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Archmage Rises News

Build 0.0.10 Live!

This was a big week, several long running tasks came to completion freeing people up for next week. We also introduced a more formal git branching strategy which had the adverse effect of tripping is up a bit yesterday, so we needed an extra day to get everything right. I'm proud of what we've accomplished this week. This build was real hard to get out.

New
  1. We now support up to 130% Text Scaling. It was a significant amount of work to pull this off, ~2 people for 3 weeks combing over the entire UI and tooltip system. We did this to allow people to play on many kinds of screens: 13" laptops, TV's, Steam Deck, etc. all at what is comfortable for you. We also did it to lay a foundation for future UI work. Note: There is a known issue it is slow to respond as you move the slider, and occasionally some text will pop out of a container. We will optimize in a future patch.
  2. Now support more (all?) 16:9 Screen Resolutions. 1440p and 4k screen users rejoice! Actual 4k support will come later. 21:9 probably never. (I say this as the lead dev working on a 21:9 screen I love so much I could kiss it. It's like my fourth child.)
  3. Using a dungeon door key will now remove it from your inventory. They were always magical, but now go
  4. poof* so as not to clog up yer inventory. (The vendors were sick of buying your useless keys and raised a complaint!)
  5. Added 9 more character creation equipment bundles, for a total of 12.
  6. Added 2 more quests
Improved
  1. Removed an unnecessary click in spell casting, making combat play faster. You pick the spell, then can click the spot you want to cast it. No longer do you have to confirm "cast" above.
  2. Rewrote locked doors, levers, and keys. This was real broke, but now it should be good: keys and levers will appear on the correct side of the locked door (the side where you can reach it! ːsurprised_yetiː)
  3. Optimized game loading, starting the game is at least 10x faster. Sadly, this does not improve save game loading. Baby steps...
  4. Changed Magic School XP Level up cost from +100xp per level to +25xp per level cost, so 100, 125, 150, 175, etc. instead of 100, 200, 300... (player feedback)
  5. Camps no longer are consumable. They cost more now, but they never go away. Later we will introduce wear & tear or something, but we solved the immediate issue of needing stacks of 8 of them. (player feedback)
  6. Harvesting resources is down from 15->5 stamina. This is a bandaid based on player steam forum feedback (sleep simulator! ːhappy_yetiː). Stamina will slowly be taken out of the game entirely, but the beneficial need to sleep will not. (player feedback)
  7. Resource generation is much higher and now uniform in the code. HOWEVER, there is a deeper problem of the map showing a forest where there is no forest. Correcting the graphics to match the map is a longer solve and we didn't have time to do it this week. So this is a small improvement with a major improvement coming. (player feedback)
  8. Made the Ara and AP refresh a little juicier
Fixes
    Combat: Ground placement of corpses and things like acid pools and such is fixed. It was trying to place it in the right spot, saw there was something there (the monster) and then trying to find an open place to put it.
    Fixed showing wrong spell title/icon/radius in cast box. Oops. ːsteamfacepalmː
  1. Gambling: Somewhere around the player reaching 10,000g the game would crash. The issue was bankrupting the innkeeper! He would try to take his turn, but couldn't afford it, but had to take his turn, couldn't afford it. Infinite loop goodness.
  2. Gambling: Fixed natural 20's going firey. Nothing special happens during gambling so it shouldn't show the effect.
  3. Fixed inn sleep fire VFX. It was miss-firing (Ha! I'm a dad). It now scales correctly to whatever screen you are on and no longer looks like it is burning the furniture.
  4. Fixed text bleeding outside of popup boxes on world generation and spell school level up
  5. Fixed fellow student names must be unique in character creation. We had a player report going to school with Barbara, Barbara, and Barbara. It certainly made it an interesting challenge to keep them all straight, but we decided it was for the best to just ensure they are unique.
Known Issues

There are plenty of general problems in the game, but here are some specific ones we're working on:
  • There is a quest, Gather Stone for Inquisitor, which has some ??? showing in it.
  • Sometimes a new world has a bunch of the spells way up the tier. It's real weird, we can reproduce it, but not often. If you get this, just generate another world and it'll be fine.


Finally, thanks for all the great design ideas on the forums. It helps us to be able to read a multitude of opinions on a matter, picking the best elements. Yay Early Access! Thanks for adventuring with us.

Last note: Monday is a holiday in Canada, something about a queen. So we'll be back at it on Tuesday!

