In Magicka, Arrowhead Game Studios have constructed a game where magic feels as powerful as it should, where an exploding magma ball behaves exactly as you would expect it to, yet within an incredibly balanced, robust system of game mechanics. Energy beams shift with slow weight, feeling like barely-contained pandemonium even as their speed makes them less mechanically effective. Crossed rays of magic from different casters explode, in a satisfying Iron Man 2-meets-Voldemort sort of way. It combines eight raw elements into a myriad of spell effects. Fire and water create steam, steam and water create rain, steam and arcane create a beam of steamy death that causes your enemies to swell and explode from the belly outwards while making them a bit damp. Steam, arcane and lightning create a steaming death-beam full of bolts of electricity, damaging damp enemies more severely and so on.
Although inspired by games like World of Warcraft, Magicka isn’t an RPG. You won’t find level-gaining, side-quests or loot in your travels. Grinding or gold farming to improve your character's spell-weave is impossible in Magicka. Instead your brightly-robed little wizard’s life depends on your ability to make strategic choices and pseudo touch-type skilfully. Mastering mechanics seems a nobler goal to me than maintaining players’ interest by rewarding them with an XP/magic item puppy treat every five seconds.
Magicka's ‘story’ (ostensibly based in Norse mythology, though full of the same goblins and trolls as every fantasy tale) is generic, but whimsical and self-conscious. Well-trodden fantasy is normally my least favourite thing, but Magicka gets away with it by embracing mechanics and affectionately referencing other games and pieces of nerd culture. It's not Watchmen level genre deconstruction or even South Park satire but the clumsy references to 300 and The Holy Grail become so heavy handed as to become endearing.
My experiences with the game were mostly smooth but it has a reputation for technical unreliability, includimg characters falling through the map and walking off cliffs in uncontrolled cut-scenes. Personally though, bugs I experienced were outside of gameplay. Often I had to alt-tab out of the game because of a locked-up menu. It would also stutter, slowing down to a few frames each second contrary to low specifications. I assumed this was due to me running the game on a not-particularly beefy Macbook, but apparently it persists even on powerful systems.
Magicka costs $10 US on the Steam digital distribution service which, with the current exchange rate, is a great price for fundless students. If it sounds like your cup of tea I'd recommend downloading it straight away on the Otago network. Except you can't because Steam doesn't work with the current proxy. Someone sort that out. Right now.
4/5
Magika
