Chaos is Here
Chaos is Here
Chaos is Here
Chaos is Here
Who are Chaos Agents? Why do they need your help?
A new batch of Chaos Agents are ready for recruitment and willing to fight for your House.
They await your orders to begin.
Answer the call, and get ready for the adventure of a lifetime.
Popularium was founded by Richard Garfield, Jon Bankard, and Arka Ray to build a playground-lab hybrid from which the next generation of innovative gameplay experiences would emerge, with a focus on player choice, empowerment, and having fun. Chaos Agents, our first game, is the world’s first Autobattler-Royale, combining the best of Autobattler and Battle Royale games with globally unique heroes. Each Chaos Agent is unique in the way they look, play, and win, and only one player at a time can play with that Agent. Every player has the chance to become the global expert on playing their Chaos Agents, and building the greatest Brokerage House the Firmament has ever seen.
From the creation of a rich, detailed story universe to the building out of valuable IP, along with great development and design progress, we are incredibly grateful to our amazing team, player community, friends, family, investors, and advisors who have supported us every step of the way.
We’re so glad to have you with us on this journey.
Let Chaos Reign!
Release Notes: 1.9.22
We are very excited to release 1.9.22! It’s been a long time coming and brings with it a lot of quality of life improvements and some features that we’re super excited about!
Featured Blogs
Chaos Agents at Gen Con 2024: A Recap
We had a two part plan for the Gen Con event and World Championship: First, we would introduce Gen Con attendees to Chaos Agents through hands-on tutorial matches at the Gen Con show floor. Those who enjoyed the experience would then be able to sign up to play in a World Championship Qualifier Tournament. Those who won a Qualifier Tournament would be qualified for the Gold Finals of the Championship, which would crown the first Chaos World Champions.
First World Championship Report: Schumaniac, The Marshal, and a Tale of Woe
This however, is not a story of glorious victory, but rather one about a terrible performance in the first Gold Chaos Agents Tournament. It’s also a story about how trying to play fair is not always the best strategy—so the main moral of the story is that if you have an unfair advantage (such as being the President of the company building the game), you’d better press that advantage before it’s too late.
It’s too late for me and The Marshall now, kids, but it’s not too late for you. Read on to hear my tale of woe…
The First Chaos World Invitational: A Champion’s Tale
One aspect of this tournament stood out to me so much that I feel like I can focus on it to the exclusion of all else; namely, the implications of the improved survival movement algorithm.
For those who haven’t been play testers for the last several months: until quite recently—less than a month ago—survival mode gave you the same armor and regeneration benefits that it does now, but the algorithm it used for deciding where to run didn’t work nearly as well.
Read up on the history of the Firmament, the universe of Chaos Agents… and play Chaos Agents to become a part of its everlasting history and lore.
Chaos Lore Highlights
The universe of Chaos Agents, known as the Firmament, is vast and varied in its planets, species, cultures, and their motivations. Chaos Shards govern and shape many aspects of the socio-political and economic events of the Firmament, making Chaos Agents and their Chaos Brokers–such as you–key players in this ongoing cosmic theater. Every faction and species have their own motivations when it comes to Chaos Shards, and you should be aware of them all. Here are some of the latest news and rumors from across the Firmament, with a lot more of its history recorded on the Chaos Lore page.
Altareth River Valley
The Altareth River Valley (ARV), with its rolling meadows, crystalline rivers, and ancient lore, has long been a sanctuary for the soul. The ARV Gorge, where the Altareth and Khyok Rivers dramatically meet, has inspired poets, philosophers, and spiritual seekers across the Firmament for millennia. Over the centuries, it has become more than a place—more than a geographical marvel—it has become legend. As beings of all species and beliefs descended on the ARV from all corners of the Firmament to marvel at the confluence of its natural wonders, they spoke of the “Jewel of the Alta Mountains,” a moniker that rings as true today as it did in the early days of Altareth City’s founding. But beneath this legendary tranquility, a storm—both literal and political—has been brewing.
Leaked Communication from the Padoccia Trade Union to MrThrifty Reveals Incentives Behind “Xandrian Win Donations”
The Red Sun News Brokerage can exclusively reveal from trusted sources that the Padoccia Trade Union offered several incentives to Chaos Brokers participating in the Xandrian Challenge that led to the offer of “donating” Win Conditions to the Xandrians.
