Choice of Magics Reviews

One of the greatest text-based adventure games. Every path of magic, every route has actions and consequences. No matter your route, you feel accomplished by what you've done; and you can either feel a sense of emptiness or satisfaction depending on how to choose to act in the final chapters. Actually made me put my hands together clasped, thinking, after my ending. Spoilers for my ending; [spoiler] I went full into Vivomancy and Glamour and was surrounded by everyone I loved and worked with as I laid there dying from rot, not letting anyone die for me to live; and making sure the nation was in good hands with a future generation of intelligent, careful scholars. It was extremely satisfying, never compromising on ones morals. [/spoiler]

This book is beautiful, which is common in Kevin's writing. The amount of endings, the lore of the world, the decisions, it is all really beyond words to describe. I appreciate your gems, Kevin Gold.

So on my first attempt, I tried to help everyone, raised a baby dragon, dated a nerd, broke up with him to follow my destiny, got back together with him and married him, rode a dragon, prevented a war, and then died tragically, leaving the world not much different than it had been when I started. Second attempt I went full dashing rogue, attacked people with lightsabers, tried to overthrow the church, dated two different women and managed to get them BOTH killed (mostly by encouraging them to be as reckless as I was), tried and failed to first-strike the war, embraced dark magic til the point that I nearly blew up the world... AND YET SOMEHOW THINGS TURNED OUT BETTER IN THE END? Anyway, definitely fun to be had.

I have fallen in love with this game. Pros: -You can really feel your character. There are so many opportunities to define your character and really connect with them. What are their defining features? What do they like to wear? What does their room look like? All of this makes the experience more rewarding. When your character does something awesome, you can picture them and it feels like YOU did something awesome. This is a nice change to other games in COGs lineup, where most of the time you know their hair and eye color and what they're wearing and that's about it. -Everything feels connected. Choices you make all throughout the game come back to be reflected later down the line, and sometimes when things would be referenced I was like "Wow, the work that went into this is amazing." Are you like me, and get annoyed when a game has a set track and it feels like the choices you're making most of the time are flavor text that aren't sending the story in different directions? NOT THE CASE HERE, MY FRIENDS. I am here to announce that up until the very last page of the game you feel like almost every choice you made throughout made a difference in how the story progressed, how your relationship with the characters developed, or what endings were open to you. Fabulous!! -THE CHARACTERS. I've read some other reviews and Reddit posts before I bought the game that assert that the supporting characters could have been more fleshed out and that they were hard to connect to. I agreed with them... until I got halfway through the game. There are two scenes in particular that stood out to me, that I was GLUED to my computer screen, feeling like I was right there with the characters. I won't describe the scenes because -spoilers- but all I will say is: Tal and Cos both made me tear up with their wholesome friendships and I love them both. (And Vera made me smile quite a bit, both my character and me fell in love with her for good reason, and my ending with her made me honestly sad that I wouldn't be able to read more about her.) There are more things I love about the game, but those are the big three. Now, on to two things I did get hung up on here and there as the story progressed... Cons: -CHARACTER DESCRIPTIONS. Now, this might be confusing considering what I said above. Let me explain. The characters PERSONALITIES are well developed and made me honestly feel for them all throughout the story. BUT... As I read a story, I imagine everything that is happening, and often I had a hard time picturing the supporting characters throughout the story. It would pull me up short. What color is Cos's hair? What color are Vera's eyes? Is the queen's hair long? To her shoulders? The queen's dresses are very detailed and sound beautiful... but I cannot even begin to imagine her face without stretching my imagination. I don't need in-depth descriptions of every character in the game. Of course not. But the characters that accompany us all throughout the story, the ones we romance and possibly marry, how is it that I have a hard time picturing them? Overall, this didn't take me out TOO MUCH, but it is what made me stumble the most while reading. -ENDING REQUIREMENTS. If you are interested in your character not dying, and not being locked out of an amazing amount of endings by choices you wouldn't think are important... You need a way to save. I am completely serious. Do not play this game without looking up how to "save" your game in a COG game so you can go back and try different options throughout the story. Being able to do this is something I would recommend for every single COG game, but especially this one. Normally, you can tell what each choice will do... normally. There were a few key points where I honestly could not tell what my choice would do, and being able to "save" kept it from being frustrating and kept me having fun! With all that being said... This has become my favorite COG game. I actually drew fanart for the first time in a year thanks to all the loving work put in by Kevin Gold, the editors, the scripter, and all the testers. It's also encouraged me to look into Gold's other works, because if this is showing off his talent... well, I have more to check out!

