Meta Magic by Inkie Inc
Cast spells using mana, but you won't always have enough. You also, have the ability to cast spells using...
Y O U R S E L F.
Spells:
Fireball (using D key) Kill enemies, and time it right to kill multiple in one blast. Killing enemies will also grant you mana so that you can continue to cast spells.
Shield (using W key) This blocks the movement of enemies, giving you the time to escape sticky situations.
Freeze (using R key) Blast a spike of frost which will freeze all enemies for 3 seconds, allowing you to slow down the mobs of enemies coming your way.
Teleport (using A key) As in the name, instantly travel to your cursor to avoid attacks, get away from enemies, prepare for the perfect shot, and so on.
Force (using S key) If you are being surrounded use this ability to blast all enemies around you back, and stun them for a quick second.
If you don't have enough mana to cast a spell however, a variety of effects may occur. Either your speed or vision is sacrificed to cast a spell, but it only gets worse over time and eventually you will begin losing health when you cast spells.
| HTML5 (web) | https://inkie-inc.itch.io/metamagic |
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/43/meta-magic |
Ratings
| Overall | 592th | 3.352⭐ | 29🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 500th | 3.278⭐ | 29🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 534th | 3.13⭐ | 29🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 630th | 3.296⭐ | 29🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 632th | 3.296⭐ | 29🧑⚖️ |
| Audio | 308th | 3.426⭐ | 29🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 511th | 2.86⭐ | 27🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 707th | 3.077⭐ | 28🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 35🗳️ | 24🗨️ |
More seriously the controls feel responsive and the enemies are just forgiving enough. I like the music too. The special effect when you use your soul is really great and it surprised me the first time hehe.
GREAT JOB, keep making games <3
I feel like the controls could be a bit more intuitive - or maybe I was just overwhelmed by the large amount of spells, all with their own buttons. Something like that can work but only if you learn it over the course of a longer game, piece by piece.
I can also confirm that the screenshot @spacemonkey posted is 100% legitimate and definitely not edited. Impressive score, I must say!
The balancing felt a little off to me. The fireball is definitely the way to go because everything else doesn't really deal with the incoming enemies in a sustainable way.
If I could suggest 3 things you could do to finish this game off, I'd say:
- Make more abilities deal damage.
- Choose hotkeys that are next to each other and in a row like Q, W, E, R!
- Give a bit of feedback when the player gets hit and when you use a spell without having enough mana.
Movement feels pretty nice when you actually use the movement spells. :)
All in all pretty nice game!
It took some time to feel confortable with controls; the mix of aiming and moving with mouse cursor and shooting with keyboard was kinda weird at first;I wished I could stop the player from moving with a mouse button or something, as I could not avoid moving toward enemies while aiming to them. I had fun trying different spells but some are quite harder to use with these controls, and a over using is quite punitive in the gameplay. Also, it was a nice idea to affect the game's visuals with the use of sacrifice, but I had no idea of times I was getting hurt.
Cool music and SFX too.
Good job!
Cheers!
Anyway, I like the movement! Feels smooth and movement speed is good. The spells could be more balanced (as everyone just uses fireball) and the key map could be better.
The one thing that bugs me the most is the enemy attack. The hitbox for enemy attack isn't really clear and there aren't any feedback other than your life. Most time i go "Really??" when it hits me. My suggestion would be to make the enemy a bit faster, but they have an attack animation once they reach you. This way, perhaps it's not only avoiding, but you can dodge them? Just a suggestion.
Overall, I really like it, nice game!
Overall awesome game! Really love the idea!! :D