Ascension (Release, v 1.4) - by Big Memka and Shadowman

[John Stalvern]

A few graphical glitches and oddities I have noticed so far:

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When you exit from the ammo vendor's inventory in the market square, it shows the portrait and name for the boy in the armor shop.



There is an invisible wall here with no obvious purpose. It is where the player is looking, directly in front of the wall hanging. There are actually quite a few of these scattered around, but not usually in buildings like this.



It is possible to become stuck on the rock formation here. Not a big deal as it is easy to noclip out.



This boss' hit points display oddly. Also, perhaps he is meant to be a Bardiche Man?

Overall I am enjoying this immensely. The map for Sorona is very intricate, and the English is improved substantially from Inquisitor III while retaining its unique idiom. Magic also feels much more powerful than in the previous game- lightning seems to be more powerful than most weapons.

[MaxRideWizardLord]

The maps are awesome, but why language jumps from russian to english randomly? Also, I hope the magic combat will be a thing on it's own, so far it's pretty clumsy and not that fun to use imho.

[HopefulLayeredCake]

So far very impressed and having fun, but, now I am confuzzled and lost :<
How do I get into the necromancers guild in the sewers?

[BigMemka]

So far very impressed and having fun, but, now I am confuzzled and lost :<
How do I get into the necromancers guild in the sewers?

You should get a quest to find jewelry from Claudius (mansion in front of the city). Then talk to the chief of the Sorona guard. He is in the yellow fortress in the city itself. Then you can get into the sewers. To do this go out of the city to the location with the Claudius mansion and open the first door on the right.

[HopefulLayeredCake]

So far very impressed and having fun, but, now I am confuzzled and lost :<
How do I get into the necromancers guild in the sewers?

You should get a quest to find jewelry from Claudius (mansion in front of the city). Then talk to the chief of the Sorona guard. He is in the yellow fortress in the city itself. Then you can get into the sewers. To do this go out of the city to the location with the Claudius mansion and open the first door on the right.

I found it! After talking to the chief again, seeing as the only quests I had on my journal and undone were the chest and the amulet, then I actually read what he said carefully and found my way
Then I got lost (which I do easily) trying to find the magic lockpick, but went to talk to Sandro and he gave me a solid clue about where to go and I have to admit, really good design, how the quests link up and you get clues about where to go!

[SallazarSpellcaster]

Hello! Last year I played the demo for Ascension, and it showed huge potential, now I'm glad to see it come to fruition! Been playing as a mage character, and so far I've cleared the crypt, here are some thoughts!

The good:

Systems are well developed and easy to understand, the story is nice to go through, and the maps are really well detailed, and quite beautiful. It's great that you added more early-game spells and ways to be a spellcaster from the get-go, as it opens up that development path much quicker than it did in Inquisitor III.

The city of Sorona is great! The general feeling of the game gives off a strong Daggerfall-like vibe -I understand you went for Gothic, but as I haven't experienced it wholly, Daggerfall holds a stronger resemblance for me.- It's a neat feature that you need to choose your path, either as a member of the mages, or warriors' guild.

Dungeons and crypts are fun, and interesting to go through; thus far, the crypt of the Wormed has stood out, as the puzzles take a little to figure out, but are quite easy if you pay attention.

A few things which could be better:

- A melt lock / Knock spell linked to either Intelligence or Wisdom, so mage characters can open locked doors, too. After all, a wizard would be able to melt a flimsy lock, or manipulate its insides, couldn't they?
- A means for fast return to Sorona, such as a town portal scroll or a mark/recall type spell would save a lot of time when completing quests and returning to the city.
- Another ice spell - maybe it's the progress I have in the game so far, but Frost Darts seems to be the only ice spell -other than frost shards- EDIT: Nevermind, just found the Blizzard spell!
- Bombs and flechettes could be a lot stronger; as it is, they're more useful for selling than using.

Other than those, I've been having a blast with the game, it's really awesome what you've accomplished!

[Cassidy]

Anybody know how to solve the crypt puzzle? Kinda stuck on that, been doing other quests. Love it so far.

[SallazarSpellcaster]

Anybody know how to solve the crypt puzzle? Kinda stuck on that, been doing other quests. Love it so far.

I solved all of them! They're quite easy actually:

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Puzzle 1, you just read the book and kill the Undead Noblemen who come alive.

