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It’s a Kind of Magic - Magic the Gathering: Duels of the Planeswalkers By: PoisonRamune, the Apathetic Lizardman A couple months ago, Wizards of the Coast released a new Magic the Gathering game on the Xbox Live Arcade. While the game got fairly high reviews from critics, a lot of Magic the Gathering fans really didn’t like the game. But honestly, this game really isn’t made for active Magic (I will use “Magic” and “Magic the Gathering” interchangeably from here on out) players, but rather this is made to be a sort of introduction to the world of Magic. It makes sense to do this, as starting out in Magic the Gathering is relatively costly. Though there are cheap pre-made decks you can get for $10 or so, good luck trying to play someone in a competitive match with one. Wizards of the Coast being the marketing geniuses they are, must have realized this and offers you a nice stand alone Magic the Gathering experience (including online play) for the cost of one themed starter deck at your local retailer ($10).
If you never played Magic the Gathering, I’m not going to go in depth on exactly how to play, as this would take pages to text to do so; however, I will break down the basics for you. In Magic, your main objective is to deplete you opponent’s (or in some cases opponents’) life points before losing all of yours. Like the name “Magic” would imply, you do most of your damage with spells. Spell cards make up the majority of the Magic the Gathering card library and come in a variety of flavors. Damage causing spells can range from monsters that will attack your opponent to direct damage dealing cards such as fireballs. There are even defense spells like interrupts (which have the potential to negate an opponent’s spell) and spells that can “buff up” you and your monsters. To cast these spells you need the proper amount of “mana” which is indicated on the top right corner of each card. Mana comes in 5 colors represented by 5 “elements” (you’ll see why elements is quoted): red (fire/earth), green (plants/growth), black (death/decay), blue (water/air), and white (holy); and as you would guess, each of the spells have a native element. Your main sources of mana are from land cards which represent the various colors in Magic. Each land will yield one unit of mana of their respective color per turn, so mana management is an essential part of your strategy. There’s a lot more to this game than what I can explain in a few paragraphs, but there is a very easy to understand tutorial that will walk you through the entire process in the Live Arcade game.
Aside from a pretty blasé, yet thorough tutorial, Wizards of the Coast offers a really cool online mode in this game, called Mentoring. Basically this is really neat way for most experienced players to help newer players with Magic strategy and also a non-boring way to actually learn the game. I didn’t really get to try this mode out very much, mostly because I’ve played Magic 10-15 years ago and still remember the core rules. However, I do want to start mentoring people after I get used to the various cards in this edition. Speaking of modes, Magic the Gathering: Duels of the Planeswalkers does have quite a few modes to keep you busy. First mode you’ll notice is single player campaign, this is basically a gauntlet of 16 rounds against progressively harder AIs. You’ll pretty much play this once through, just to win: the other decks, auxiliary/advanced cards for your deck, and Xbox achievement points. There’s also a very fun “challenge” mode which I really like. Challenge mode is basically a collection of puzzles based on the Magic the Gathering play mechanics. Each challenge is set as such: you have a pre-selected set of cards in play and in your hand and must figure out a way to beat insurmountable odds to finish the challenge in a single turn. My only wish is that they gave you more of these puzzles, since I pretty much beat them all during an afternoon of drinking. In fact, I’d even pay another $10 for 25 or so more Magic puzzles as DLC.
There’s also a free/custom match mode and a 2 player co-op mode. Unfortunately for me, no one around here (that I’d like to hangout with) knows how to play Magic the Gathering or cares to play the Xbox Live version so I wasn’t able to try co-op mode out. On the online front you have the pretty much all the modes available for play, aside from campaign and challenge. While I did hear of some clunky online mechanics such as: the game randomly dropping players, gameplay freezes and other game ending glitches; I’ve honestly never experienced any of them. Perhaps they fixed this in the last 2 months since the games launch or maybe I’m just really lucky. One thing I can complain about the online system here is the fact that a lot of the players here are very sore losers. You’ll experience the normal: getting cussed out if you’re winning, people saying “fuck this” or the like then quitting mid-game, and people generally annoying you during the game as a sort of psychological tactic. This is more seen in the ranked games, but I’ve also seen it in the casual matches. However, this is pretty standard Xbox 360 faire and most likely nothing you’ve never seen before. There are a couple low points about the game that I must mention. The first is the fact that there is no deck customization whatsoever; at best you can just add the cards you’ve won in single player to their designated deck. I can see why they did this, since the game is more of a marketing tool to get you into Magic the Gathering and not really a full fledged Magic “simulator.” Also, the AI’s “thinking delay” is really pointless and just drags one player matches out longer than they should be. I mean, it’s nice to not get devastated by a barrage of spell cards and actions, but on the same note the computer honestly doesn’t need 10 seconds to plan its next move. We all know it has the next 10 moves through branching choices AI all planned out. Finally, it seems as if the challenge mode is rigged to only accept one right answer. Maybe I was tired or something, but I could have sworn I found an alternate way to beat puzzle 4 & 5 which would have probably netted me a damage achievement; however, the game would not accept that solution and would negate any damage done by my attacking monster (and there was no spell or effect in play that would warrant it). In terms of graphics, the game is pretty uninspired. There’s no epic battle animations or effects, it’s really like playing an actual card game with just a little fluff (cards will have a border of light as they’re being played, small claw marks will appear on monster cards that are taking damage, etc). The only effect that actually comes in handy here is the fact that they’ll levitate a card about a virtual inch off the play field if it has flying. This helps me a lot especially in challenge mode, since I can clearly see “Oh yes, that thing is going to swoop out of the sky and eat my elf. That may not be the best tactic to do an elf assault.” The audio is also uninspired, but appropriate. While the background music does get you in the proper mood to do some spell dueling, you’ll be very bored with it after a few matches (or in my case a few turns). I understand that these types of games aren’t like full production disc based games, but is it too much to ask to make more than one battle song? The sound effects are a bit cheesy and really do nothing more than substituting my annoying “clink, cla-cla-cla, graaaaawh!!” onomatopoeia with digitally produced foley. Though in the game’s defense, I guess any additional audio/visual extras here is a step up from playing with actual cards that only make a cardboardy slap noise when being played. I’d highly suggest this game if you’ve had a yearning to get into a collectible card game, but didn’t know where to start. I also suggest it to those that have played and enjoyed Magic in the past, but have stopped playing for whatever reason; since the game was like a welcome back party for me. You’ll get to see what Magic the Gathering is all about (or if you’re like me, see how it changed during the last 10 years) in a way that has very little potential for buyer’s remorse or that doesn’t makes you feel obligated to get into the game because you spent $60 on decent cards. If you actively play Magic the Gathering in card or PC form, I highly suggest you stay away from this game. You’ll find more enjoyment playing with your established decks and friends who understand that a losing match is sometimes part of the game.
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