Mage in Exile by Nikolay Zapolnov
You were one of the powerful mages in the Noble Order of The Duck, but you have been exiled. Now you are seeking revenge. You will have to fight flesh-eating flowers, angry villagers, strong soldiers and powerful mages to get back what is yours. But you start with nothing. Will you be able to return your old powers?
The game belongs to the beat-em-up genre. Controls are W-S-A-D or arrow keys, Spacebar or MouseLeftButton to shoot, 'U' to open the inventory. Don't forget to craft health potions and mana elixirs in the Tower to use them during battles!
Unfortunately we didn't have time to put sound into the game. And balance is quite off... We hope you will still enjoy the game! We definitely do!
Here are some screenshots:


| Youtube | https://www.dropbox.com/s/2bk4cx723vb3d6c/MageInExile.zip?dl=1 |
| Youtube | https://zapolnov.github.io/ld45_webgl/index.html |
| Original URL | https://ldjam.com/events/ludum-dare/45/mage-in-exile |
Ratings
| Overall | 486th | 3.525⭐ | 62🧑⚖️ |
| Fun | 462th | 3.392⭐ | 62🧑⚖️ |
| Innovation | 880th | 2.75⭐ | 60🧑⚖️ |
| Theme | 244th | 3.75⭐ | 62🧑⚖️ |
| Graphics | 492th | 3.633⭐ | 62🧑⚖️ |
| Humor | 362th | 3.109⭐ | 57🧑⚖️ |
| Mood | 627th | 3.264⭐ | 57🧑⚖️ |
| Given | 62🗳️ | 60🗨️ |
Suggestions:
- Move the "use item" button somewhere else than U! It's impossible to reach while wsad-ing around trying to survive! Having a 'quick action' belt would probably fix this (e.g. place items and then click 1 or 2 to use)
- Balancing/grinding. Let the player get somehow better, aside from by gathering more health potions (since they're so hard to use right now). E.g. give them better spells or level ups or somesuch. Right now the difference in difficulty between lvl 1 and 2 is really harsh.
- Sounds! Even just some music.
- Does "upgrading the tower" actually do anything? Not sure.
Otherwise, really well done!
@Tannimun Yeah, running for life proves to be useful. I think that's the only way to actually complete the game (Yes, you can beat it if you try hard).
I loved the intro, it was very funny and it reminded me of my greatest moments of my childhood when being bullyied so good memories <3
The rest of the game was pretty classic but well executed.
Sadly it lacked music and we also lacked another spell to do AoE.
Kiss
The slight delay in attacking took a bit to get used to, though once you figure out each enemy it is quite easy but still enough of a challenge to keep it interesting.
I had way more stuff than I needed. I barely ended up using anything at all.
Having to click for the dialogue was annoying.
The levels were hard at first. But once you figured out how to inch forward to not trigger multiple enemies at once and using hit and run from there, made it nearly too easy. So balancing is needed, but that is expected from an LD game :)
Many people had a similar interpretation of the theme as you guys, but I love how you introduced it in the game, makeing this extra intro scene really makes it stand out from those simmilar interpretations. Good job.
The game did crash for me playing the html5 version, just as the lvl restarted after dying:
index.html:104 OOM
printErr @ index.html:104
LD45.js:1 Uncaught abort(OOM). Build with -s ASSERTIONS=1 for more info.
Honestly I can't find much to really give feedback on beyond movement speed, which is slow for my taste but probably appropriate for the type of combat you're going for. I also would have liked the fireball to either spawn instantly, or at least spawn in the direction I clicked (It seems to follow my movement, so I can't "look away" during the cast period). Again, this might be an intentional and potentially correct choice for this game though.
The other piece of feedback would be to just get more playtesting data. Something I started doing in recent jams is to wrangle random friends to just play it at various states to get raw feedback on the mechanics and difficulty. It's been a positive force on our entries, and something that doesn't really burn much time.
Overall really solid entry; great work!
Definitely fun. I wonder, though - is it possible to get stronger fireballs or fireballs that shoot faster? Like, when I stepped into the graveyard, I died immediately and got the impression I'd need to come back stronger. But then after doing the forest and attempting the village several times, it doesn't seem like you do get stronger - you just have more healing items. Is that right?
Indeed game has some balance problems. Guards were added to the game pretty close to the end of the jam and they are overpowered. Currently the only reasonable strategy is to run away from them, but that wasn't intended.
We planned to have weapons upgrade but didn't have time to put it in. Still there is some progression: you get a bit stronger after completing each level. But compared to the overpowered enemies this is negligible.
Its good to hear that even unbalanced game was fun to play for you :)
Insane amount of gameplay embedded in this 72 hours game, no weird bugs or anything, just a game that works, like it!
Insane amount of gameplay embedded in this 72 hours game, no weird bugs or anything, just a game that works, like it!