Technical gripes aside The Mage’s Tale is a really good magical adventure that really puts you into the heart of the experience. The story provides hours worth of gameplay and the potion creation side adds even more fun, mixing and matching various items to see what they do. If you’ve been looking for a decent fantasy RPG then you can’t go too far wrong with this.

It is awesome to play a VR dungeon-crawler with a big budget. The dungeons are visually amazing, filled with puzzles and secrets and they are a joy to play, combined with the exciting combat and bosses. [Tested with Oculus Rift]

Traveling through the dungeons gives that rare feeling of a pen and paper RPG coming to life. The puzzles and traps are smartly done. Overall, this is a highly enjoyable VR RPG experience. Unfortunately, the weak link comes in the controls.

With high production values, solid voicework, and impressive scale, The Mage’s Tale was every bit worth the wait. While the controls are certainly obtuse for the platform, the fun storyline, puzzles, and spellcrafting makes it a fun addition to the Vive library.

Creating and casting magical spells in VR is an awesome experience that I didn't ever get tired of, but if a sequel is in the works, finer character animation and more locomotion options should be on the docket to turn up the immersion factor.

Still, in a world full of VR demos and proof-of-concept games that are barely that, The Mage's Tale feels and plays like a real, fully-realized product that is actually worth the $40 price tag. It has a genuine story arc, excellent combat, and visuals and game play that would be far less effective in another medium. The game makes excellent -- if perhaps over-zealous -- use of the Touch controllers and although The Mage's Tale reminds us that the VR genre is still learning to find its way, this game is certainly a milestone product for the Rift.

Neither a groundbreaking VR experience nor a strong dungeon crawler, The Mage's Tale ultimately squanders its potential. It offers a couple of high points--some jokes do hit their marks from time to time--but there are so many problems, and there’s so little of substance to drive the experience forward, that The Mage's Tale feels more like a shallow experiment than a reason to get excited about VR.