Wolfram “Both Ways Baby” Marflow
“Now, maggots, there’s only one rule,” said the judge, picking his teeth, “this isn’t a death-match. Bones were meant to be broken, teeth to be shattered, and egos to be humiliated. Please do all of the above. But I’m not paid for undertaking or body collection, and Surface matches are meant to show you might make a good Agent for a willing broker. So, try to channel your fury appropriately, will you? The name of the game is harm, not homicide.”
Chaos Agents Events Highlights
We are building Chaos Agents with the help and input of our player community, so keeping our community informed and engaged is very important to us. Below are highlights from some of our community events, with a lot more available to stream on our YouTube page.
World Invitational Finals: Highlights
The first Chaos Agents World Championship took place at Gen Con in August 2024 - see the highlights here!
World Invitational Special Qualifiers #5
Follow the exciting action from the Special Qualifiers for the World Invitational where top Chaos Agents playtesters battle it out for a shortcut to the GOLD Finals.
Chaos Agents Pre-Alpha Launch Event
On a cozy fall night in 2023, Wizards of the Coast founder Peter Adkison gets summoned by his old friend…
Chaos Agents Dev Diaries - A Look Behind The Curtain
Chaos Dev Diaries Episode 1: The Phantom Timer Menace
January 27, 2024 — The Chaos Agents dev team wanted to give you an inside look into the many trials and tribulations along the exciting journey to shipping v1.8.6, while also providing you with a classic example of how software development, despite best intentions and efforts, can sometimes devolve into a domino of causes and effects that, while being painful for us devs, can provide wonderful entertainment for the rest of the community. So grab your popcorn and get ready for a ride!
Chaos Dev Diaries Episode 2: Attack of the AI Agents
February 12, 2024 — What kind of logic do Chaos Agents use to carry out your directives during a battle? Or is it all simply chaos and madness? Learn how order leads to Chaos as we deep-dive into the AI-powered mind of a Chaos Agent.
For 1.8.6, we’ve made substantial updates to the “SURVIVE” AI Strategy, specifically in how an Agent calculates its “Escape Vector”.
As a result, we wanted to give our Chaos Agents community a closer look at how their Agent’s AI works, so that they can make more informed decisions during upcoming matches and Tournaments with a deeper understanding of the Agents’ decision-making process and logic in any given scenario.
Chaos Agents gets Private Alpha and 1st Championship Tournament at Gen Con
Chaos Agents, the latest title from Magic: The Gathering creator Richard Garfield, is entering its public alpha phase.
In Chaos Agents, players will coach and power up their globally unique superhero to victory against other foes. The game should feel familiar to tabletop enthusiasts as well as gamers. It takes concepts Garfield developed through his career — particularly Magic: The Gathering and Keyforge — and blends them with a free-for-all auto-battler format.
Magic the Gathering’s Creator Wants to Create an Even Better Game
Since bursting onto the scene in the mid-1990s, Magic the Gathering has become one of the most popular games of all time, with millions of players collecting cards to battle each other in an imaginary fantasy realm. But Magic’s early success came with a problem: the price of the game’s most powerful and rare cards surged along with its popularity. Eventually, Magic’s creators worried that the game would become too expensive and was at risk of becoming a short-lived fad. So, how do you pop a bubble in collectibles without completely alienating collectors? In this episode, we speak with Richard Garfield, the creator of Magic the Gathering, and Arka Ray, a long-time game developer at Microsoft who’s now CEO of Richard’s new gaming studio, Popularium. They talk about the surprising parallels between MTG and central banking, what they’ve learned from Magic, and how they’re applying those lessons to Chaos Agents, Popularium’s first new gaming launch.
Richard Garfield’s new strategy game will generate a unique character for every single player
As names go, Chaos Agents might seem a little vague. However, there’s nothing vague about Popularium Games’ ambitious plans for this distinctive upcoming free-to-play strategy game. This bold hybrid of auto battler and battle royale aims to offer a novel experience, where players master their own uniquely generated characters.
Battle royale titles are known for their mass combats, where only one player can walk away victorious, while auto battlers have players select strategies that their units will then carry out without their direct input. Both genres are titanic features of the video game landscape, but never before have the two met quite like this.
Jonathan Bankard - Back in the Game
“The nice thing about our industry is that it’s a very kind industry,” Bankard said. “All of our friends are out there helping us connect to people, friends of friends, and all of that is very collaborative and wonderful. It’s a big change from the big companies I’ve worked at in the past in just how much all of these indie studios are trying to help each other out.”
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To go even deeper, you can get access to Chaos Agent trades, Discord only-rewards, invitations to exclusive events, and in-depth discussions with the Chaos Agents community by joining us in our Discord.
Hope to see you there!