by theygamesPerhaps my most anticipated free PC game of 2025 is finally about to open its doors to everyone. The Bazaar has been making the rounds in deckbuilding and strategy game circles since its closed beta release in October 2024. If you ever move in the Twitch or YouTube circles around games like Slay The Spire, Hearthstone, or TFT, there’s a good chance you’re already familiar with it – but until now, you could only join by purchasing one of the premium founders packs. Now, developer Tempo is ready to kickstart the road to full launch with the announcement of The Bazaar open beta release date.
Built by former professional Magic the Gathering and Hearthstone player Andrey ‘Reynad’ Yanyuk and his team at Tempo, The Bazaar is perhaps best described as a fusion of Hearthstone Battlegrounds and autobattlers such as Teamfight Tactics. It’s a deckbuilding card game that revolves around crafting a loadout of weapons, items, creatures, and locations that synergize well together, then putting them to the test against other players.
You start a run by picking from a range of heroes, each with a distinct play style. Vanessa is a perfect option if you like to play aggressively, with plenty of swords, cannons, and other nautical-themed trickery at her disposal. You can build her to stack a wide arsenal of weapons to barrage your foe, or pick just one damaging item and support it with cards that ramp up its power level to a tremendous level.
Robotic hero Dooley, by comparison, gathers all manner of cogs, cooling fans, and machinery to amplify big chain reactions that power up his core. He’s also accompanied by a range of robotic buddies that can apply debuffs such as poison and freeze, which you can then use to trigger additional effects.
As you journey through The Bazaar, you’ll encounter treasure chests, fights against monsters, and merchants – all of which give you the ability to pick up new items. You’ll then have to decide how best to arrange them on your board. Vanessa’s Captain’s Wheel, for example, will speed up the effects of items placed on either side of it, while Dooley’s Critical Core charges when items to its left activate, applying additional crit chance to itself and any items on its right.
All this planning culminates when you face off against another player’s build. As soon as the fight begins, each of your loadouts begins firing off its effects, triggering other items and continuing the chain reaction. It’s an incredibly satisfying fireworks display of chaos, culminating in one side reducing their opponent’s health bar to zero first to claim victory.
After much anticipation around when its open beta would begin, Yanyuk confirms that The Bazaar will officially become a free PC game this coming Wednesday March 5. “We finally got a build that we as a team played and felt that it had the bare minimum that we wanted for open beta,” he explains. “It’s far from perfect, but we feel that it has what it needs to open up The Bazaar to the world, and we’re excited to do that as soon as possible.”
The Bazaar open beta starts Wednesday March 5, 2025. Yanyuk notes that sales of the founder’s packs will end alongside this launch, so if you want to claim any of the cosmetic rewards included in those bundles you’ll need to buy it before that date – expect to pay between $33 and $99 depending on your chosen tier.
Alternatively, take a look through more of the best multiplayer games if you’re eager to prove your skills, and put your brain to the test in the best strategy games on PC in 2025.
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