i need help with my Card Game...


saiyankev's avatar
so i found this list on Magic The Gathering's website about the 10 things all games need, i wrote down what i could with what i have but i have nothing for 2 of em... mainly because they depend on other peoples opinions

The 10 things are:
Goal
Rules
Interaction
A Catch Up Feature
Inertia
Surprise
Strategy
Fun
Flavor
Hook

i got all but "Fun" and "Hook"
so, i need help with...
what about a card game helps catch your attention to want to try the game out?
and...what's fun about it that keeps you wanting to play more?
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cmd1095's avatar
hmm, as a TCG fan this is an interesting thing to consider.

Using the main two TCGs I've been a fan of as a base for my thoughts on this, Yugioh and Magic the Gathering

Yugioh brought me into it because of the show, when I was little i randomly flipped through channels and watched an episode, it seemed fun and when i received a deck as a gift I was pumped and got into it.

MTG I don't remember exactly how I got involved, I remember it had something to do with my seeing one of my parent's old decks and getting interested there.

So I can't provide you much in the way of useful insight on that front, but as for fun, that I can do better with.

For both TCGs the reason the game is enjoyable is in large part due to two factors. Deck building and competition. There is a certain kind of thrill when you take a look at all of your various cards, and suddenly you see a connection between them and envison how they'd interact with each other on the field in a way that might not be obvious at a glance.

"Oh! If I play this card while this one is on the field, I can use its effect to trigger the other's effect more easily and with less risk!"

That moment of revelation is exciting and enjoyable. Then your deck starts to come together and you have revelation after revelation as you work out the kinks. Then finally there's the finished product, your deck, crafted by you, with your own strategies and combos. There's a lot of pride that comes with that.

which leads us directly to the competition aspect. You take that shiny new deck you're so proud of and pit it against shiny new decks that others are proud of, and that moment when your combos work the way you envisioned and you win is just sublime. But even when you lose, when your opponent has a combo or counter you didn't or couldn't have seen coming, it can be a bit discouraging, but you learn from that and edit your deck with that knowledge, and when you win in the future that sublime feeling is even greater.

It's this sort of thing that makes trading card games so darn fun, and its important to look at an example where the lack of this caused the death of a game. I don't recall the name of the game, it was an online card game, but essentially there were like 5 different classes you could be, each one had a set of cards available to them at certain levels, and a much larger pool of cards that were there for everyone. While you could spend currency in game to buy packs and whatnot, the fact was in the end everyone was using pretty much the same stuff with only miniscule variations in the decks and styles of play. Battles came down mostly to the level of the combatants and their stats as a player, and a tiny bit of luck.

The game got dull really dang quick, there was no way for lower level players to close the gap with the upper levels, and the upper levels got bored since the outcome of each match was practically predetermined and everyone knew it, so nobody ever agreed to any matches cause one of them knew they would lose from the start, unless of course a high level was beating up on a low level which is also no fun.


Well, I've been rambling on for a bit now, I'll leave it at that. Hopefully the musings of a TCG lover are of use to you