Worlds of Magic - First Impression @ Space Sector

Space Sector's Keith Turner posted a new preview of the Early Access version of Worlds of Magic that gives his first impression of the game.

I spent a few hours with Worlds of Magic this weekend in order to provide some brief first impressions to those who may be wondering about the state of the game as it stands “right now”. It is important to keep in mind that the “right now” status of a freshly launched Early Access game is elusive, and daily updates and changes can resolve or create issues that ultimately lead to a different experience than I have had.

Worlds of Magic, more than any other title I’ve played in recent years, feels like a game from my past. More specifically, it has a very similar feel to Microprose’s classic, Master of Magic. This should come as no surprise, given their stated goal to be a true spiritual successor. While bringing this beloved game back to life is in many ways a positive thing, this reunion isn’t without its negatives. In some aspects, I think this is by design, but in others, I am almost certain it is because the game is still in a late alpha stage. I’ll be comparing Worlds of Magic and Master of Magic a lot, for reasons that will soon become very obvious, so I’ll be using the abbreviations WoM and MoM respectively throughout this impressions piece.

Worlds of Magic does a great job at recreating the Master of Magic sorcerer lord creation system. Aside from the graphical enhancements and UI changes, the system is almost identical. When creating a custom lord, you will select a portrait from one of the existing lords, as you do in MoM. You will then divide a set number of points between your desired skills, called disciplines in WoM, and your spell spheres. You then proceed to select your starting spells dependent on the points you spent in each spell sphere. While all of this sounds mechanically identical to MoM, there are some key differences primarily having to do with how magic is designed.