2020-12-02 18:47:36 (edited by Aaronlp 2020-12-02 18:51:33)

Hi all,

I've finally finished testing on the demo for the Arcane Duels. The link below will download a zip file. Its just a folder with an exe file and some other needed files you dont need to touch.

The link may take a moment to pop up the download:
http://www.sonusinteractive.co.uk/DemoDownload.html

To recap, you begin your adventure as a duelist and are accepted into the duels. You spend your days training, questing and working to get stronger and get better equipment etc. You get more famous and make impactful decisions through out the game.

The controls are W A S D keys for navigating around, use space to select things and use A and D to go in and out of sub menus.
Press A on the over menu to hear your gold and how many days until your next duel.

There are of course some parts of the game that still need work, this is to show off the concept. Music has been limited to avoid license issues.

I'll be interested to see what people think of the parts of the game where you actually walk around, as I've tried a method of having the game tell you what is in front of you, but it plays the TTS on the object, so its louder when you are closer. Hopefully that works well but I'll let you decide.

I have done a lot of testing, but please let me know if you find any issues.

I'm looking forward to seeing what you all think, I'm sure this will only be the first draft of the game. There is a difficulty setting but as its only the beginning of the game, its not too difficult anyway.

Also if you want to follow the progress of the game, I update the twitter account pretty frequently at
https://twitter.com/TheArcaneDuels or @TheArcaneDuels.

2020-12-02 19:06:19

awesome, I'll be checking this out

2020-12-02 19:18:45

@Aaronlp
Lets get in contact, I can help you with getting free high quality music with licensing that allows commercial usage.
Email: [email protected]
Skype: @superfreq2
Discord: Superfreq #2817
Reddit: superfreq2

2020-12-02 19:31:52

ah sorry, it says the archive is  corrupt when I try to extract the zip...

2020-12-02 19:33:27

mine too. sad

Hail, Daughter of Hatred. Creator of Sanctuary. Hail...Lilith.

2020-12-02 19:34:49

Yeah, same as @4

2020-12-02 19:53:40

Technology is determined to make me look bad. sorry guys.
looks like it may have not uploaded correctly.
Its re-uploading now, estimated time 11 minutes.

2020-12-02 20:01:36

me to got this problem

2020-12-02 20:09:14

Ok, thats now re-uploaded and the file size is bigger. its actually about 500mb because of the dependancies from the game tool I use. So that hopefully should work. let me know, sorry again about this.

2020-12-02 20:09:47

file corrumpted

2020-12-02 21:27:02

Diego I'm pretty sure you msut have downloaded the older corrupt version since you posted 30 seconds after me. I'm just mentioning that because your post is after mine that says I fixed it.
Can anyone confirm that it is now working? or do I still need to look into it?
Thanks a lot in advance. I would love to get it released and sorted today if possible.

2020-12-02 22:22:29

work
thanks

2020-12-02 23:45:50

Hey is there a way to save your game? I don't currently see one.

Deep in the human unconscious is a pervasive need for a logical universe that makes sense. But the real universe is always one step beyond logic.

2020-12-02 23:50:59

Not yet Stewie. The full game of course will have a save and load feature.
The demo only lasts for a few days anyway.

2020-12-03 00:10:09 (edited by stewie 2020-12-03 00:10:33)

So I like this so far, I can tell it has a lot of potential. right now though the navigation in the minnygame areas (like the quests) feels extremely clunky. A lot of the time I can't tell how fast I'm actually turning or where I generally am. I like how it tells you what is in front of you though. I just got completely stuck at the farm because I couldn't side step or find any openings.

There also appears to be a bug with the menu that lists your spell xp. I did air training and no matter how many times I did the menu showed me having 0 air xp.

Deep in the human unconscious is a pervasive need for a logical universe that makes sense. But the real universe is always one step beyond logic.

2020-12-03 00:24:02

So, I've played around with the demo, and a couple suggestions and critiques.


1. Walking around. The TTS solution for approaching obstacles is a bit intrusive. Why not use bird or animal sounds for trees and thickets, for example? It would add to the immersion of the game an make it easier to focus on what's really important.

2. The story. It's not bad, but will you be editing it for grammar mistakes, etc.? Maybe get prfessional editing on it? I would be willing to help in this regard for editing, proofreading and so forth.

Hopefullym you can get voice actors for the game at some point; this has a lot of potential. Keep up the good work, and be encouraged. I played as Taltos smile

When the wandering fire strikes the heart of stone, will you follow? Will you take ... the longest road?
Guy Gavriel Kay

discord: tayo134

2020-12-03 00:47:48

Taltos, the archmage of fiery storm here. I must congratulate you. This is better than any game i've seen like in half a year or more. Keep it up! The orphan quest left me stumbling around in the woods but overall a good demo. A suggestion though. In the full game will you add descriptions for your enemies? Would be good to know how they look like, where they came from and such before the duel.

Hail, Daughter of Hatred. Creator of Sanctuary. Hail...Lilith.

2020-12-03 01:07:17

I like the demo so far. It has a lot of potential. I got a code error when i was doing the orphan quest. Here is what it said:
___________________________________________
############################################################################################
ERROR in
action number 1
of Create Event
for object FnF_DC_Fail:

Variable FnF_DC_Fail.Snd_DC_Failed(101042, -2147483648) not set before reading it.
at gml_Object_FnF_DC_Fail_Create_0
############################################################################################
gml_Object_FnF_DC_Fail_Create_0 (line -1)
gml_Object_QuestController_Orphan_CarerDialog_KeyPress_32 (line -1)

2020-12-03 01:17:33

Oh bugger. I forgot about the xp bug. You can also view your exp in the player menu. That one works. I forgot the exp menu in the spell learning menu was broken. I copied it in there so you didn't have to go all the way to the player menu. Ill be sure to fix that.