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Puzzle 2, you press the lights in the order the book tells you -I don't remember right now, but I think it was Red, Green, Blue

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Puzzle 3, the one with the Upper Path bridge can take a little to figure out: The riddle says that twelve lights burn on the bridge - if you look at your map, you'll see that there are twenty four sconces with lamps, you need to light the twelve torches facing the bridge, while the other twelve must be off

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The last puzzle is a bit more complicated. The shape is a trident - the switches in the room are arranged in a 5x5 disposition, the trident is drawn like this:

o x o x o
o x o x o
o o o o o
x x o x x
x x o x x

From the bottom row, start in the middle -third- switch, then two ahead 'til you're in the center switch, the third row needs to be fully pressed, on its ends are the trident's prongs. Still, you should fail at least once, as it takes you to a secret room where you'll find the answer.

Hope these help!

[Cassidy]

Wow, thanks a bunch SallazarSpellcaster. They helped 100% it was the catwalk bridge / light the torches that stumped me. Again thank you

[Shadowman]

The wad has been updated to a version 1.1.

Have a nice game!
Download Ascension v.1.1 from Google.drive

[BigMemka]

Has anyone else completed the wad?

[Captain J]

I did, but it was quite hard to accomplish. Even though it's still on a demo state! I'm pretty sure i made some feedback before.

[SallazarSpellcaster]

Has anyone else completed the wad?

I did, as a full wizard with an Intelligence-Wisdom focused build, playing on Normal difficulty. The adventure was excellent throughout; only at first it was slightly difficult, as I didn't have enough money to keep a steady supply of mana batteries and food. After the middle of the game, it became much easier, alternating between magic attacks, and skullstaff runes.

The game was pretty consistent in its difficulty, it never felt like there were spikes in difficulty, or areas too difficult to overcome without a bit of forward-thinking. The only area I got "stuck" on, was because I didn't realize I had to do the Fighters' Guild quest, too. After that, however, puzzles, locations, and whatnot are all pretty easy to solve if you give them a little thought.

Playing as a wizard was satisfying; unlike Inquisitor 3D, in Ascension I managed to get the hard-hitting magic spells early on, making the playthrough much more palatable early on. Most enemies' elemental weaknesses were pretty easy to figure out, and the transformation spells -particularly shields and holy strength- made wielding the black sword an option to make a more efficient use of my resources.

Late-game, using the Apocalypse spell made the final areas of the game easier to overcome, but not to the point where they became trivial. Mowing through hordes of monsters was a fun thing to do, especially since my character was already fully equipped to deal with anything thrown at him.

I mentioned before a few minor things that could change - mostly, a means for mage characters to open locked doors, and a means to quickly return to Sorona. Other than that, I had a lot of fun playing Ascension, in fact, I started a new playthrough as a full warrior with a Strength-Dexterity build.

I did, but it was quite hard to accomplish. Even though it's still on a demo state! I'm pretty sure i made some feedback before.

Game's no longer a demo, but a fully fledged, 20-maps long adventure. Give it another go, it's really worth it, and quite impressive, what BigMemka and Shadowman accomplished.

[BigMemka]

Very well! Please note that you can play not only pure mage / warrior, but also mixed classes. That is, you can pump both strength/wisdom and dexterity/intelligent. Each branch of development has a powerful weapon.
As for opening doors for magicians: Increasing strength or dexterity with transformation spells also allows you to open closed doors.
And if you make quick moves to Sorona, won't it greatly simplify the gameplay?

[SallazarSpellcaster]

Very well! Please note that you can play not only pure mage / warrior, but also mixed classes. That is, you can pump both strength/wisdom and dexterity/intelligent. Each branch of development has a powerful weapon.
As for opening doors for magicians: Increasing strength or dexterity with transformation spells also allows you to open closed doors.
And if you make quick moves to Sorona, won't it greatly simplify the gameplay?

Well aware! That's a great feature, offering multiple paths to follow, and I do intend to make a mixed build too.

About opening doors, at least in version 1.0, it never allowed me to, even using holy strength - it always said that my true strength needed to be at a certain amount. I haven't tested version 1.1 though.

Yes and no - it would simplify it, but in what could be a good way, as it would cut the time going from point A to point B, especially when needing to resupply, or turning in quests. The objective downside I see is that this could be abused if the player returns to Sorona without going through one of the ambushes happening after completing a quest objective. It could be balanced by placing a very limited use of recalls, so the player can decide whether to use it as intended, or to use it to make certain sections slightly easier.