Arcane And Able: Worlds Of Magic Demo

Two unusual things have happened in the world of Worlds of Magic. You may remember the game from its days on Kickstarter, where Wastelands Interactive pitched it as the spiritual sequel to Master of Magic that, somehow, has failed to materialise over the past couple of decades even though I sacrifice a wizard every Christmas to usher it into being. Worlds of Magic could save the next generation of wizards and make my Boxing Day cleaning less of a chore because it seems to be on the right track. The first unusual thing is the release of a demo, which I hadn't expected. It only shows the tactical battle grid at the moment but that part certainly feels very MoMish. The second unusual thing is a return to Kickstarter. Hmmm.

Rather than raising funds to finish the game, Wastelands are seeking stretch goal cash. They tell me that the mechanics of the game are in place and they're now creating the graphics and audio to hang onto the scaffolding. That means we should see more of the world map in the near future and it probably makes sense to put all of the content in place at one pass rather than patching it together. For now, here's some footage showing the changes to the battle map over the past months.

There are plenty of details about the additions on the new Kickstarter page. The $5,000 goal has already been passed - in fact, they might have hit $15,000 by the time you read this. I'll bring more impressions when I've had a chance to play with the world map, which shouldn't be too long from now.

The demo for the battle map can be found here (or in browser here but it's more than 100MB. It's unfinished but there's plenty of variety in spells and units, and it's about as close to Master of Magic as it could be without cuddling it.