine once its all dialed in but hOW. IS. THIS. STILL. A. THING.!??@?@?@@@#$@#%T!$@Q#YFHWDFB.....wooosaa....wooooosa...... -It can be easy to click through important dialog. (I had this as a note during my earlier playthrough, my subsequent one did not have this as an issue as much so maybe it was some setting I changed or something.) -There should have been a transport gate placed outside the entrance to the town. -The intro video on this game's Steam page talks about how this games takes place in a world that used to be like our own, with technology and cities 'n all that. But then something happened and instead the world turned to magic. And also somehow there are all kinds of monsters and goblins and demons. But the game never touches on this at all. It seems totally unnecessary. Like why not just have it take place in a standard fantasy setting. Why tease this whole pre-magic society thing? But it also doesn’t matter to the game's story so whatever I guess..... Just seems like a lost opportunity is all. Maybe they thought it’d make it too much like Guard Duty? Idk...moving on! ------------------------------------- [h1][b][u]Cons:[/u][/b][/h1] ------------------------------------- -There’s going to be a few here. Normally I start off with either the most egregious Con or the cons that are prevalent thru out the game...and we'll get to those in a second. Instead I want to point out one very specific thing that irritated me in this game. This is something that happened during a specific quest, Quick heads up some spoilers ahead. So in this game you pick your character class, and I picked fire. I mean look at my name, of course I picked fire! During a quest about 3/4 of the way into the game, there’s a scene where your in a darkened cave, and clearly what is necessary is to illuminate the cave. No problem, there is a spell I picked up called flash. In the description it says that this spell is good for startling enemies, impressing non-mages, and LIGHTENING DARKENED AREAS. Since this spell has been pretty useless and boring (like most of the spell casting in this game called MAGE'S INTITIATION...we'll get to that in a sec) clearly, this is the one situation that it should work well in right? Well your obviously an idiot, who would think that!?? clearly not the game, which gives the great comment of "tHiS CAvE iS TOO dArK evEN fOR My flAsH SPeLL." aHHHH DOIIIIIIIIIII....... That situation alone would warrant me putting it first in the cons list because it is incredibly stupid. You'd think there would be no way to make this quest any dumber. But oh, sweet summer child, you would be wrong. So, since the spell designed to light a darkened area doesn’t work for the darken area you may ask what, prey tell, is the solution? Well, there is a lantern in the cave, but oh no! The wick is wet and the flint is missing. No problem, I'll use my heat spell to dry it out. Ah, but how to light it? Hmmmm...lets think here. The fire mage....how can...the...FIRE...MAGE.... light the lantern? Hmm???.....No? nothing? C'mon class...The FIRE MAGE. How can the fire mage light the lantern.?...... Ah, yes, you in back, what was that? Use magic to light the lantern? The Fire mage can shoot fire and light the lantern? What do the rest of you think, I see nodding heads here. Show of hands. Who here thinks the FIRE MAGE CAN LIGHT THE LANTERN WITH HIS MAGIC? HMM??? WELL GUESS WHAT, NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOPPPEEEE you STUPID IDIOT. NOPE. YOU SEE. THE FIRE MAGE NEEDS TO USE THE CANDLE HE PICKED UP EARLIER TO LIGHT THE LANTERN..............::::breathes::::......... So clearly, that’s it then, right? That’s the peak of dumbness with this incredibly simple objective. Just use the candle...Yep....the candle..but...oh........wait. The. Candle. Is. Not. Lit....................OH MY GOD.....I, I obviously have been way way to harsh on this puzzle. The MAGE, the FIRE MAGE, who USES FIRE, is supposed to LIGHT THE CANDLE WITH HIS MAGIC AND THEN LIGHT THE LANTERN WITH THE CANDLE.OF COURSE!! :::slaps forehead::: DUH!!....haha....ok.....Let me just use my magic spell to light the candl............... ..... ... ... . The. The Candle? You mean...it...it...it TOO, CAN NOT BE LIT BY THE FIRE MAGE AND HIS FIRE MAGIC????????......................SO WHAT DO I DO THEN, GAME? HUH?..... .... no no.. You cant possibly want me to teleport back to the city....and go into the tavern....to, to light the candle? Surely not, haha, right game? :::eyes dart around the room delusionally::: No. I must have something wrong. Here I am , in the tavern, and I clicked my candle on the nearest OTHER candle on a table. And its telling me no I cant use that to light my candle. I CANT LIGHT THE CANDLE, THAT I, THE FIRE MAGE HAVE,WITH ANOTHER CANDLE. Clearly there’s something I am missing here. I'll head back to the cave.... ... .... But first, just for ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥, I'll click the candle on the raging fireplace in the tavern, I mean I'm SURE it will just give me the same nope message as when I tried to use THE CANDLE on the table to light the CANDLE that I THE FIRE MAGE AM CARRYING. Ok, got the candle selected, dragging my cursor over the fireplace annnnnnndddd, mouseclick. Ha ok here comes the messa.....hey. Hey wait. why is my character moving over to the fireplace? OH, it must be some scripting error, he's just moving over there and then its going to give me the same messag....... .... ... . He lit the candle. Tha..Thats how the fire mage needs to light the candle for this quest. He needs to teleport into town, take his candle, and light it in the fireplace, then go back to the cave to use the candle to light the lantern. MAKES PERFECT SENSE TO ME! HAHAHAHAHASHDFHASDFHASGasbfmadba t434ty=55qy3qy [i] "Channel 5 news here. Tonight local video game reviewer and prolific degenerate CrazyPyro69 was found dead after trying to eat his own keyboard. Authorities believe him to be another victim to the retarded Mage's Initiation candle puzzle." [/i] -Ahem, con 2. The Voice actor for the main character is just awful. There's maybe a hand full of times when he doesn’t sound like the queen from that 90's era Dungeons and Dragons movie, the rest of the time I am confident my shoe could have don’t a better job. -As I touched upon earlier, there is a surprising lack of magic in the game about mages. There are 5 spells you can use outside combat, of which one is passive and another is just a transport function. QFG had mad different spells that were woven into some clever puzzles. Having only a few is boring. -Combat is not fantastic. Again, there are like 6 casting spells so not a lot of variety. QFG 3 didnt have phenomenal combat either. I guess this could be a "meh." But I'm not scrolling back up there, look how far away it is. -Too many mazes in this game. -Cutscene animations are jarring for the aesthetic of the game. I would rather have seen some in game cutscenes instead of the weird CD-I Zelda game style animation. -Pixel hunting -More than a few moon logic puzzles. [Cont.]

