[Ars Magica" is a tabletop RPG published in 1987, set in medieval Europe, where magic is real and all the player characters are wizards. Well, technically, that is true. One of the novel ideas in Ars Magica is "troupe-style play," in which every player creates multiple characters and plays different characters as the story dictates. One week you might be a powerful wizard in the Knights of Hermes, and the next week you might be one of the menial sidekicks called "grogs."

Ars Magica also pioneered the shared worldview rule, in which players jointly create a covenant (a stronghold where wizards and their associated outcasts and nonconformists unite). It was also proposed that players would take turns serving as game masters and story guides, each telling a different story in Mythic Europe before handing over

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Another area in which Ars Magica was innovative was its magic system, as befits a game with an emphasis on wizards. In addition to pre-prepared, formulaic spells, magicians can invent spontaneous spells on the fly by combining techniques and forms (verbs and nouns, each with a Latin name). To create fire, for example, he combines the technique of creation, cleo, with the form of fire, ignem.

The fifth edition of Ars Magica was released in 2004, and the last supplement was released in 2016. Publisher Atlas Games has announced that it has been working for the past few years on a revised fifth edition, the Definitive Edition, which is scheduled to be crowdfunded in the fall of 2024. Atlas says it will release "a deluxe, full-color, hardcover core rulebook with new art and layout and heirloom quality."

It will be a "much larger" book than the 5th edition, with revisions that "reflect decades of play and incorporate much new material published since the original rulebook's release." It will also be based on an open license.

"We have recently completed a long-term project to resurrect the original printer's files for all supplements to Ars Magica 5th edition. This means that the entire series of supplements, fully compatible with ArM5D, will continue to be printed indefinitely, both as e-books and as books printed to order, and delivered to buyers worldwide. We intend for Ars Magica to continue to enjoy the game and expand its creativity for generations to come"

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Ars Magica will be familiar to fans of World of Darkness games. Its rules became the basis for WoD's storyteller system, and some of its background influenced similar concepts in games like Vampire: In Ars Magica, Tremere is not yet undead, but merely a dark wizard), Mage: The Ascension (which is essentially Alsmagica in the modern era).

Black Chicken Studios attempted to crowdfund a video game based on Alsmagica in 2012, but unfortunately did not reach their goal.