Magician Lord is a 1990 action video game developed by Alpha Denshi and released for arcades by SNK. It was one of the first four games for the Neo Geo Multi Video System (MVS) and a pack-in game for the Neo Geo Advanced Entertainment System (AES). The plot follows Elta, a descendant of the "Magician Lord", on a journey across the land of Cadacis to find eight grimoires and seal the demon Gal Agiese before he can resurrect the god of destruction Az Atorse. The player controls Elta, who can transform into different beings by collecting elemental orbs.

Magician Lord was the first Neo Geo game produced by Akira Ushizawa, who had previously worked on Alpha Denshi titles such as Time Soldiers (1987), Sky Soldiers (1988), and Sky Adventure (1989). The team designed the game with the intention of releasing it on home consoles, but faced numerous challenges due to it being their first foray into Neo Geo development and the production environment of the time. Initially, the game was easier during location testing, but the team felt this would be boring and increased the difficulty for the final release. The soundtrack was scored Hideki Yamamoto, Hiroaki Shimizu, and Yuka Watanabe.

Magician Lord proved popular among North American arcade players and received generally favorable reviews. Critics praised the graphics, sound, and Elta's transformation mechanic. Many publications noted its difficulty, and some had mixed opinions on its gameplay, while criticism focused on the sprite animations. The game flopped in arcades but became the best-selling Neo Geo AES title at the time. Retrospective commentary in the years following its release have been mixed. A sequel for the Neo Geo Pocket was announced but never released.

Magician Lord is a side-scrolling action game. The story unfolds in the land of Cadacis, which was once on the brink of destruction by the appearance of a demon named Gal Agiese. He led a horde of monsters and sought to resurrect Az Atorse, the god of destruction. A young man, using all the magic at his disposal, destroyed the monsters and sealed Gal Agiese and Az Atorse inside eight grimoires. The people cheered the young man and hailed him as the "Magician Lord". Several centuries of peace passed until Gal Agiese broke the seal and revived, leading an attack on Cadacis and attempting to resurrect Az Atorse by opening the grimoires that had vanished one day. Elta, a descendant of the Magician Lord, embarks on a journey to find the grimoires and seal Gal Agiese away before he can resurrect Az Atorse.

The player controls Elta and fights enemies across eight stages. Elta can jump, climb ladders, crouch, and attack with magic shots in four directions. Each stage consists of a main area with doors leading to a trap-filled dungeon. The primary goal is to find the door that leads to the room where a miniboss is located. Defeating the miniboss leads to a battle against the main stage boss, and the player will obtain a grimoire upon defeating it. In each stage, there are scattered treasure chests containing items such as an extra life, valuables that award points, a power-up (P) orb that increases Elta's attack power by up to three levels, and elemental orbs.

There are three types of elemental orbs: fire (red), water (blue), and wind (green). By collecting two of them, and depending on the combination, Elta can transform into one of six different beings, including a dragon warrior, a waterman, a poseidon, a shinobi, a samurai, and a raijin. Each one possesses specific powers: the dragon warrior can breathe fire and aim diagonally at short range; the waterman can toss water balls that shoot out upon contact with the ground; the poseidon can send bursts of frozen water that turn into waves that spread across the ground; the shinobi can unleash spiraling magic bursts; the samurai can slash out medium-range wave projectiles from its magic sword; and the raijin can emit a barrage of thunder at short range. Each transformation also changes the player's attributes: the dragon warrior, waterman, and poseidon move slowly, while the shinobi, samurai, and raijin can jump high.

Elta's health bar starts with two hit points (three in the home version) and increases to four (six in the home version) upon transformation. Elta will revert to his normal form if his health bar returns to its initial hit points. Elta's attack power will also decrease by one level when hit by enemies, but collecting an elemental orb will restore his health bar. The player will lose a life once the health bar is depleted and will respawn at the place where they died, while in the home version they will respawn at a checkpoint. Once all lives are lost, the player can continue from where they died, while in the home version they return to the beginning of the stage. The player can save and resume their progress by using a Neo Geo memory card. The game also allows two players to participate by alternating turns.

Magician Lord was the first Neo Geo game developed by Alpha Denshi, an Ageo-based video game developer founded in 1980. Alpha Denshi had established a close relationship with SNK and collaborated on the hardware design of what would eventually become the Neo Geo. The game was produced by Akira Ushizawa, head of Alpha Denshi's second planning division, who had previously worked on titles such as Time Soldiers (1987), Sky Soldiers (1988), and Sky Adventure (1989). Ushizawa also worked as a graphic designer for the game's character sprites, along with Shinji Moriyama, head of planning and design at Alpha Denshi. Yukinori Nishikata, head of the programming section at Alpha Denshi, served as one of the game's programmers.