I wrote a 4-page long review for the game, then I realized that no one will care to read all that, so I tried to compact it down as much as possible: The writing in this one? pretty good, the descriptions of places are sometimes interesting, and some characters are pretty lively, but it is also held back by the extreme railroading. The first time around I wanted to play as a psychopath to cause the most damage to humanity but kept failing at it due to bullshit reasons. I, the wizard who could erase a town within a few minutes stay in the village I was born in for no reason? Then when it turns out I can use dark magic, I get arrested by completely normal city guards? Why didn't I just blow them up? grow wings and fly? (happened at 4 points in the story btw) maybe use glamor to mind control them into leaving me alone (also happened many times), maybe use divination to see that they are coming and prepare some kinda attack against them, use automation to make a golem servant (also happened) who will beat them to a pulp, and so on. Many times my immersion was broken by me asking: "But why didn't my character solve this issue with a certain magic he was shown to be capable of some chapters back when my magic stats were much weaker?"(OK I didn't always ask that I was just thinking: really? that's bullshit). And this issue is always there. I accepted an invitation to [spoiler]be the royal mage of the queen[/spoiler]. why though? My first 2 characters, a mostly negation-based wizard with a shitton of destructive power and a burning hatred for human life, and the second one, life magic, and fighting-focused spell-blade with like 5/100 empathy and greed for power wouldn't even care to reply to such an invitation, yet, I don't get a choice and must always go to that place. Later I tried my best to make a character that would not get an invite, but then my character wrote a letter to be there, without me having a choice. Due to railroading, I feel like whatever I do will always be of least importance, since even if at every possible choice I lean towards a psycho, I'll still be someone who asks myself if it was right to kill those people, and there is no choice to say "yes, I enjoyed it" or "the deaths of ants doesn't matter", it will be "it's for a good cause" and varying degrees of guilt in the other ones. When I make a powerful wizard, I get captured by nobodies, when I make the best fighter, I also get captured, though at a different point. I make the most charismatic and mind-control-focused guy, I still get beat up by some old man who found out I'm a wizard thus I must die. And this list goes on and on. If you can ignore this bullshit and you take joy in the little romance this game has or just enjoy talking to people, go ahead. If you want not even a sandbox, but a world where your choices have consequences, I recommend trying something else. Now that that is over, let me present the many ideas I had when I looked at the game's magic system. This is not part of the review and is full of spoilers so don't read it if you don't want to get spoiled. As a life mage, I thought I could heal wounds and influence plants to some degree, but it turns out that I can modify myself and create completely new life forms. A few examples of what I did: A crop that can survive anywhere and is nutritious spreading across the empire and changing the profession of farming. Making the empire's air force Dragonriders instead of airships. Making some sort of giant bugs with really strong outer shells that are great for mining and don't care about cave-ins. There are more examples, but I think you get it. Life magic is strong with imagination, but I think this novel lacks a lot in that department. Now for my ideas of what could've been done with life magic: -Making a bio-weapon using mushroom spores and ending the war before it began -Modifying my own body to be that of a superhuman. At some point in the story, I had the choice to grow wings, and when I couldn't carry something heavy, I just increased the muscle efficiency, density, and amount to make strong wings. Why didn't I do that on my regular muscles? The game says that every magic has a great drawback, and life magic's big drawback is that it may cause unexpected changes. When I gained wings I lost subtlety and fighting, due to me lightening my bones and my body mass in general. When I changed my face so the inquisitors don't recognize me, some features became permanent. So if I change my body to be like a giant with extreme physical strength, then I will lose subtlety, charisma, and maybe some of my humanity, but if I can crush to paste whoever I want why do I need any of those things? Why don't I make myself have the brain of a dolphin mixed with a human's for intelligence and 0 need for sleep? And if I'm worried about unexpected changes, why don't I make a copy of myself and experiment on it, or just random animals like monkeys for example? Why don't I make myself have the scales of a pangolin reinforced with steel? Or why don't I change myself to a bigger and stronger body, like a dragon's? and so on -How about making life that is more intelligent than humans are, then teaching it magic and telling it to create something even better than itself with its intelligence, then telling that thing with its even greater intellect to create a life form that is even better at it, then repeat this process until I create a godlike being? -How about using my abilities to make an army of magic-capable creatures that can survive anywhere and annihilate anything using either their physical features or magic? -How about using life magic to gain perfect control of my body so I don't have to worry about anything like emotions influencing my actions ever again? And the list goes on and on, but I also want to include some other schools of magic too: Automation: being able to create magic-powered machines by drawing energy from the eternal storm above. In a different run, I created a luxgladius (strongest sword, basically some kind of light-saber) and a golem. The limitations on the luxgladius were because of impracticality and energy concerns, but if I make many golems wield it, and use great amounts of energy from above, why can't I make a massive laser pointer with the strength of a weaker death star? How about covering the golem's armors with antimagic obsidian (which exists in the story) and making them strong, so they can only be destroyed by magic (due to humans innately being incapable of breaking a mountain), but they are immune to magic from the outside due to being covered in antimagic material. How about making artillery using negative energy canons (also happened) and destroying the other country's army without them even knowing what is attacking them? Since the greatest drawback of automation is that it will strengthen the magical storm above, how about moving underground? Shouldn't be hard if I make giant untiring machines with intelligence. Or since levitating ships that can stay in the air indefinitely exist, how about moving your headquarters above the clouds? Make the golems immune to magic go down and get resources, otherwise live undisturbed above the clouds? How about making some massive machine that can contain the storm in a compact size? etc. And if all of this seems to take way longer than your lifetime, just become a god. Yes, really. There is a shop in the last segment of the game where you can buy a book called the theory of immortality or something like that. And when the dark sun erupts you can harvest that power to become a god. Now you have all the time in the world to do whatever you want. I had some more ideas but no way anyone is reading this mess anyways so I'll stop here. It appears like this one also got quite long, but at least it is about a thousand words shorter

