Alakadabra

Come in, come in. Mind the puddle.

It was a pond this morning, and by the look of that frost it will be a floor again before you finish reading this.

Alakadabra is a multiplayer PvP game about wizards dueling in a simulated world. Once a year, wizards and witches from all over turn up at the fair to put their names down for the Alakadabra tournament, and every time the arena has to be rebuilt afterwards, mostly on account of the wizards. The winner is the best wizard in the world, until next year.

You are the wizard

Before each duel you choose from a great many spells and abilities: what you cast, what you carry, how you get about the place, and which school of magic you mean to make your own. Poison the ground between you and keep well back, or take up a wand of light and go in swinging. Some wizards raise something out of the floor to do the arguing for them. A few learn the blood spells hardly anyone can land, and are insufferable about it. Pick the playstyle you like most.

Mind the scenery

Every pixel of this world is simulated, and every pixel has opinions. Wood catches fire. Water freezes solid, or doesn't, depending on who got there first. Acid is nobody's friend, least of all the iron bridge's. Whatever you knock down stays down, so the arena at the end of a duel is rarely the arena you walked into. Every stage is beautifully hand-crafted pixel art with a trick of its own, and not one pixel of it is safe from you.

Still brewing

Alakadabra is in development, with a demo aimed at 2027. The arena is still being built, which for once is nobody's fault.

Now then. The sign-up table is just past the shops. What name shall I put down?