https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pHriGuy_KIQ

Luna Orion is a newer game studio created to focus on development of Wild Mage – Phantom Twilight, an ambitious action-adventure fantasy RPG set within an equally ambitious open world.

The game is currently seeking funding on Kickstarter to finish development for a Windows PC version (via Steam), but already reached its funding goal within 13 hours. They’re very close to their Nintendo Switch stretch goal, with many others lined up afterwards.

Featured above, you can view the pitch trailer for the game. Here’s some screenshots:

Here’s the full rundown on the game:

Wild Mage – Phantom Twilight is an open-world action/adventure RPG, featuring airships, floating islands, dungeons, and next-gen combat. Monsters can be dynamically sliced into pieces. Terrain and structures can be altered or destroyed. Abilities and spells can be acquired from monsters and lore books. A game that re-imagines the genre.

Key Features:

• Voxel-based, dynamically destructible floating islands
• Ability to slice monsters and objects into pieces
• Airships for transportation, combat, housing, and crafting
• No traditional “levels” – Spells and abilities are acquired by taking them from monsters
• Musically driven environment and gameplay
• Final Fantasy like world, Diablo like dungeons, Zelda like adventures, with next-gen mechanics

Platforms:

Main funding goal includes single-player Steam PC release. See Stretch Goals for information on multiplayer/co-op as well as release to other platforms.

Why Wild Mage

Hi, everyone! My name is Lucas McCann and I’m the owner and lead developer of Luna Orion studio. I decided to spare the audience of my appearance in the trailer above, because I have a great face for radio. :P Although I am convinced that if I included clips of my 8-month old daughter, the project would be funded in hours. She is a precious bundle of joy and a constant source of inspiration and motivation.

I started making Wild Mage – Phantom Twilight over a year ago, for the simple reason that I wanted to live my dream of making the game that I want to play. As a gamer, I always liked the idea of exploring a world made of floating islands with airships, like in some of the cut scenes in Final Fantasy IX. But few games that I know of really expanded on this concept as part of their core gameplay, so I decided to make one myself!

It’s About Magic

 Powerful spells with physical effects

Though ARPG is my favorite genre, I found myself unsatisfied with the way spell casting is done in most games over the years. Instead of particle effects accompanied by some ranged damage, I wanted magic spells to have physical effects. That’s why in Wild Mage, a Tornado spell would literally throw monsters into the air, and your airship too if it’s within range!

Precision spell casting system

To make spell casting more realistic and more fun, players have full control of the targeting precision. This means that if you’re not careful, things may not turn out the way you planned.

Dynamic Cutting

Slice your enemies into pieces, yet seamlessly transition from sword to spell.

Another feature that I had wished for as a gamer for a long time is dynamic destruction of monsters. In an ideal world, swords slice, hammers crush. Their effects on enemies should be physical, instead of being represented as only numbers. In Wild Mage, monsters are dynamically destructible. An artifact sword can slice enemies into pieces, and how it cuts depends on the position and direction that the sword hits the monsters. So no two cuts are the same!

Destruction

Environments in Wild Mage are destructible by weapons, spells or monsters!

The floating islands are made of voxels and can be tunneled or destroyed.

Fire propagates dynamically.

Dungeons are nested in voxel-based islands. In certain spots, the walls are destructible so you can tunnel your way to hidden chambers.

Character Advancement

Destruction and game-play

In Wild Mage, dynamic destruction is a key feature, but NOT the goal, and has its consequences. For example, if you blow up a bridge, you may find it hard to cross a river. But if done strategically, it can slow down the monsters that are chasing you. If you dig a big hole in the ground, you may find it hard to get out of it yourself. But sometimes digging a tunnel is the quickest way to get to a different part of an island. If you destroy a villager’s house by accident, you will have to pay for the damage with gold that could’ve been used for an artifact weapon. It’s not about causing damage just for the sake of damage itself, it’s about using it to your strategic advantage.

Acquire new spells from monsters

There is no traditional “leveling” in Wild Mage. You do not gain skills or power automatically as you complete a level. Instead, new spells are acquired by taking them from monsters and lore books. Your power increases as you gain experience through adventures.

Replayability

All these add to the replayability of the game. In Wild Mage, players will be exploring the world, acquiring new skills and learning to master their powers as they advance their characters through adventures. There will be trial and errors, and your experience as well as outcome depend on the steps you took along the way, much like life itself.

The Story

The story is set in the beautiful yet dangerous world of Etherion, which is made up of thousands of islands floating above a dense, purple Miasma. Rising at night and burning off during the day, the Miasma spawns terrible creatures and posts constant threat to the people of the isles.

10,000 years ago a Revenant took his revenge upon the world, using himself to power a gate to the deepest depths of oblivion. From the gate poured a foul mist known as Miasma, and from it came terrible creatures that devoured the land. The only hope at the time was to raise Islands into the air using magic crystals known as float-stones to escape the grasp of the all-encompassing Miasma. Dungeons laced with powerful traps were created around the crystals to protect them from the Miasma’s spawn. Years passed and the people prospered above the clouds, but now the crystals are running low on power and the islands are slowly sinking back into the mist.

As a Wild Mage, you act as the right hand of the Tower of Heaven, extracting adventures, escorting Ships, delivering goods, reclaiming lost islands.

Dungeons

Dungeons in Wild Mage take various forms and scales.

Traditional dungeons | Mount based adventures | Airship based combat

Treasure Hunting

Explore old ruins, caves and secret passages with traps and puzzles. 

Acquire crafting recipes, mounts, spells, and skills. Light to no combat.

Airships

Airships play a vital role in the world of Etherion.

Transportation | Combat | Housing | Crafting | Storage

Races

Races: Human, Fairy, Dwarf, Gnome, Elf

You can play as a fairy in Wild Mage.

Crafting and Mining

Mine resources and craft powerful relics.

You only craft Relics in Wild Mage, Items so powerful they must be kept in the center of the islands. Crafters sell tokens for the chance to retrieve these items, should you die the token is destroyed and you are forced from the dungeon. Everything in Wild Mage is earned.

A release window for Wild Mage – Phantom Twilight is tentatively set for sometime next year.