Elemental: War of Magic - Misc. Links and Tidbits

magerette

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Since we had some users' requests for coverage of this non-rpg, turn-based fantasy strategy game being developed by Stardock and inspired by Master of Magic, here are a few links to create a frame of reference and give some background on the game as well as to take a look at its current state.
First, the game has a homepage with several developer diaries as well as the official forums.
Gamasutra has also done a piece interviewing Brad Wardell on the modding engine used in Elemental and Rock Paper Shotgun has an interview as well.
Also available from the forums at the official site is a link to a short impressions piece over at Colony of Gamers forums, and a couple of user videos from Pax 2009, showing Wardell informally discussing the game and the demo previewed there. [Warning: quality is not high; it's obviously amateur with a lot of noise and shake, but there's some interesting background on the informal ties to Master of Magic and also some specifics on the actual game elements if you have the patience to sit through them.]
Finally, here are links to the older two part interview with Wardell over at Shack News in this newsbit we posted back in October.

More information.
 
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Nice. Every game mentioning the name "Master Of Magic" makes me instantly interested.
 
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I am also interested however, bad time of the year to spend 50 bucks:(
 
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I don't think it will be out til sometime next year. They're still doing beta on it. Unfortunately, there's a bunch of games coming out then too, and I've still got a massive backlog on this years stuff . :(
 
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I'm greatly looking forward to this game, but I can't help be a little bitter that the same sort of revamped spiritual successor isn't in the works for Jagged Alliance. Why do great classics like these have to wait so, so long for devs to revisit their conceptual general area? At least MoM is finally getting its due.
 
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I am also interested however, bad time of the year to spend 50 bucks:(

It's expected release date is in February next year. So you still have some time to save after the holidays if you like.

This will be just about perfect. It's close enough to look forward too, but not too close that it will clash with the other games that are coming out.
 
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Wow RPG news must be slow by covering strategy turn-based games.

No, it's not, just look at all the dragon age posts.

Besides, several of the members who - unlike you - contribute to this forum have expressed interest in the game, so I don't see the problem.
 
Wow RPG news must be slow by covering strategy turn-based games.

There are a lot of Masters of Magic fans here and this game could be just as good if what they are saying is true.
 
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It's expected release date is in February next year. So you still have some time to save after the holidays if you like.

This will be just about perfect. It's close enough to look forward too, but not too close that it will clash with the other games that are coming out.

I went ahead and preordered this and dabbled in the beta. It is in a very rough state now and Brad Wardell has been stating the release will likely be pushed to late 2010. So it is not that close unless you want to join beta testing at some point, which comes with preordering.

To give you an idea of where the beta is now, the game is cloth map only and I doubt they will have even have magic spells included before Christmas. It is just a rough outline of potential features, playable as a very weak war game at the moment.

There is the promise of the beta being fun later on (probably not until at least January), when the graphical engine is included and all game elements (heir system, heroes, magic, ai, economy) are present.
 
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Thanks for the impressions. Sounds like it has a way to go. I don't mind waiting actually; I have a long list that seems to get longer all the time. Though pre-ordering and playing it as it's built has a certain appeal, too.
 
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Thanks, Burress. I think it's safe to hold off on pre-ordering for awhile, At least till they get closer to having the 'good stuff' in there :)

One question, I remember reading something about the creatures/NPCs wandering around the map and affecting it. Not nessarily against you the empire, but just wandering around doing their own thing. I think the example they gave was a group of heroes (not under your control) going into a cave and either coming back out to to continue their quests or failing and then some monsters pops out to cause havoc for being disturbed. This feature interests me the most and was wondering if they have implemented that yet or have you seen 'neutrals' walking around that aren't necessarily your enemy?
 
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One question, I remember reading something about the creatures/NPCs wandering around the map and affecting it. Not nessarily against you the empire, but just wandering around doing their own thing. I think the example they gave was a group of heroes (not under your control) going into a cave and either coming back out to to continue their quests or failing and then some monsters pops out to cause havoc for being disturbed. This feature interests me the most and was wondering if they have implemented that yet or have you seen 'neutrals' walking around that aren't necessarily your enemy?
The creatures walking about in the game not aligned to any of the factions don't attack at the moment. Again it is in a very rough state, but they do have lairs they spawn from. So if you see a bunch of spiders walking about (which you can fight), there is a lair or two in the vicinity. At this point, if you reach the lair the spiders will stop spawning. Quests have not been added, so I don't know how that will work.

Here is their plan and current state of adding content. http://forums.elementalgame.com/363845
This is their progress since mid-september. Things are advancing slower than I anticpated.

It is kind of strange playing a game without so many intended features. It is really not fun at all as a game right now. The only fun is really being a part of the discussion of how things should be, what would be nice, how this should work ect, on the forums. When I signed up, I didn't know they were doing it this way. If I had, I would probably have waited until the beta 2, where all features and the graphical engine are present.
 
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Thanks. Not exactly encouraging to see that list with all that is needed to do.

I finally found that article that I was talking about earlier. Here is what interested me the most:
Like Stardock’s Galactic Civilization games, there will be bits of humor and irony sprinkled about Elemental. In one example, the game offers an ironic take on the oft-visited scenario of a loot-lusting adventurer jumping headlong into an uncharted dungeon. In some instances, as you’re running your sovereign empire, an overzealous adventure may enter one of the dungeons, only to die at the hands of a demon, now awake, and very perturbed. Thanks to that adventurer (who any RPG player can relate to), the roused demon will then proceed to wreak havok across your land.

Now I"m not sure if he is talking about your adventurerers or a computer controlled band (which would be much cooler, imo). To have some kind of living breathing world where your choices and that of your oppenents would actually affect the world in logical ways. Like that band of adventurers going into cave only to be wiped out and now a very grumpy demon is on the loose. I just like the randomness of that.

This game does sound really interesting. I just hope they can step up the timetable. They've only done 3 things on their beta list. I thought they would of been much further along by now. Maybe they can just dump that whole multi-player aspect until later. Who needs that anyways ;)?
 
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I've ordered the game a long while ago, when it was first announced on totalgaming.net their former gaming website… So I've been messing around with the closed beta a bit. It's been progressing slowly, but still quite nicely I'd say. They listen and speak with the community quite a lot which is refreshing. I highly suggest browsing their forums, especially the dev journal for anyone interested in this.

Already in the Beta there's some nice Stardock humor. Just check out the intro movie for the beta.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uAgEPCltF2Q


Oh and to answer Skaven about the random band of adventurers waking up a big bad guy…. Can't say precisely which post I read it in, but on the Elemental forums I am pretty sure that I read the example, by Frogboy, where it was random AI adventurers that wake up the big bad guy :).
 
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Im in the beta since summer but theres not much to play with yet. The game doesnt even work properly on notebook keyboards. I had to use keymapper to make the game playable.
 
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