The Rite of Elements is a unique, 3D action puzzle game about a young mage exploring an ancient city to capture an angered spirit that lives in the ruins. 聽After the spirit strips the mage of the power to use incantation, a benevolent spirit in the ruins teaches the mage the sympathetic magic of the elements. 聽By transferring the properties of an elemental force to other objects, the mage solves the mysteries of the ruined city鈥檚 mountain fortress and overcomes the challenges presented by the spirit. 聽The mage travels through four sections of the crumbling ruins in search of the spirit, culminating in a final battle between the spirit and the mage in the citadel atop the mountain fortress.
Fifteen dedicated developers created The Rite of Elements over the course of five months, with one month dedicated to design and documentation and four months for the actual development. 聽We chose to work on this project because of its unique mechanics and the opportunity to develop an engaging puzzle game. 聽Over the course of production, our designers learned how to create and balance puzzle-solving gameplay to create an enjoyable experience for the player. 聽Our programmers created a series of unique abilities based on the interactions of custom elemental object types that enabled designers to implement the games unique puzzle mechanics. 聽Our art team created a set of core construction assets that allowed designers to build environments that maintained a cohesive theme and feel, as well as many unique objects needed for specific gameplay encounters. 聽In the end we created ninety minutes of gameplay in a sprawling contiguous play space. 聽We learned to work as a team to refine an inspired concept, create a unified design and production plan and build a game we are proud to have worked on.