Magium [WIP] ---

Off-Topic Other Interactive Fiction
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Edit: Magium is now available on both Google Play and iOS App store. The link for iOS is: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/magium-text-adventure-cyoa/id1229498009 . The link for the Play Store is: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.magiumgames.magium .

Magium is a text-based choose your own adventure game (CYOA) with RPG
elements where you play as an ordinary guy trying to win a Hunger
Game-esque tournament against the strongest mages in the world, in order
to use the prize to become a mage yourself.

The tournament takes place on a continent where someone tried to
create a few utopias, but failed, and you will get to see the downfall
of these utopias, Bioshock style. You can also choose to intervene, and
save these cities from destruction.

Besides the traditional choice making, you also have stats you can
level up, and there are different checks in the game to see if you have
the necessary level to take a certain action. For example, if your
ancient languages level is high enough, you can understand when the
animals or monsters speak.

There are also nine save game slots, and the game autosaves regularly
at the beginning of each chapter, so you don’t have to start all over
after each death.

The game is a work in progress, and I just uploaded the 10th chapter,
which brings the story to a total of 147k words, so far. There will be
one more chapter after this one to end the first book and at least two
more books of the same length before the story ends.

The game can be played here: http://magium-game.com/play/

The site doesn’t really work on mobile, but I also have an apk
version for android users, which you can download from this link: https://www.dropbox.com/s/p7zg47c9rotz7mb/magium%20chapter%2010.apk?dl=1

If you don’t feel like downloading an apk that isn’t on an online
store, the game will be uploaded on Google Play once I finish writing
the first book. You’ll be able to play the first book for free with ads,
or pay 3 dollars to remove them in the first book. The next book will
also be unlockable for free if you complete enough achievements, or it
will get unlocked immediately if you remove the ads from the first book.

Enjoy!

17 Likes
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i really like this its fun

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Glad you like it so far!

I just uploaded the apk version, for those that couldn’t play on the site. You can download it at this link: https://www.dropbox.com/s/esl2fa5ib7mgk2t/magium%20chapter%207.apk?dl=0

Have fun!

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Hey I really would love to play your demo/game however I have an IPhone so I can’t play it or download it, I can’t play it on your site thing because it says I need canvas and safari doesn’t support cavnas I’ll try chrome but it’s upsetting that I won’t be able to view this game because it sounds alsom. Sorry for the punctuation erors I’m writing this super fast.

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@adamthecowdog

Yeah, sorry about that. :sweat:

There are several problems because of which I cannot afford to develop this for iOS right now. One is that Apple charges annual 100 dollar fees unlike Google that only charges a one time 25 dollar fee. Also, unlike Google who only charges this fee when you want to upload the game to their store, Apple charges you even before you can test a build of your game to see if it works. On top of all that, from what I’ve read, I think I also need a Mac in order to compile the code (which I don’t have).

If you want, we can make a few tests and see if maybe we can get the html5 version working on your IPhone. I doubt the game will ever work on Safari, but there may be a chance with Chrome.

Right now I’m seeing 3 main problems with how the html5 version of the game translates to mobile (at least for android, since I don’t have an iOS mobile device to test on):

  1. Unlike the PC, where you get to pull down a scrollbar or use the mouse scroll button to scroll down, on the mobile you need to drag down the screen, which is a problem, because if you try to drag and drop on top of the text, the focus gets taken by the html5 app and not the website, and so, the website doesn’t scroll down. A way around this that I’ve found is to try to scroll down or up by dragging the screen from the far left side of the screen, since there’s a little white stripe that isn’t part of my html5 game’s screen. I tested this on three android devices, so I’m guessing it should work on the IPhone as well.

  2. The button presses don’t seem to be detected properly every time. To get around this, I noticed it helps to keep pressing the button for a longer time, until it turns light gray. I also noticed that for some reason, the detection hitbox does not always match the full size of the buttons. If you find that you keep pressing on a button and it does not turn light gray, try to click on a different area of it, and it might just do the trick.

