We’re excited to bring some great new features to Archmage Rises! We’ve worked hard to plumb in the new systems, and create a bit of content for them. Hopefully this build will give a better idea of what the final game will be like, but there is still plenty more to come!

Watch this video update to see the new version:

New Features/Additions

Mage Tower – after buying or persuading a noble for land, you can build your own mage tower. Limited blocks, rooms, roofs, and decorations for now. More content to come.
Save / Continue game – you no longer have to play a whole game in a single sitting! Save the game whenever you quit and continue from the title screen. If you die, your save file is deleted and you must start a new life.
Better Dungeons – better map generation, better object placement, a few new rooms, easier skill checks, some new artwork. More content to come.
Twenty Sided Dice (d20s) – behind the scenes it was using d20 rolls to determine success/fail, now we show you the actual roll. And the rolls are real and physics based. Currently used in skill checks and crafting, more to come. Playing with actual dice will be an optional feature for those who just want RNG.
Crafting – We’ve put in a basic crafting system for potion making. Successes level up skills making it easier to craft in the future. Rolling a 20 is a critical success resulting in 2 potions for one herb instead of just 1.
Basic economy and trading - The dynamic economy (trading with merchants) isn’t done yet, but we decided to release it anyway because it is needed for the mage tower features. 18 trade goods are simulated in the economy with pricing based on supply and demand.
Draft Animals – The amount of trade goods you can carry at any given time is determined by the total strength of you and your draft animals (carts are assumed). Right now only the monthly cost and strength matter: speed and defense ability will matter soon. Ability to name your own animals still to come.
Treasury – All monthly expenses are paid from your treasury. This is like asking your neighbor or employee to pay your bill in your absence. If your treasury has insufficient funds you go to debtor’s prison (currently game ending, but won’t be in the future).
Storage – You can now store items in your mage tower, and manage what you carry. Build storage rooms to increase capacity. More depth coming to this in the future.
Buffs moved – we moved all buffs (good and bad) to be at the bottom of the screen and show in chronological order. Mouse over them to see current effect.

Known Issues

Mac – saving and loading isn’t working, we’re investigating
No loading screens between transitions, it just hangs, but it does actually load the next scene
Distribution of buildings in towns is still not right, may get doubles of the same building, distribution of all building types still not right, and based on randomness some may be too rare in any given game
When rolling dice, sometimes reports a value different than what you see due to it stopping on an angle. You will get more success and failures than you should, balancing out even. Will fix in the next major version, it’s fairly rare but does happen.
On Mac or 16:10 screen resolutions the dungeon east/west navigation areas are hard to see, but just put the mouse there and click, it does work

How To Get the Build

Don't see Archmage Rises on steam? That's because these pre-release versions are only available to those who pre-order. If you would like to play the game today and get involved in development, you can place your pre-order here.

Next Build

Build 10 coming end of Jan. This one will be a content build fleshing out many of the systems we already have in place. More info on what it contains will be posted after Christmas.

Let us know in the steam discussions what you guys think of this build!

Merry Christmas everyone and watch out for Robot Santa!