Magister Mayhem

This project is the culmination of over a year's part time work implementing a first person magic based shooter in Unreal Engine 5 using the Gameplay Ability System (GAS). It's still in an incredibly early state but I'm really happy with how the abilities have turned out and how the frameworks I've developed will be easily scalable.

The general concept of this game is that you play as a resurrected lich who uses fire based magic to defeat enemies. This early proof of concept is meant to showcase the use of GAS, some simple UI work, a save/load system, and basic enemy logic. My intent is to expand on the current framework to refine the spells available, add more enemies and AI decisions they can make, and implement a simple rogue-like progression system. Currently the plan is to have this game play as a first person shooter rogue-like where the player will periodically be given choices / upgrades to refine their current run. A run would end if the player dies or defeats all levels.

I'll note up front that this project is very early stages so is likely to have a LOT of bugs. If you encounter any game-breaking crashes or strange behavior please feel free to leave a comment indicating what happened and what you were doing when it happened. I intend to continue working on this project if there's general interest in seeing it completed, with the eventual goal of releasing a full version at some point.

Controls:

WASD - Movement
Space - Jump
LMB - Primary Attack
RMB - Utility Skill
1-4 Keys - Activate spells - NOTE: For abilities that start a channeling animation you MUST press the activation key again to confirm casting it!
Z - Open/Close Curio Menu

Prototype Feedback Survey:

Given the level of work put into getting this small prototype realized, I'd like to gauge general interest to see if I should continue developing and refining this idea. I would GREATLY appreciate any feedback provided through the following survey:

Magister Mayhem Prototype Feedback

Main Features:

• Spell Loot System - Rather than unlocking spells in a tree, they become loot-able items similar to a deck building game.
• Spell Levelling System - Spells will automatically level up as your use them to destroy your foes.
• Perk System - Unlockable passive perks that dramatically alter playthroughs.
• Rogue-Like Dungeon Selection System - Choose your own path through the dungeon, with each area having certain bonuses or maluses. Note - this is still in early stages and is simply a level selector at the moment
• Deckbuilding mini-game - Your perks double as cards in a deck battling mini game representing the growing threat of the dungeon. Gamble your active perks to negate powerful bonuses enemies will receive!

v0.12 Known Issues:

• MAJOR - The deckbuilding minigame currently uses debug statements to show cards health and damage. The UI has not been fully implemented to reflect this so expect this layer to be clunky. In general this layer is very early stages and more a proof of concept than a fully fleshed out system.
• Melee enemies occasionally register multiple 'hits' per attack, causing far more damage than should be.
• Some fire spells have their costs set to zero - enjoy blowing things up infinitely!
• MAJOR - The tutorial level does have a bug where if you click anywhere instead of pressing 'Z' as prompted you will have to alt-F4 to restart the game.
• Some skills are not fully optimized so you will likely see frame drops.