Arcane: The Armor Collector

Development

Arcane was inspired by the Naruto series and the Diablo franchise, it presumably got its arena-style battles from the former and it's fast-paced gameplay from the latter.

The coder of the game, Hadar Itzikowitz (Hadar1989), started this game after finishing another project that took nine months, this time wanting to take it slow and polish every detail of the game.

Eduardo Mojica (cicla), the artist, had always been a huge fan of the old Diablo games and joined the project wanting to make something like those games, though of course simpler due to technical limitations of flash.

There was also a third person working on the game who was supposedly responsible for the voice acting and "other stuff" as described in the games credits.

After 2 years of on-and-off development the game was first uploaded to newgrounds by its creator. It included a simple highscore system and an in-game timer, which however is not very reliable. Many modified versions can be found on different flash game websites, normally with a different highscore system to fit in with the respective site.

Story

The story is presented in the form of a total of 6 cutscenes, one at the start of the game, one that serves as a short tutorial, one before each of the three bosses of the game, and a final one after beating the game's story mode which contains a major plottwist. All of these cutscenes can be skipped using a "skip" button at the top right of the game.

Beginning cutscene: Arcane as a child

This cutscene shows Arcane watching his father, the poor blacksmight Acamus, doing his work. He then proceeds to narrate how his father received a letter by the GMGS, the "Great Midorian Gladiators School", inviting Arcane to said school.

The second part of the cutscene consists of Arcane's teacher "Roko" informing the students about the 3 masters (presumably a reference to the three Ho-kage of the Leaf village in Naruto) and their greatest works: The magical armors that prevent the wearer from dying. This special property not only explain why one cannot enter a battle without armor in the game, but also why the main character can respawn as many times as required without ever permanently dying.

The three masters are described as: Orius the designer, who died years ago. Heiser the blacksmith, who is said to have disappeared without a trace, and Glorious the third, the current director of the GMGS.

Second cutscene: Movie Tutorial

This is where we get to see Jaiku for the first time. He is characterized as a sort of rival of Arcane, reacting with jealousy when Roko makes Arcane the leader of the example team in the tutorial.

The rest of the tutorial mostly consists of an interactive demonstration of how the item menu and the general gameplay mechanics work, always using young Arcane and Jaiku as examples.

After the demonstration it cuts to now 20 years old Arcane, anticipating his graduation from GMGS.

1st Boss cutscene: Graduation

Glorious the third, the director of GMGS, announces that a battle between the two best graduating students, Jaiku and Arcane, will determine who gets to represent the country in the 50th "World Wide Warrior Games". There they will face 6 different nations in a "patriotic challenge", as the games are described in the cutscene.

The "World Wide Warrior Games" make up about half of the story mode and are probably yet another reference to the Naruto world, where similar tournaments are very important events.

2nd Boss cutscene

This cutscene first shows all the different battles Arcane has won on a map. With each match a trophy is shown, the final one being the WWWG trophy, showing that Arcane has won the "World Wide Warrior Games".

Seemingly wanting to achieve even greater glory Arcane fights one of the "Gladiator Lords" in the second boss fight of the game. Whether Arcane just accidentally trips into this or purposedly challenges the Gladiator Lord is unclear, for Arcane doesn't speak a word in this cutscene.

3rd Boss cutscene: Glorious the third

Final cutscene: Arcane returns home

Gameplay

Arcane is a fairly fast-paced game consisting of gladiator-style battles. Using either a bow or some form of melee weapon combined with a shield (or switching between both) up to 6 warriors compete in one of 10 different arenas.

While in most games the player is the "center of world" and the enemies are more or less just cannon fodder for them to shoot at, Arcane is much different: The enemies are all technically equals with the same kinds of equipments and restrictions as the player. If anything the player's team receives a disadvantage since the player's allies cannot use throwing weapons, whereas the player and the enemy fighters can. The opposing teams also tend to have slightly better weapons or more members in some fights, giving them an advantage. This gives the game an unique feeling of fairness and balance, which also emphasizes the general gladiator-like atmosphere of the battles. The only thing the player can do which other warriors may not do is equipping 2 armors and then swapping them mid-fight.

Controls

The player's character is controlled using WASD for moving, jumping and crouching. The mouse is used for aiming and attacking. If both a bow and a melee weapon are equipped the Spacebar may be used to switch between ranged and melee weapons, one may also roll the mouse wheel to do this. While in melee mode an equipped throwing weapon may be used by pressing E (or the middle mouse button). With B you can switch between 2 equipped armors.

In-game timer

Upon completing the campaign one is given the option submit their time to an online highscore. The in-game timer is however very inaccurate and may easily be tempered with, allowing for zero or even negative highscores.

Free Modes

Weapons & Armor