[b]Mage's Initiation[/b] is a fine tribute to the legendary [b]Quest For Glory[/b] series. As a hybrid RPG/adventure game it almost perfectly captures the spirit of the first [b]Quest For Glory[/b] game. It's not as humorous as its source of inspiration, but the game is very well balanced and does a couple of things better than its classic counterpart. No repeated spell casting is required to improve your stats. You gain xp points by solving the puzzles and once you cross a threshold, additional points can be assigned to your stats. I quite liked this mechanism. You can play as one of four classes of mage. Each class adds a little variation to the puzzles throughout the game. Each class also has a class-specific quest which warrants a playthrough per class. Achievement hunters will have a field day with a wide variety of possible play styles: kill all types of monsters, kill no monsters at all, kill 1000 monsters... The puzzles are decent and never get frustrating. Art is what you'd expect from a pixel-art type of game; although some of the cut scenes look out of place because the drawing style seems quite different than the rest of the game. The quality of the voice acting varies a bit; personally, I don't quite like the main character's voice but other characters really stand out. All in all, I really enjoyed this one. Just like in [b]Quest For Glory[/b] you can save your character for use in a sequel. Unfortunately, the developer has made it clear that a sequel is very unlikely to ever see the light of day. That's a real shame; I would have been a day-one-buyer.

Fun, classic, Sierra-style point-and-click adventure game. A neat feature was being able to choose your menu display style. A good play for us old adventure game fans!

Love the game. It reminds me of the old Quest for Glory games.

This is the best game inspired by Quest For Glory which I have found so far. I want more!

[quote] Love RPG? [url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/39973073/]Make sure to Follow my Curator Page[/url] for plenty more! [/quote] A surprisingly successful successor to Quest for Glory, less humor, but the atmosphere was preserved. Unfortunately, there is only one class in the game, but there are 4 types of magic. According to internal impressions, the choice of magic changes the gameplay by about 15%. Is it worth playing? Without a doubt! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xNDAerYekrw [quote] And don't forget to [url=https://www.youtube.com/c/WizardWorm?sub_confirmation=1] Subscribe to my Youtube [/url][/quote] [quote] Join my [url=http://steamcommunity.com/groups/wizard_rpg] Steam Group [/url] [/quote]

I didn't like the story much and the game mechanics were clunky. I am very glad I got this on sale.

This is a surprisingly fun game. It's an Adventure point 'n' click/RPG hybrid, like Quest For Glory back in the day. It's one of those games that doesn't really hold your hand, so you have to turn your brain on. Once you realize "it's one of those types of games", it becomes immersive. Great for a coffee buzz (+Bailey's Irish Cream!)

Very well done, game similar to titles "Quest for Glory" or "Quest for Infamy" which are point and click RPG storybook-like games. Immersive story, interactive, very fun. Hoping to see more games like this being made in the future. Already know I'm going to enjoy this one!

I like it! if you enjoyed the Quest for Glory games then I think you're going to have a good time with this.