DC Deck Building Game

DC Deck Building Game

 

If you like your Super Heroes, then I'm sure this is right up your alley.

The DC Card Game is a collectible card game (CCG), wherein you use heroes to take down the villains along with their maniacal regime. The core of the game centers around the Justice League, with heroes like Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman, along with many of their super allies. There are different card types that you will come across, some start in your opening hand, such as Punches and Vulnerabilities, but more on those later. You will encounter many of the arch nemeses of the DC universe, in the form of Villain cards including; Bane, Poison Ivy and the Suicide Squad. Along with Super-Villain cards like Ra's Al Ghul and everyone's favorite grease painted, colourful psychopath, The Joker. 

Fear not though, because these villainous foes can be combated with another card type, Super Powers. Ranging from a humble Kick to X-Ray vision, these cards offer more resources as you square off against whatever rival rears their nefarious heads. Other card types include Locations and Weaknesses, so with acception to flavour, the art of the game doesn't really have any affect on the actual game play. However, this means you can expand your story told through the game. By having expansions like the DC Crisis and DC crossover Legion of Super-Heroes packs, and other core game sets like Teen Titans or Forever Evil, merging all of these together allows players to have a plethora of Heroes and Villains to play with. Utilizing each skill of those heroes against their adversary to save the day once again.

On with the game, and you start by randomly dealing out a Super-Hero card to each player. These Super-Heroes have effects throughout the game, for example regarding the amount of cards you played that turn giving you a Power bonus like Aqua man.  Now you shuffle the Main deck, containing cards types such as; Hero, Location, Equipment, non Kick Super-Power and Villain cards, the last two sometimes coming with additional effects that are represented on the card. Place the Main deck at one end of the play area and leave room for a line up of five cards next to it. At the other end, past the line up, put the stack of Super-Villains you're playing against, with a stack of Weaknesses one side and a stack of Kicks, that I mentioned earlier, on the other. Your starting deck contains seven Punch cards, serving as your primary resource, and three Vulnerability cards, serving the sole purpose to dilute your deck to prevent drawing all action, all the time. At the end of your turn, after you've made your plays and purchased your chosen cards, all of those along with your hand are put into your graveyard. You then draw a new hand of five cards, replace any empty slots in the line up from the top of the Main deck if any cards were purchased, and pass the turn to the next player.

The aim of the game is to use the Power on the cards you have in your personal deck to buy other cards from the Main deck's lineup, the cost of that card represented in the bottom right hand corner, then use those to defeat the Super-Villains. Different cards have different amounts of Power to be gained, for example the Punch cards you start have +1 Power. So, if you draw four Punch cards, you can play them all and have +4 Power to buy any amount of cards from the lineup costing up to four. Either one card costing four Power or two cards each costing two Power if that's available. Cards that you can obtain from the lineup will have +Power and other effects, giving you a bit of variety to play with, or if all else fails you can just by a Kick card that has +2 Power. Eventually, when you run out of cards to draw from your personal deck, you will shuffle your graveyard and it will become your new deck, ensuring that you will get to use your new cards soon.

You win the game when either you have defeated all Super-Villains, by which I mean purchase them in the same way you would any card in the line up, the only difference is they don't get put into your graveyard. Or if you cannot fill the five spaces in the line up. When this happens, players count the number of Victory Points on the cards in their decks, represented by the number in the star. Weaknesses, obtained due to negative effects of cards played or bought, subtract Victory Points. The highest total of Victory Points wins.

The crux of the game is the sculpting of your deck. This game can be played in a team or all on all, so sometimes you might be trying to find cards that have certain bonuses in certain locations or against specific Heroes. At other times you might be looking for things that give you and only you a boost and leaving other cards that may work better for another member in your party.

The core game play is reminiscent of drafting in MTG; picking and choosing the best cards to work in your deck to get maximum value out of them. So if you enjoy drafting and are looking for games that resemble it, like this or Dominion, a game that I'm sure ill take a look at soon, or if you're like me and you're looking to improve your drafting skills, look in the direction of the DC Card Game.

This is a fun game to play with two people and even better with a group of friends. The strategies that you can employ vary so much that it's always a new and interesting experience.

Hopefully this has given you a look into the world of CCG's and I'll be taking a look at other CCG's and Table Top games in the weeks to come. 

In the mean time, keep checking back to Game Changers for more updates.

