Spectral Sorcery

Spectral Sorcery, as the name might suggest, is a game based on colors and a form of magic.

It is a strategy board game.

For one or two players, the game being played on a partial-perspective playing board that consists of a 5×5 matrix of colored squares (pads).

The color of each pad can be changed by the players to any one of the five colors in the games spectrum (red, yellow, green, blue and violet).

The object of the game is to convert all of the pads on the board to your color (red or violet, depending on which side you are playing).

To accomplish this task, you are provided with a single playing piece (your wizard) and a number of actions that the wizard is capable of performing.

Overview :

The field of play is a 5×5 board of squares.

Each square consists of a colored surface (the pad) and a colored edge (the edge).
Each pad may, at any given time, be any one of the five spectral colors.
The order of the spectrum colors is shown in a row of platforms just above the 5x5 matrix.
From left to right they are : red, yellow,green, blue and violet.

The edges come in three colors, where each color indicates the "lock" status of the square.
A gray edge indicates that the square is not locked (its pad color may be changed).
The other colors (InfraRed and Ultraviolet) mean that one of the two players has locked the pad color so that its color cannot be changed until the lock is removed.

The object of the game is to convert all of the pads to your color and to hold that configuration until the end of a turn.
If the board is all one color at any one time at the end of a turn, then the game ends.
If the board is all red or all violet, then the appropriate player wins.
If it is one of the other colors (yellow, green or blue), the game ends in a draw.
This last circumstance rarely occurs since all of the options available to the player are designed to convert things to his or her color.

The game consists of an indefinite number of turns.
Each turn is broken down into a series of rounds.
In each round, both of the players are allowed to take one action.
After an action is selected, the appropriate amount of power is deducted from the players allotment for the turn.
When both players are out of power, the turn ends, some book-keeping is performed, and new power is allocated based on the configuration of the board at the end of the turn.

Essentially, a player gets 16 base-power points plus one point for every pad of his/her color on the board at the end of the previous turn.
One point is then deducted for every lock belonging to the player that was on the board at the end of the previous turn. Maximum power is 99 points.

Inspired by Spectral Sorcery / Jeff Makaiwi / 1988 / Atari ST / open source game.