Definitly sounds like navigation needs a bit of work. The reason I didnt use a sound for every object is because it starts sounding extremely busy. And also some objects just don't make sounds. But I did add little sounds just for ambience. Such as birds and squirrels rustling around in certain areas. Maybe they don't stand out enough.

I also think descriptions for opponents is a good idea. I will find somewhere to include that. I was also thinking having an option to use gold to spy on your next opponent. So you can learn their behaviours and what spells they know and can prepare properly

Some opponents fidget more than others and more randomly. Some dodge more than use barriers. Some use a lot of buffs or debuffs etc.ir prefer one type of element.

Really appreciate the responses. It will help make the game better. Thank you all so much.

2020-12-03 01:20:50

Sorry computer Gamer. I knew I would miss a bug somewhere. Looks like you failed a charisma challenge or something like that and for some reason the fail sound effect messed up. Ill look into that. I've took a snap shot of the error. Thank you.

2020-12-03 02:40:30 (edited by stewie 2020-12-03 02:40:45)

I think a skip cutscene option would also be a good idea, I'm currently playing on normal difficulty and have to sit through everything again.

Deep in the human unconscious is a pervasive need for a logical universe that makes sense. But the real universe is always one step beyond logic.

2020-12-03 03:56:49

@20, no problem. I tried to do a charisma challenge in the orphen quest and that error code was what i got. I am hapy to report any bug. I feel the tts is a bit quiet sometimes. or it could be the Music being loud. I would like a option to  increase or decrease the volume. I didn't get too far into the demo, but  just noted that bug. I am not good at dodging attacks during the first duel in the tutorial. I need to be better at that. But the game is definitely interesting and I Believe it has great ptential. I will try it out more later.

2020-12-03 04:27:40

This game has great potential. @Aaronlp: Yeah, I'd almost prefer a busy audio environment over this tts-based navigation system. The farm quest is almost unplaybale with the fence/haybail navigation concept, and with the same tts saying this way. And, for the record, the this way was centered perfectly in the stereo field.
Other than that, the game is pretty good.

2020-12-03 07:02:52

@Aaronlp
So as others have said this is a pretty solid framework and I like the mechanics for the most part, but it definitely needs work.


I think that foremost menu navigation needs to be more consistent and more interactive.  Maybe play a sound for when a menu has opened or when you've moved to another one, and rather than making certain things launch with "D", always try to use "space".
The sounds could use allot of work.  If you are going with a retro feel that's one thing but some of them are just too loud, too long or too confusing.  I can definitely assist with this even if it's just finding good legal free/low cost resources for commercial games.
Having a more common alternate/additional keyset for navigation (up down left right enter) for those more used to it would make things easier, but at the least having a quick key guide and an interruptible message on game open giving the basic menu commands would help allot.
Being able to speed up the speech on demand would be very helpful, I just don't know how much this would mess up timings.  If that isn't possible, I still think that changing it for everyone might be a good idea because I think most of us can still easily understand it at at least half again the current rate.
A tutorial showing how the average minigame, dual, and quest works would be pretty useful I think as they are all different.


In duals, I wasn't properly able to center the grizzly bear no matter how many times I tried (or maybe the spell hit sound just wasn't obvious?) and I somehow managed to win one just by blocking a single time.
The walls of the fighting area don't seem to make an impact sound and incoming spells only seem to pan at the last second (or maybe panning just updates slowly when you move?) so it can feel like you aren't really dodging iti.
It seems like "W" in duals does something?  But I can't figure out what.  I mean having a range mehcanic where you'd have to get closer for some spells would be cool but it doesn't sound like walking.


Navigation in quests is pretty tricky.  Some of the terrain step sounds are really quiet while others are really loud, and I'd much prefer to only hear the obstacles when I walk into them manually rather than any time my character is in contact with one.


In minigames, a learn game sounds option would be very useful, or just something integrated into the normal instructions.  Some of the games are also super simplistic and just not fun for grinding.
I noticed as well that with the fire turret, you don't indicate when a beast is coming from behind with say, a lower pitch, so sometimes you'll hear a beast on the right but turning towards it just moves you further away because it's actually behind you.
Hearing "Beast, Beast, Beast, Beast" is also kinda redundant considering it's already roaring in your face, and I don't even think that game needs a targeting lock especially in difficulty modes other than easy.
I also never gained XP even though I was told I had been, as when checking the experience menu the spells all said 0.  And I find the points VS XP reward thing at the end of minigames kinda confusing.


I'm sure I'll discover more but that's what I've got for now.

2020-12-03 09:50:15 (edited by arceus 2020-12-03 09:50:44)

hey there, Aaronlp. I didn't had time to play the demo at the fullest yet, but I  spent 3 minutes in a school break to see how things were going. I was a little bit confused since the only minigame I could try was the air training one. how can I know when i'm staying in the target practice area? I was pressing space constantly, yet i got a 0 score at the end of the minigame, and never pressed space when the gusts of wind were around.
can you explain it in a little more detail, please?

"Words can light fires in the minds of men. Words can wring tears from the hardest hearts. There are seven words that will make a person love you. There are ten words that will break a strong man's will. But a word is nothing but a painting of a fire. A name is the fire itself."