B/G Delirium

B/G Delirium

Over this last weekend, most of the focus has been on the World Magic Cup 2016 with Greece seizing their moment and taking top spot. Today though, I would like to have a look at the Star City Games standard open in Knoxville, Tennessee which was taken down by the one and only Brad Nelson.

First, a quick break down of the day two meta game for Knoxville:

B/G Delirium – 37

W/U Flash – 31

Mardu Vehicles – 8

W/R Vehicles – 7

G/R Aetherworks – 5

B/R Zombies – 4

R/B Aggro – 4

B/G Aetherworks – 2

Jund Delirium – 2

W/U Humans – 1

W/R Humans – 1

B/W Control – 1

Bant Midrange – 1

Bant Aggro – 1

Sultai Emerge – 1

Temur Energy – 1

Jeskai Control – 1

Jeskai Aggro – 1

G/W Aggro – 1

W/R Midrange – 1

Under the top two decks, B/G Delirium and W/U Flash, there is quite a bit of diversity through the field, with the Mardu and W/R Vehicles decks along with various Aetherworks builds becoming the interesting decks to watch, with their fancy interactions and possible turn four 13/13’s. If you know Brad Nelson at all though you would be able to take a guess at what he was play from that list. That’s right, B/G Delirium. Right now, thought of as the best deck in the format, it just made sense for Brad to pick this up and go on a tear through the weekend. When we look at the Top 8 deck lists, that notion is certainly backed up with B/G Delirium making up half, closely followed by three W/U Flash decks and the final spot being taken up by the only Jeskai Control player on day two who ended up fighting it out with Nelson for first place.

As a deck, B/G Delirium is strong and does its job very well. The main aim is to use cards like Grapple with the Past and Vessel of Nascency to fill your graveyard, enabling Delirium and adding more card types, making your Emrakul cheaper. That’s the long game though, in the meantime B/G Delirium is a mid-range deck with some very hard questions to answer.

Like Grim Flayer, this 2/2 creature with trample for GB can get out of hand very quickly, easily becoming a 4/4 as soon as turn three thanks to its Delirium ability. Grim Flayer also allows you look at the top three cards of your library, put any number of those into your graveyard and the rest back on top in any order, whenever it deals combat damage to a player. An early enabler for both itself and the late game Emrakul I mentioned earlier. This deck is full of cards bursting with value, all of which can turn the tide of a game.

Playing B/G Delirium isn’t hard but it’s by no means easy. Yes, you can make a couple of Grim Flayers, get enough card types into your graveyard to make them 4/4’s, drop a Liliana, the Last Hope and ride it out. Or you could use a mix of Vessel of Nascency and Grapple with the past to stack your graveyard and fix your hand, take out all of your opponent’s creatures with your spot removal, tutor up an Emrakul, the Promised End, take your opponent’s turn and completely waste their resources, leaving them defenceless to your oncoming 13/13.

B/G Delirium had a big showing in Knoxville over the weekend, so watching the mirror matches were inevitable and interesting. Watching both players trade off Clues, Grapple with the pasts and Vessel of Nascencys, trying to find a card to give them the edge. There is a lot of set up in the mirror match what with both players knowing the exact build their opponent is playing, give or take a few cards. The really interesting stuff comes with picking your spot, finding the right time to strike. A lot of Emrakul followed by opposing Emrakul happened which meant it was hard to remember whose turn it was and who was controlling it. But watching each player choose slightly different paths with the deck, playing around certain cards or using cards at different times, reacting to their opponent’s plays, it was interesting to see who understood what kind of deck they were piloting.

 I will now reveal the main focus of this article. As interesting as the deck is and in this particular time in the Magic Standard meta game, B/G Delirium has really shown its place in the top tier decks, what about the pilot?

Brad Nelson spent a lot of the weekend playing on camera which meant, if you were watching, you got to witness him rattled off win after win to secure third place and a spot in the top 8. Brad is a fantastic player but what was apparent in this instance is that, no one in the room knew their role in the match up better than him. This doesn’t just mean knowing your deck or knowing your opponent’s deck. What I mean by knowing your role is, for example; you may be playing a control deck, so you want to sit back and counter all the spells. What if your opponent has a slow start? What if you can play an early creature and possibly do a considerable amount of damage, do you? That’s not what a control deck traditionally does, but does that mean it’s wrong to do it? In Brad’s case, he is very good at playing most types of strategy so this may come naturally to him. As he watched his opponent going through the motions, playing their deck as they would in testing perhaps, he was able to punish them because they weren’t playing against B/G Delirium correctly. A lot of players know what their deck does and will play for that. Brad understands that you can’t always be on the defensive or constantly attacking either, seeing the intricate interactions and having perfect timing both playing his cards and bluffing his opponent. He definitely deserved the trophy at Knoxville and after finding the current “best deck”, I’m sure we have more strong performances from Brad to come.

