Mustic Dungeons is now available

Mystic Dungeons is now available for download on the App Store and Google Play.

After working on this game on and off for the last two years, I have decided that I should publicly release what I have done so far. In order to release it now, I removed multiplayer and sound effects because those features were only partially complete. Additionally, some features that I planned to implement, such as an item enhancement system and difficulty scaling of infinite dungeons, have been delayed for a future release. I would also like to add additional content: more spells, dungeons, monsters, weapons, etc.

If you enjoy the game, please leave a positive rating and review to help motivate me to continue developing it.

Thanks,
Xerse

Mystic Clicker. What the what?!

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Mystic Clicker is live on the App Store and Google Play. So what is it, and why did I make it?

Mystic Clicker started out as a simple app to test implementing in-app purchases and ads. The idea was simple: tap to earn coins, spend coins to pull cards, use new cards to get more coins, rinse, repeat.

Then I developed a prototype and started playtesting it with my children and some friends. Soon the simple idea evolved into a surprisingly fun game despite being primarily a satire on the current state of free-to-play mobile games.

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Progress Update: Mystic Dungeons

I was aiming to make a beta version available before the end of 2015, but I didn’t quite make it.

When I submitted Rise of Heroes to Google Play in December, it was rejected because of the game’s name. Apparently Rise of Heroes was released near the end of last year.

Therefore, the new 3D mobile version of Rise of Heroes will instead be named Mystic Dungeons.

I’m now going through the processes of submitting the app to Google Play and the iTunes App Store to start a beta test on these two platforms.

I’m making progress towards completing and releasing this game. My progress is slower than anticipated, but I am still making progress!

Here’s a screenshot showing some of the UI updates that have been added recently:

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Rise of Heroes: the origins of Mystic Dungeons

I first encounted www.byond.com (Build Your Own Net Dream) while searching for a way to play Dragon Warrior on my computer. I found a byond game called Dragon Warrior Online and started playing around with it and a few other games on byond.

In 2003, I took a Computer Science class using C++. The Dream Maker program that came with byond had a C-scripting language that was very similar to what I learned in my class so I started messing around with it.

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Rise of Heroes started out around June 2003 as a conglomeration of all the tutorials and demos that I was playing with. I learned about creating mobs and having them interact. I created test graphics (green slime) and began forming simple levels.

I found some graphics and started making more complicated levels. I added shopkeepers, spells, and inventory. Everything I added was based on using some demo or tutorial. Almost all of the gameplay mechanics were finalized with only the first town and noob cave in place.

The gameplay was fun. It was fast-paced. It was enjoyable to run around attacking enemies, casting spells, gaining levels, and finding items. More and more people began to join the game and demanded more content.

So I added a forest and uploaded a new version. Then all the players would romp around there while I frantically pieced together more content: another town, more forest, a graveyard, a crypt, more spells, more items.

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And thus it continued. Each day, I would add new areas and the avid players would then grind away on those areas, leveling their characters and spells, as well as hunting down those elusive unique items with cool icons and powerful abilities.

As I created more and more content, I received help from the players. Many people sent me new icons for monsters and weapons. A buddy of mine created quite a bit of music for the game. I kept adding more and more content all the way up to the fourth town. I also finally published the game to the public hub at byond.

It was now about September 2003 and school was starting again. I was busy with school and work and had little time to update Rise of Heroes. It was hard to find a permanent server host for the game. Development came to a halt.

…or so I thought.

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In 2004, I searched for Rise of Heroes to see if anyone was still playing it. To my surprise, it was still being played. I decided to post the source code so that others could continue the game where I left off. On October 23, 2004, I commented much of my code and then posted the entire source code and graphics as a demo so that anyone could download it, learn from it, modify it, continue it, or do whatever else they wanted with it.

After I posted the source code, I spent a few days replaying the game. Several players had characters that were nearly level 200 and wanted more content. I set up a final area (Pandemonium), which could be reached by walking into the Kishkan well after hitting level 100. I also added an ultimate shield, named after the first person that reached level 200. (During the course of development of the game, I had added several unique items named after my best players.) These were the final additions I made to the game and are in version 7 available for download from the hub page (aka the “original” Rise of Heroes), but are not contained in the available source code and the subsequent variations made by others.

Some gripes about free mobile games

Currently, most free mobile games are addictive time-wasters without very much fun gameplay. The mobile app marketplaces have many games with “social” features like sending points to friends or “visiting” them, but few mobile games have actual multiplayer features that enable you to play the game with your friends concurrently. Additionally, many mobile games stop your gameplay with “energy” or timers. The mobile game market needs better games!

Sending social points in Summoners War

Sending social points in Summoners War

Visiting friends in SimCity: BuildIt

Visiting friends in SimCity: BuildIt

Out of energy in Heavenstrike Rivals

Out of energy in Heavenstrike Rivals

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