  3. Finally, the problem that’s giving me the most trouble is the fact that the html5 app does not resize at all for mobile devices. Since I’m working with a game engine to make this, I don’t really have direct control over these sorts of things, but at first I figured it wouldn’t be a problem since I could export the game freely to both iOS and Android. That was before I found out about Apple’s ridiculous restrictions and prices for iOS developers. Since I definitely won’t be developing Magium for iOS [Edit: As of 9 May 2017, Magium is now available on the iOS App Store] until I know I can make at least some money out of this, all I can do for now in terms of html5 is to try and upload the game in different resolutions, and see if I can get one to fit your screen.

I made a tab on the site called “Experimental mode(for mobile)” which has the width 640 instead of the original 1024. If you turn your phone horizontally, it might fit in. If not, I’m going to need some information from you. First I’ll want to know if the version of Magium from the “Experimental mode” tab fits better on your screen than the one from the “Play game” tab. Second, I’m going to want to know if on the “Experimental Mode” tab you can see a “LALALALA” in text just above the game. I made that message to make sure that the mobile device is properly loading the latest html and not the old one. Some of my devices refuse to display the “LALALALA” even after deleting the cookies and cache and it’s driving me crazy :rage:.

One last thing, in case we ever get this to work, there will be a certain screen on the 3rd chapter where if you ask the question “Why not?” you will get a screen where there’s a large gap between the upper and lower halves of the text. Just ignore it and keep reading. There is no text missing, it’s just an arrangement issue that came from the resizing I did for this experimental version of the game that I was too lazy to fix.

If you’re still down for giving this game a try after reading this wall of text, then please post a reply to this thread! :grin:

1 Like
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I finished a playthrough and have really enjoyed it.

Right off the bat, there seemed to be no continuity issues or contextual conflicts.

Usually, the fact that I could not customize my MC would not bother me but in this story it did. I think it bothered me because your story does a very fine job of weaving different types of magic users together in a believable and intriguing way.

I don’t mind being a lessathi What I would have enjoyed was being a female, even if this means you must re-write the first companion encounter. I also feel it could lead to a greater bond forming between the MC and Kate .

I do hope you continue your project and I thank you for sharing it with me.

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The thing is that in most choice games you can get away with switching genders by just changing a few pronouns, but for this game, it would have required a great deal more effort on my part, since most characters take Barry’s gender into account when they interact with him.

There would be many scenes that would have to be completely rewritten, and even the basic premise of the story would have to change.

There were only two reasons why Barry thought he might actually have a chance in the tournament. Spoilers incoming.

[spoiler] One of them was the stats device. The other was the fact that he thought he could bluff his way through the tournament by claiming he is a stillwater. Since the fact that everyone assumes women can’t be mages is a very important plot point, no one would have believed Barrina that she was a stillwater, and she would have known this before joining the tournament, so she likely wouldn’t have had the guts to go through with it. Technically, I could have made it so that people know about female stillwaters, which would be an exception to the rule, but that would have impacted some plot relevant stuff I’m planning for the second book.

It’s not just the first encounter that would have to be changed. Daren always treats Barry like a guy, in the way he speaks, in the way he acts, in the way he makes fun of him. With Barrina, he would try to act a lot more gallantly, and he would abstain himself from most of his sarcastic remarks. (“What’s that? I know that sound. Did you bring a fortune teller’s trinket with you, Barry? Are you planning to tell us our futures?”)

Furthermore, there would likely also be other characters that would react differently to him. Off the top of my head, Cutthroat Dave would most definitely take advantage of every situation to make some rude and sexist remark about Barrina joining the tournament.

Another problem I’d have is all of Daren’s commentary related to Barry only having saved Kate because he wanted to hit on her. I’d either have to remove all of that commentary altogether, or make them both bisexuals/lesbians. If I started including lesbians and bisexuals, the next thing I know, people will start getting upset because transexuals, asexuals, gender fluids or some other category I am unaware of is misrepresented in my game. Since this is not a subject I’m very familiar with, I’d rather avoid it completely than shoehorn it in and make it feel forced.