The lesson I took away from the Knoxville open was, understanding the ever changing situation no matter what deck you find yourself playing against. Like my control deck conundrum above, you may not always find yourself in a place that you can carry out your normal plan and you’ll have to adapt on the fly. You can’t spend every round of a tournament trying to do the same thing because it doesn’t always work that way. I’m sure there are videos of most of the rounds that were on camera on YouTube which I would urge you to watch. Or check out Starcitygames.com for coverage reports and deck lists, but as always keep checking back to Game Changers for more updates.

Upcoming Games In 2017

This week, I'm going to be taking a look at whats to come this year, giving us something to look forward to after 2016 may have left some of us feeling a bit blue.

Mass Effect Andromeda

Probably the most awaited game of 2017, Mass Effect Andromeda is the fourth Mass Effect game brought to us by Bioware. Bioware are very good at writing games and it seems that they have really latched on to the space exploration theme wherein you meet many a person of different races, creeds and origins. A lot to go deep on the writing with, the problem that shows its head with Andromeda is, the smell of retreading old ground. Not always a complaint to go back to what worked, the names are all changed as well as the main character, but in a world so rich as the Mass Effect world I'm sure there will always be another story to tell.

Resident Evil VII

Resident Evil - or in this games case "Resident EVII" evoking roman numerals in a short sighted attempt to get the number into the title, although I guess its better than Fe3ar or Thi4f at least - has always been a fun, if a little cooky, survival horror game. Wandering through towns, routinely smashing crates and boxes looking for ammo and herbs, all the while popping the heads of whichever inhabitants or Residents if you will, that are under some sort of manipulation or virus, thus turning them Evil. The name has always kind of made sense, but in this installment its gone more literal. After coming to the middle of nowhere to find your wife, you end up in this mansion that wants nothing more than to see you dead, so now you are located in an evil residence rather than shooting at the oncoming hoard of evil residents. As a fan of the Resident Evil series, I've been looking forward to this for a while, it is the first Resident Evil game from a first person perspective, from other games that wouldn't have made sense because you need to be able to see around you when the camera wont behave. In this case its more for immersion, as well as this game being designed for use with VR (Virtual Reality) which looks very interesting. Staples like puzzles, inventory management and of course herbs are all going to be present in this installment, however I wouldn't go into this expecting as many opportunities to shoot heads off with a shotgun as in previous games, as this is more about survival horror in a sense of running and hiding not in the sense of "someones trying to kill me, better shoot their kneecaps out and suplex them to death."

Scalebound

Another one I've been keeping my eye on. It looked like an intriguing premise to me, a mix of Japanese role playing games (JRPS) such as Final Fantasy, spectacle fighters like Devil May Cry and western role playing games like Skyrim. You get to run around an fantasy open world environment, slashing through enemies, oh and did I forget to mention you can command a big, fire-breathing dragon to swoop down on your opposition and gobble them up. Sounds great doesn't it? Well, by the end of 2017 Scalebound will have hit the shelves and I have a feeling might become one of the games of the year. 

Death Stranding

Hideo Kojima's new IP after Metal Gear Solid is set to make some waves in 2017. Not much is known about the game itself, but with a name like Kojima's behind it, you would imagine it has a lot to offer in both story and game-play, especially if Metal Gear Solid is anything to go by - a lot of words and the talky talk without actually saying anything, and many mechanics introduced throughout game time resulting in almost a Swiss army knife attempt at game-play. This could be the start of a big new series for Kojima, but until we see what the game is, nothing can really be said.

For Honor

I'm sure you've heard or seen something about For Honor. After its announcement last year at E3, it feels like its gone from strength to strength, finally to be release this year. As it looks, For Honor is very detailed and finely tuned actions hack and slasher, featuring historical soldiers for you to play as in a medieval fantasy setting. Pick from Knights, Samurai and Vikings to utilize their speed, cunning and sheer brute force to overcome your opponents. Seems simple to understand but I'm sure will turn out to be very hard to master. This is a very interesting game in my opinion;  I like only having three main playable character types, all with four sub-types each, as it keeps it easily balanced, especially in comparison to something like Overwatch. The setting is another plus point for me as I feel mythical fantasy is such a rich vein that granted many have tapped in to, but the detail that lies within, if captured and portrayed correctly, can really make a game come to life.

Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

  This is going to be my reason for buying a Nintendo Switch as I have been keeping my eye on Breath of the Wild for a long time now. Originally set for a Wii U exclusive release in 2015, it was delayed twice over the upcoming years and had to settle for a 2017 release instead. Don't worry though, even with six years between this and the last Zelda game on the Wii, from the look of the trailers at least, its keeping true to the feel of the Zelda universe. Nineteenth in the series but the first Zelda game in HD, Breath of the Wild brags a huge, expansive open world environment and advanced physics engine to go with those gorgeous graphics that have been teased out over the last couple of years. I'm sure this will draw players in like many a Zelda game before it and I for one cant wait to be playing this over and over, discovering every little detail and mechanics used.

So that's been my look at some of the games to come and what I think could be some of the picks of the year. I'm sure I'll be taking a look at these in more detail over the next twelve months in addition to others - cough cough Red Dead Redemption 2, but until then keep checking back to Game Changers for more news and updates.

Trials Fusion

Trials Fusion

 Motorbikes and frustrating physics, sound interesting?

Trials Fusion is the third installment of Redlynx's Trails games. Games based around accelerating, braking and leaning backwards and forward on your motorbike to complete tracks. No turning, the camera does all the corners for you and you just worry about the next oncoming jump or obstacle. This is probably going to be more about the franchise rather than just one game, as they all employ similar game play, but its still cool to hit a sweet ramp and do five front flips in the air.

So as I said, Trials is a motorbike game. Not your everyday motorbike game though, instead of riding in a circle, Trials takes a sudo side scrolling-third person view, using hybrid-3D graphics running on a 2D axis. Whenever you hit a turn, the camera pans around to reveal more track leaving you to worry about Trials other feature, the physics engine. Not that other motorbike games don't have physics, but Trials uses the rider's as well, meaning you can shift back and forth to generate slight momentum. Mainly being used for bunny hops across various incarnations of platform, but also being employed to keep your bike on two wheels as you ascend a particularly steep hill. Using two analog sticks an two triggers makes Trials simple to learn but hard to master. There is one last button though, a button that will make you curse your twitchy, Call of Duty (COD) style reflexes. While riding through tracks you come across checkpoints that you respawn at when you crash, the B button will also cause you to respawn at your time of choosing. This results in controller destroying game play when you accidentally hit the respawn button just as you finally land a jump after the thirtieth try. Saying that, Trials is very good at being addictive; one moment you're playing through the story and getting the lean before the jump down, then four hours later you find yourself laboriously going back through all previously played tracks to gold medal them all. It hits that completionist part of me I think, mixed with the stubbornness not to try another level until this one is beaten, and then it puts you into a trance. Once you've played a track ten or so times, you start to memorize the jumps and how to land to get maximum speed on the next jump. It all starts to get very methodical, but that's satisfying. Clearly marking out your plan of action and having it executed perfectly, step by step, is a feeling that's hard to beat, and this game offers it in spades. Provided you haven't thrown your controller out the window or through the TV in frustration of previous attempts of course.

Trials Fusion has added a couple of things to the Trials formular, firstly a couple of disembodied voices; SynDi and George, to tag-along on your motoring journey and sometimes teach you some new things. One of those things being tricks. You use the right analog stick while in the air to control your rider, moving it in certain ways to perform different tricks. These aren't just for show either. There are events where you need to rack up a certain amount of points to gain a medal. Most of the time they are being used in normal races if just to liven up the previous games "tricks" consisting of front flips and back flips.

As much replay-ability that Trials has, this game comes into its own when played with friends. Get three mates, some pizza and some beers and let the fun and shouting begin. 

