Steam's new big game lets players use a microphone to cast spells at each other, and it's $3

It's always interesting to see what game is climbing the ranks of the most-played games on Steam, as it's almost impossible to predict what gamers will be sinking their teeth into next. That new game is Mage Arena, and it lets players scream magic spells at each other.

Mage Arena is developed and published by solo developer jrsjams and is currently in early access with a humble price of $3. For this meager price tag, players can step into the shoes of a mage and enter into a 4v4 voice-controlled battle between sorcerers and warlocks, or test their spellcasting skills in the Mage Colosseum in a 1v1.

Mage Arena is currently popping off on the Steam charts, with the title reaching its all-time peak in concurrent players only 1 hour ago (13,450). Mage Arena was released on July 24, and at the time of writing, it has 12,552 players in-game casting spells via voice commands.

Not only has Mage Arena attracted quite a lot of players, it has also gained many positive reviews which has brought its Steam Review rating to 92% "Overwhelmingly Positive" over 2,178 reviews. So what do you do in Mage Arena? It's extremely simple. Make a lobby with up to eight players, divide those players into warlocks and wizards, and then begin to cast spells at each other. To cast a spell, players need to flip the spell book page over to that spell and then speak it into existence via their default Windows microphone.

2

Additionally, players can craft swords and staves out of logs and frogs, trade at the goblin village, and even take on a crypt full of skeletons for loot. Moreover, there is a setting for British and Indian accents. jrsjams has estimated they are making about $1 per sale of Mage Arena after Steam takes its cut.

"DUE TO A LARGE NUMBER OF BUGS THE GAME HAS TEMPORARILY BEEN DISCOUNTED TO 2.99. IT WILL BE RAISED TO 4.99 ONCE STABLE," reads the Steam page