So basically, I agree with you that adding an MC female option would have probably made the story more interesting, but I already feel like I’ve committed myself to a lot of work with a story this long that also has a stat system, and I feared that branching in two like that from the very beginning would mean biting off a little more than I could chew. [/spoiler]

I hope that you liked the story enough to be able to continue reading despite these limitations. I for one am not planning to stop writing on it anytime soon. :grin:

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No worries there - there is still a lot to discuss but not within the scope of the game, only outside. We can go there if you want but it would be a tangent to your thread’s purpose and it would be up to you.

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Hey your website lags for me, and it does no work on chrome on my phone. All I am able to see with the experamenal mode is lalala and then the message that says your browser does not have Canvas.

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Hmm… Technically both Chrome and Safari should have canvas support, as long as you have the latest versions. But if it’s a limitation of your phone, then I don’t know if there’s anything I can do about it.

I was hoping that we could find some workarounds for the individual bugs, but if it doesn’t even start then we can’t really move forward.

From what I see, you need to have iOS higher than 6.0. Then for Safari you need either of these versions: 8.4, 9.2, 9.3 . And for Chrome you’d need any version from 45 to 51. The only thing I can still suggest is to try updating your Safari browser(if you haven’t already) and to also try Firefox. Other than that, I don’t really have any other ideas. :confused:

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No update yet.

Just wanted to give a heads up that starting with the next chapter, the game will be entering closed beta, so if you want to keep reading the WIP before it’s released on Google Play, please leave a message in this thread or give me a PM and I’ll give you a code when I update the chapter.

Since Flower’s introductory chapter is getting a little longer than I initially estimated, I’ll probably be splitting this chapter into two separate chapters, so there will be 3 more chapters until the first book is concluded. I’m still thinking whether to upload the two following chapters one by one or if I should upload them both at the same time once I’ve finished them. I’ll think this over once I’ve finished the first chapter with Flower and Petal.

If you don’t feel like helping out with testing, the first book should be available on Google Play by the end of march, and on the website a few weeks after that. It’ll be free to play, with ads, but in order to unlock the next book, you’ll need to get 80% of the achievements, or buy the first book for 2 dollars(which removes ads for the first book, but not for the second).

If you want to help out with testing, then any kind of input you can give is more than welcome. By this I mean either spelling mistakes, grammar or expressions that seem off to you, issues you have with text formatting, plot inconsistencies, bugs that prevent you from finishing the game, general writing advice, or anything else that comes to your mind.

Notable examples of very useful such feedback I’ve received from this forum were how @stsword told me about a scene where the MC tried to pick up a log from the ground even when he didn’t have a single point in the strength stat, or about the fact that the stat device wasn’t 100% explained at the beginning and how that could create confusions between the stat booster and a traditional D&D stat system.

I’ve also received some useful general writing advice, notably from @BabbleYaggle who brought to my attention the fact that I have a habit of skipping on important descriptions, especially when it comes to the environment, and how that could cause the reader to make wrong assumptions. I’ve tried to correct that, since I started working on this game.

Also, if you’ve already found a bug or something that feels off to you in the game, please let me know.

1 Like
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I would love to have a link

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Alright, glad to have you on board!

I’ll send you the code once I’ve finished the chapter. (I’m currently at 6k words)

The link will remain the same as before. You’re just going to need to enter a code to unlock the 8th chapter.

1 Like
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I can’t download the apk, can you give me a link with auto download?

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Here it is: https://www.dropbox.com/s/esl2fa5ib7mgk2t/magium%20chapter%207.apk?dl=1

1 Like
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I truly like how the MC(with the right stats) can be a badass jokester.:joy:

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Yeah, I really am having a lot of fun writing those smart-ass responses of his. :grin:

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wow… you have my support when you sell it, i love how you have writed the fighting scenes :smile:

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Thanks! I try to make each battle as interesting as I can, while also using my gaming experience to make all of the skills and spells as balanced as possible. :smile:

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@Nemeean_lion if you dont mind me asking, wich program do you use to make this gameÂż?