Everybody sees the race from a side-on view but riders change position for each race. So, someone might be right at the from with a clear vision in one race, then shoves to the back of the screen the next. The fun here is trying to remember what colours your rider was as the games gives your three very quick seconds before hedging your bets and just holding accelerate. I have spend the first couple of jumps in a race, every now and again, thinking I'm controlling another rider while mine is flipping and crashing two lanes over. The other good part of multiplayer is turning "No bail" off. Doing this means that you get the effects of another button usually shut off in story mode, the Y button. Pressing Y causes your rider to launch themselves from their bikes in whichever way they may be facing. Usually this would count as a bail and you would respawn. In this case however, it can be abused towards the end of the race by catapulting your rider towards the finish line, the best part being if they cross it, it counts. Many a friend have been rendered furious as they witness my ragdollised pilots flying gaily through the air, sailing past them and taking first with no right at all.

Trials is a lot of fun and very good to play in short bursts, lest the anger get the better of you, or with friends. All three are solid games and can give you hours of fun and a thought out, patient style of play to go with the result. And don't to Bail.

Keep checking back to Game Changers for more updates.

Nintendo Switch Update

Nintendo Switch Update

 

Recently, there has been a slight leak if you will about the Nintendo Switch's price point.

GameSeek put up the upcoming console on their website for pre-order at £198.50 (probably to be rounded up to £200), also stating that the prices are guaranteed so if you pre-order and the price increases, you don't pay anymore than the pre-order price. However, if the price decreases you will still have to pay the pre-order price, but I think it's safe to say that it wont be decreasing based on every console that has come before it.

As odd as this looks, and with no comment from Nintendo, it only seemed right when GameSeek revealed that every customer that has pre-ordered the switch has been refunded.  

I think someone jumped the gun here, maybe due to over excitement or maybe due to marketing "slipping up" and subtly dropping a price on us, my monies on the second one.

Keep checking back to Game Changers for more updates on the Nintendo Switch as they happen and more gaming news.

Contrast

Contrast

 

Contrast opens on the shadow of a woman putting her daughter to bed while you stand in the corner watching. It’s not as creepy as it sounds, at least the standing in the corner bit, as you find out Dawn - the character you control, is only the manifestation of the daughter’s - Didi, imaginary friend. That clears one of those oddities up, so just that shadow thing then. Shadows are Contrast’s main mechanic; Dawn can turn from 3D character model into a shadow, using other shadows cast by objects to walk on. Didi, also represented in a 3D character model but unable to turn into a shadowy figure, is the plot device, kind of, in a loose term at least. All other characters are shown as black splodges on the walls leading me to believe the core mechanic was born as a result of the companies rendering abilities or lack thereof. Not a problem though, as I feel it adds to Contrast’s charm with its dark, twenties era, vaudevilley little world and all the shadow manipulation works well in this puzzle-platformer.

As you make your way through Contrast, you will come across various cogs, buildings and even a model solar system to illuminate and use the silhouettes to be on your way. Moving a light around a room to find the perfect platform to create offers a decent amount of variety. Granted it all gets you to the same place, but you aren’t forced to find the one and only thing the level designer put in the right position. Exploration is encouraged, to be able to find a box to press down a button or power cell to restart a machine for example. Though this does become trivial towards the end of the game, Contrast isn’t that long and it does what it can with lighting to good effect. 

Back to story town and, as I was saying earlier, this part of the game focuses on Didi. This little girl is constantly running from point to point, showing you the next objective and giving you little pieces of backstory. Through this adventure, you witness Didi talking to her mother and later her father as she tries to bring her family back together. This getting a bit awkward later, when she finds out the deadbeat she was lead to believe was her dad is in fact just an unrelated, regular old deadbeat with mob debt to boot. Maybe I should have spoiler alerted that but it’s not that big of a twist when it happens, I think it was intended to be a bigger plot point but was probably cut down to make room for more shadow puzzles. Didi doesn’t seem so surprised either, shrugging off the estranged father thing one minute and almost throwing a hissy fit because the theme park ride she was on broke down the next. A little inconsistent with the voice actor me thinks, but good for the most part. The story culminates in a nice, possibly slightly weird way. You find your real father, some sort of steampunk wizard, and it turns out he didn’t even want you, another slice of info Didi pretty much waves off while barely paying attention. Your family reunite with one less wizard dad and plus one deadbeat, lessons learned of love and caring and then roll credits. 

Contrast is an interesting idea but I couldn’t shake this feeling of it being a bit rushed. A couple more puzzles in each act and spending a little more time on them would help the game I think. Maybe using this mechanic in another environment, that offers more of a free roam feel, could be very effective. As it stands Contrast is a neat tech demo with a thin story, it’s about three hours all in all but worth a play.

Keep checking back to Game Changers for more updates.