I’ll never understand why all these wizard fellas don’t just relax at home and work on their magical mojo, instead of traversing the lands in search of danger and adventure – that’s the route I would have taken for sure. But ‘safety’ is not in Cloaks and Spells‘ dictionary, as you’ll have to find a way past demonic beings and treacherous traps, aided by a unique magic system.
Best as I can tell, since the game doesn’t really reveal anything, you play as a hooded wizard on a journey through dangerous lands. You find yourself trapped in a dungeon, where the first puzzle is immediately made apparent – a simple one, but its secondary purpose is to introduce the controls. After escaping from your cell, things get much more complicated than that silly pressure plate puzzle, with the addition of combat and far trickier puzzles.
From what I gathered, a large part of the game revolves around solving puzzles by flicking switches to redirect fireballs with mirrors and slaying undead monsters, either with melee attacks or… magic! Sending these guys six feet under (again) serves a purpose beyond simply being able to get past them: slain foes drop mana. This is used to cast various spells, indicated by the bar at the top of the screen. Picking one up will enable you to cast shield while saving it will grant you access to more powerful and/or different spells as your mana pool grows – an interesting method for sure.
While it may seem a bit bare bones right now, I’m sure more features will be added as development progresses, including some sort of background story and different puzzle types. Screenshots in the TIGForums thread shows a jungle area at least, so it seems you won’t be traversing that creepy dungeon the entire time! A change of scenery is rarely a bad thing.
Pre-release demos are so rare these days and who doesn’t like getting a taste of things to come? As such, I’d recommend trying the demo – won’t take but a minute to download. And since only time (and the developer) knows what’s coming in Cloaks and Spells, be sure to keep an eye on the dev log.