Build 0.0.9 Live!

2.5 weeks from launch and we're starting to build up momentum! We obviously had some serious issues to deal with the first week, and we are still working through bug reports, but in today's patch you will experience some of the content development momentum that is going on in the background!

NEW
  1. Spell power slider has made it's return. This is unlockable via a new "master class" quest available at the Starter Town Conclave. When you unlock this new magical control knowledge, you'll be able to adjust the power of your spells before casting: Weaker, Normal, Powerful
  2. 3 new quests (including the previously mentioned spell slider quest)
  3. Magic school power leveling is now on a curve of 100, 200, 300, etc. It no longer is just 100xp per point. This makes the game harder and it was always supposed to be this way*
  4. 3 new spells: Air Pocket, Earthquake, and Wall of Stone - NOTE: You have to generate a new world and game to get them, does not just appear in your saves!
  5. Added descriptive prefixes to help differentiate enemies (thanks to player Durbitwaz for the assistance!)
  6. Several new NPC portraits
  7. Rebalancing of character creation - 6 sessions instead of 9
  8. Added back the ability to Explore a hex to find a lair even if you failed the tracks roll. Look for the [?] in the top panel right column, if you see it, you know to explore! (player request)
  9. New VSync option under Graphics Settings (player request)
  10. Updated FPS cap slider option (player request)


FIXED
  • Stink Cloud debuff no longer persists after combat, was causing lots o' issues
  • Light & Arcane Insight now scale according to spell school power
  • Fixed fill direction on enemy armor bar
  • Item descriptions now display properly in combat
  • Fixed Dispel Gem, and now you can also use it on yourself outside of combat
  • Fixed buff/debuff icons for Stink Cloud, Ice Shield, and Flame Shield
  • More save file optimizations

*Fun Fact - the programmer found a note in the source code for the School XP system from 2022 saying "TODO: Don't leave this at just 100Xp per point."ːsteamfacepalmː

Former God of War Designer Joins Archmage Rises Team

Design veteran Mark Webster has joined the Defiance team to help improve Archmage Rises game design.

Mark comes by way of Sony's Santa Monica Studio where he worked on Game of the Year titles God of War (2018) and God of War Ragnarok (2022). Before that, he also assisted Activision Blizzard with their Skylanders, Guitar Hero, and Marvel Ultimate Alliance franchises.

Mark has been following Archmage Rises since he and Thomas met at a game conference in 2019. Mark is excited to dive in to coaching us on game design. He already started digging into Combat today!

We're grateful for the chance timing and opportunity which made this possible for our little indie title. We're serious about making this game great!

Build 0.0.8 Is Live!

We have an update to enjoy this weekend, including new content!

New

- Added two new quests: a healer quest and a much involved "towel" quest!
- You can now attack foes out of your weapon's normal attack range by spending extra AP
- Dungeons now contain locked doors, blocked doors, and trapped doors. Levers now unlock doors (if they exist in the same room as a locked door). This solves the "hey every lever does nothing, just trapped" problem - it was because the door wasn't locked, not because we are mean sadistic devs ːhappystar2022ː

Fixed

- FIXED: Flatter does not correctly use Persuasion Skill
- FIXED: Paying fine does not reduce wanted level
- FIXED: City Guards no longer return immortal
- FIXED: Casting a Shield no longer stacks the FX overlay
- FIXED: Stink Cloud VFX is no longer lingering around after combat
- FIXED: Wellbeing now caps at 100
- FIXED: 2 Mayors being created in some cases, causing some quests to not be completable. Issue may persist in pre-existing saves, but will no longer be an issue in new games.
- FIXED: Light spell description shows the current number of hours that it lasts now.
- FIXED: sometimes haggling increased the value of a deal instead of reducing
- FIXED: Minor performance improvements

Build 0.0.7 Is Live!

The latest build is now here!

While this list might seem small, it's mighty in nature as some of these bugs were very intricate to solve (and we're fixing bugs while working on the much anticipated Update #1: Townsfolk).

- FIXED: Saving/Loading bugs that were causing massive save files which causes the game to crash when saving or loading some save files
- FIXED: Dead enemies not being removed from combat, preventing combat from ending.
- NEW: Quick character creation options. Now you can bypass school and launch into the game with a pre-gen character.
- NEW: A new dynamic NPC portrait has been added into the game