Developer: Borealys Games
Publisher: Borealys Games
RRP: £14.99 (Gog.com, Humblebundle and Steam)
Released: 18th May 2017
Available on: Gog.com, Humblebundle and Steam
Played Using: Xbox 360 Control Pad
Approximate game length: 14 Hours
Magic is outlawed and those that practice it or have it develop within them are cast out to live in exile. Thus it has been for over century but lately dark forces have been rising in the lands of Mystralia and the only ones who can stop it are a band of renegade mages. You aren’t one of them, not yet, at least.
Mages of Mystralia is a hack and slash style RPG in the vein of Torchlight but with quite a few puzzle elements akin to Hob. However in this game you’re a mage you don’t hack or slash you use magic! You play as Zia a young girl born with magical powers in a land where they aren’t allowed, what’s worse you can’t control them and at the start of the game you accidentally burn down your home and are exiled from your village.
For the sake of transparency I shall mention that I backed the kickstarter for this game.
So anyone who has played a game such as Diablo, Torchlight or Titan Quest will know the core part of this game is all about killing enemies, leveling up and attaining loot to enhance your already formidable powers. However that isn’t the case in this game, yes you do kill enemies, lots of them in fact. But you don’t gain experience from killing enemies or completing quests, there’s also almost no loot to be gained. Occasionally you’ll earn a wand that’ll effect how your spells work but that’s about it, at least as far as traditional loot is concerned. In this game the only loot you’ll really care about are the runes you’ll find (which we’ll go into later).
Runes and wands aren’t the only things to be found in this game as you explore and break open pots and barrels etc you’ll also find health replenishers, mana replenishers and soulbeads. Soulbeads are the currency of this world and are depicted as green orbs (There are purple ones around but they are far rarer and involve a lot more work than simply breaking open a pot). Now given what I said before you’d be forgiven for thinking that soulbeads are kinda’… pointless. But that isn’t the case, soulbeads allow you to purchase a few items that will aid you in your quest, such as jewelled scarabs that revive at full health you should
you die, which I can tell you is very useful in some of the boss battles you’ll face.
Of course what kind of hack and slash (because I can’t think of better term that involves magic) would it be without side quests? That’s right some of the other denizens of the realm will have requests to make of you each with its own reward, usually a purple soul gem or a wand. These additional quests encourage you to explore the world fully, and there is a lot to be found including some specially marked doors that involve solving a mini game puzzle to open.
What makes this game more than a hack and slash adventure game that’s replaced the hacking and slashing with magic is your ability to edit your spells. Using the runes that were previously mentioned you can edit your four basic spells into something more powerful. For example the ‘Ego’ spell creates a shield that will defend Zia from attacks, however if you add the ‘move’ rune to it sudden the shield is gone but Zia can now dash. Add into that dash the ‘impact’ rune and suddenly Zia’s dash triggers a second spell as she zips past her opponents.
These edited spells can be incredibly powerful, having multiple triggers and effects. However this means that the spell expends more of your mana, sure your mana regenerates reasonably quickly but when you have a room full of enemies do you want to only be able to let off a single extremely powerful spell or many less powerful ones? Thankfully there is a quick menu you can access without pausing the game, allowing you to quickly swap out spells.
There are three types of rune; behaviour, augment and trigger. Behaviour runes dictate how the rune acts, whether it moves, explodes etc. Augment applies effects such as firing left and right or how big the spell actually is. Lastly the trigger runes will cause the spell to do something at a specific point, for example the ‘impact’ trigger rune allows the spell to trigger a second spell (of your choosing) upon impact.
The thing to remember is that the order in which the runes are sequenced matters. It can make huge changes to the way a spell behaves. For example if the ‘Left’ augment rune is connected directly to a spell core then the spell will fire in a horizontal line to Zia’s left, but if the ‘Left’ rune is connected to the ‘Move’ rune (which in turn is connected to the spells core) then the spell will ark to the left.
I have to say I’m really glad I backed this one. I know these days people go on about how bad crowdfunding can be (especially in light of the Shenmue and Phoenix Point controversies) but I hold that crowdfunding is still very important and the only real way that many smaller developers can get funding for their projects.
Anyway I’ll get off my soapbox. Give this game a look, if you enjoy hack and slash or just want something a bit different give it a go!
If this appeals to you perhaps try;
Hob
Torchlight 1 & 2
The Diablo series
