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Game News Quest for Glory-like Mage's Initiation releasing on January 30th

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Tags: Himalaya Studios; Mage's Initiation

Himalaya Studios' Mage's Initiation was crowdfunded way back in February 2013, during the golden age of Kickstarter. It was part of a trio of crowdfunded Quest for Glory-likes, along with Infamous Quests' Quest for Infamy which came out in 2014 and the Coles' own Hero-U which was finally released earlier this year. The game, in case you've forgotten, is an adventure-RPG where you play as D'arc, a novice mage who is tasked with saving the land. Himalaya have really taken their sweet time with it, having spent 15 months on voice acting alone. A dodgy combat video they released back in 2016 had us worried that the game had gone down a feature creep rabbit hole. However, it looks like things have come together, and today they finally announced a launch date - January 30th. Here's the obligatory teaser trailer and accompanying press release:



Sixteen-year-old D'arc has spent most of his life confined to the Mage's Tower, studying elemental magic under the instruction of Ele'Wold's most accomplished scholars. Now his skills will be put to the test with three quests across a mystical land he knows only from stories and dreams.

But something's rotten in Ele'Wold: the realm's once benevolent winged guardians have turned hostile and restless redcap goblins are on the warpath. Can D'arc pass his initiation *and* rescue a kingdom on the brink of chaos?

Mage's Initiation is an adventure/RPG hybrid inspired by the venerable Quest for Glory (a.k.a. Hero's Quest) and King's Quest series by Sierra On-Line. It's the second commercial adventure game from Himalaya Studios, who have also released four free remakes of classic Sierra games under the moniker Anonymous Game Developers Interactive (AGDI).

Features:
  • Choose from four character classes -- Fire Mage, Air Mage, Water Mage, or Earth Mage -- each with unique magical spells and puzzle solutions.
  • Explore a vibrant fantasy world with hand-drawn graphics reminiscent of the Sierra, LucasArts, and Revolution adventure games of the early 1990s.
  • Select between three point & click interfaces: a Sierra-style icon bar, a LucasArts-style verb coin, or a streamlined compact UI.
  • Run into combat for an RPG experience, or avoid it for pure adventure.
  • Automatically gain new strengths, spells, and abilities as your character improves -- no stat grinding required!
  • Get your money's worth: branching storyline and optional side quests provide replay value.
  • Fully voiced and lip-synced.

As the gaming world moves on to newer things, it's nice that Quest for Glory fans are getting one last unabashedly classic spiritual successor. Mage's Initation has a Steam page now, so go wishlist it.
 

Farewell into the night

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This looks like a child of The Longest Journey and Warcraft (Adventures).
 

wtrboy

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Wonder if the Hero-U: Rogue to Redemption artist was involved in this...artwork looks similar!
 

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Somehow this is the QfG-like I'm the least excited about. Well, I know how actually - I've seen their combat videos.

It might end up being the best of them though, no? Remember, this is the team that made the QFG2 VGA remake - ie, they have the most recent experience actually making this kind of game.

(I also think the additional lore they added to King's Quest in their remakes was really cool, but others have disagreed with this)
 

V_K

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It might end up being the best of them though, no?
Um, I highly doubt that. It might be the best looking of them, but none of the gameplay videos I've seen impress me too much. Combat looks too twitchy, and the character system seems shallow. It's one thing to remake something, and a very different thing to design something from scratch.
Besides, HQ is already quite close to perfection as far as QfG-likes are concerned.
 

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Yes sorry, I meant excluding Heroine's Quest.

What recent gameplay videos have you seen other than that 2016 combat video?
 

Pope Amole II

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Hell yeah. Will try to promote this as much as I can. Their QfG2 remake was pretty good so I have some faith in this being good.
 

Mortmal

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As the gaming world moves on to newer things, it's nice that Quest for Glory fans are getting one last unabashedly classic spiritual successor. Mage's Initation has a Steam page now, so go wishlist it.

You seem oddly enthusiastic about this game.

Maybe a little to enthusiastic.
Indeed he will at least spend a good 0.2hours on this one .Too much time counting ad money and not enough to game.
 

MRY

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Emily is awesome and by far the best PR person for adventure games -- but this is still maybe a cruel burn to Hero-U. (They should definitely have hired her.)
 

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Emily is awesome and by far the best PR person for adventure games -- but this is still maybe a cruel burn to Hero-U. (They should definitely have hired her.)

Seems like specifying "2019" may have been a deliberate attempt to avoid a burn (a gesture of pity which in itself may count as a cruel burn, but that's getting meta)
 

Pope Amole II

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Emily is awesome and by far the best PR person for adventure games -- but this is still maybe a cruel burn to Hero-U. (They should definitely have hired her.)

Why? The point of Hero-U was to specifically avoid creating another Quest for Glory. It never tried to become a successor to QfG.
 

Morkar Left

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Wow, I remember backing it and was wondering a month ago what happened to it. Nice to see that it actually gets released.
 
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Game looks like shit. And who the fuck wants to play as a goddamn apprentice? If I wanted pedestrian chores, I'd leave my room and go molest old people at the nearby retirement home.

Still, I'm gonna buy the damn thing. My fruity 13yo niece is gonna have a blast playing it.
 

ghostdog

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Whoa, I backed this and by now I was sure it was gonna turn vaporware. Cool turn of events, and it looks pretty nice too.
 

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