Mage's Initiation Kickstarter

[Rath Darkblade]

Hmm. Luckily I have both Galaxy and Steam, so I can pick and choose ...

Incidentally, how big is this game? It costs the same on Steam and GOG - but GOG quotes the size as 979 MB and Steam says it's 2 GB. What's going on?

[MusicallyInspired]

It's a little over a gig. Probably just the different ways they interpret file size. One is probably compressed while the other is a rounded off post-install size. In a world where we have games that are 50+ GB, different platforms probably don't worry too much about which way to round off a single gigabyte.

[Rath Darkblade]

Right. I'm not sure how speedy my connection is, but ... put it this way: A couple of months back, I downloaded NWN2, which is about 9.5 GB. It took me from roughly 4pm to just after 3:15am to download it. So to me, 2 GB can take quite a while; 1 GB is manageable.

[MusicallyInspired]

I'm not knocking your or anybody's issues with internet connection speeds, I'm just saying you're fringe and the big distribution platforms don't care about fringe when they're posting their sub-20GB game file sizes that's all.

[Rath Darkblade]

Heh. I understand that - I wasn't offended or anything.

How is "fringe" defined, by the way?

Yes, I don't think I've changed my ISP plan since at least 2013. Maybe I should, but my current plan fits well within my budget, and what I do online is well below my bandwidth limit. So ...

By the way, I now have Mage's Initiation! I have a question:

I tried to start the game, but it did not run in full-screen mode - all I got was a blank black screen, and I had to restart. My screen resolution is 1440 x 900.

Under Windowed mode, the game works in 1280 x 800 (i.e. Max round multiplier) and 1337 x 836 (i.e. stretch, preserving aspect ratio).

I prefer 1280 x 800 because it fits in my 19" screen. 1337 x 836 does too, but only just - a tiny part of the window (i.e. the window title) doesn't.

I'm just confused ... why does the game work in Windowed mode, but not in full-screen mode?

[MusicallyInspired]

It works fine in fullscreen mode for me and many others. I'm not sure what the difference is. If "OpenGL" doesn't work, try another driver. I recommend "stretch, preserving aspect ratio" modes because it keeps the image proportions as they should be without stretching or squishing the art which is a major pet peeve of mine. The video will be slightly pillar-boxed, though. The stretch function should also stretch the rendered video output to your maximum screen size regardless of the scaling multiplier.

AGS driver settings have always been a little clunky and vary from system to system.

[Rath Darkblade]

Hmm. I tried MI last night, and the beginnings of the story work fine for me. I got through the beginning (tower section) just fine. I think I know where to find the priestess etc., and the black merchant in the town gave me an idea on how to build a raft. I just can't find the "ingredients" - there's one plank near the water and another leaning against the city walls, but where are the others? And how do I lash them together? I thought of using the vines, but that doesn't work.

Also, the combat is far too difficult. I tried entering the forest to look for more planks (as well as the appleblossom fruit), and was immediately set upon by a goblin and a spiderling, who chased me around and killed me. What can I do about combat? Or getting better spells?

[Tawmis]

Hmm. I tried MI last night, and the beginnings of the story work fine for me. I got through the beginning (tower section) just fine. I think I know where to find the priestess etc., and the black merchant in the town gave me an idea on how to build a raft. I just can't find the "ingredients" - there's one plank near the water and another leaning against the city walls, but where are the others? And how do I lash them together? I thought of using the vines, but that doesn't work.

Also, the combat is far too difficult. I tried entering the forest to look for more planks (as well as the appleblossom fruit), and was immediately set upon by a goblin and a spiderling, who chased me around and killed me. What can I do about combat? Or getting better spells?

Is there a settings to make the game easier, perhaps? (Don't own it yet, since I dropped a lot of money for Odin's vet care two weeks ago).

[MusicallyInspired]

There is a difficulty slider. By default it's set to "Intermediate". Put it all the way down to "Easy". If you want to avoid combat as much as possible, just run away. The key is to keep mobile, though, and don't stand still. Your skills improve over time. Each time you complete one of your 3 tasks you get more spells from the Sphere of Knowledge to use in battle and for puzzles. You can also find gems on fallen enemies sometimes that will give a boost to your stats if you set them in your Conductor in the Equip screen (not Inventory).

Also, the raft puzzle is slightly different depending on which class you are. I'm guessing you're an Earth mage? You need 4 planks altogether. They're all found around the main gaming area (not in the forest or wastelands). Keep looking!

Some further advice on combat. I like to use the WASD keys to run around. From there I can use the number keys to select which spells I want and then "SPACE" to attack. I use the mouse to target the enemies I want to attack. That seemed easiest to me. In fact, I pushed to add that as an extra optional feature . But yeah, just keep moving. If you feel overwhelmed, just leave the screen. And stock up on health and mana potions when you can. You can also get poisoned so get some venom potions to cure yourself if that happens (your health bar will turn green if you're infected). Spiders can infect you. If you're low on gold, remember that some of the merchants have errands you can run for them which they will reward with gold. You get the items off dead bodies. Good way to make money early on. Gems are worth more too if you've already got a good pair installed in your conductor that you don't want to part with and have extras.

[MusicallyInspired]

The Mage's Initiation OST is now available on my Bandcamp store. $12 CAD ($9 USD) for over 2hrs and 20mins of music. 80 tracks plus 12 bonus tracks and 4 variations of the cover art. Some themes that never made it in the game are featured!

http://music.brandonblume.com/album/mag ... soundtrack

[MusicallyInspired]

Mage's Initiation just got a 1.1 update which, among many bug fixes, adds an optional "no combat" mode which removes all random encounters in the game and also makes boss battles much easier.. Just slide the difficulty setting all the way to the left. Live on all three platforms (Steam, GOG, and Humble). Doesn't break save games.

[Tawmis]

The game is getting a lot of attention and high praise on this FB group too:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/ClassicGamersGuild/