There are some games that fulfill your expectations and provides a great time. And there are other games that are not what you expected...and provide a great time because of that. Choice of Magics is one of the latter. To be clear, I'm a fantasy fan, hardcore gamer, and minmaxer. I went into Choice of Magics fully intending to become a badass mage and live happily ever after. But Choice of Magics is very miserly vis-a-vis its "happy endings." Build an air force of dragons to fight off the invasion...and then watch in horror as your biological experiments spin out of control, and your creations rise up against you. Exploit the storms to create an industrial revolution...and then watch hurricanes destroy your own cities. The game is full of tough choices with unintended consequences, but the most thought provoking parts of Choice of Magics come after the end. Should you combine your negation and automation magic to end the storms and hurricanes destroying your kingdom, knowing that it will remove automation magic from the world forever? Or should you let the storms continue, build a battery to harness their power, and lead your survivors to an underground, industrialized, automated Elysium? Is it better to kill off all your mutinous dragons, or to become one yourself and leave behind your weak, decrepit human form? Is the "correct" choice one that preserves continuity with the world as we knew it, or one that leads people to a new, possibly greater future? Choice of Magics is a game that asks hard questions, and sits in your mind long after you're done playing it. This game is truly magisterial (no pun intended), endlessly replayable, and an exemplar of its genre.

I felt really hesitant on making this review, seeing the opinions of others' and having trouble writing down my thoughts, I'll give it my best attempt though. (I should mention I only got a few endings, but whether I got a few endings or all, my thoughts should still be valid). The flow of the story is really inconsistent, specifically at the end. I remember getting a good ending on my first playthrough but feeling so unsatisfied because of how abrupt it was. I felt like the only reason I got that ending is because my stats that I've built through-out the entire game, coasted me by, it didn't feel like my choices at the end mattered anymore. Which leads me to my next point, this game relies too much on stats, it becomes a "I need to increase these numbers" rather than "I want to make the choices I want". And by numbers, I mean everything that isn't your magic stats. I don't know if it's just the multiple ways I played, but I found myself constantly trying to avoid using magic because of the long-lasting consequences it created. It sounds like a good thing, "consequences for using too much magic", and from an objective standpoint, it is, but it ends up deterring the player from using magic. I remember using glamor only a couple of times, and ended up dying because of it, from then on, I never used glamor in my next playthroughs. This whole idea of "consequences from magic" doesn't give of "Hey, be careful when you use magic!", it gives of "Don't use magic or else...". I get why there had to be consequences, otherwise the player would just breeze passed every situation, but a good magic system is supposed to help the player get through situations, not be used to breeze past them. It would've been better if the magic in this universe was just weaker in general.

Another excellent entry by the creator of Choice of Robots, with wildly branching paths, vast and unruly feats of magic, and, indeed, a vast number of important choices. Truly a masterpiece, much like the author's previous works, and one of the best Choice of Games titles, if not the best. I cannot recommend this text-adventure enough.

Something was missing from this one. Namely, there seemed to be too many dead ends and abrupt changes in direction. I found myself asking "Really?" several times when it seemed giant swings in the story happened instantly and without my ability to avert them in any reasonable way. You might think this isn't a big deal, but when you're hours into a story and a severe shift in the story occurs and 'ruins' the direction it feels like you just wasted your time. Which is quite infuriating. My story ended by being (slight spoilers ahead) turned into a tortoise. Making my entire story culminate in a three-hour long joke. It was completely unforeseeable and irreversible and was the final whiplash curve that felt indicative of the entire experience. Weird pacing too, with long patches of the story seeming to stall out as the writer seemed to be waiting for you to choose the option he wanted you to choose. And then, BAM, giant swing. I just have a really bad taste in my mouth after this one. I felt like I wasted my time.

Even more expansive/choice-driven than Choice of Robots. Kevin Gold(writer of Choice of Robots and Choice of Magics) is THE king of the Choice of Games series. When other choice games are extremely linear or short, his games have dozens of different outcomes, and completely different branching paths. If you can get past the fact that these games are simply text-based, Choice of Magics/Choice of Robots have to be THE best choice-driven games out there. They absolutely destroy developers like Tell-Tale games in this category. So simply put, if you like choice-driven adventures that have real meaningful impact/decisions, get either Choice of Magics or Choice of Robots right away... You won't regret it. (Update 9/23/18) Rest in peace Tell-Tale games.