Magic: The Gathering’s new virtual, free-to-play card game, Magic: The Gathering Arena, isn’t a direct simulation of the physical card game in the way that Magic Online is – with every single card and every unique set of rules. Instead, Arena is trying to translate the actual experience of playing Magic – of bluffing and deliberating – all with another player sitting across from you, analyzing your every move. It’s taking the community appeal of in-person events like Friday Night Magic, and making them accessible to players 24/7.
With that, of course, Arena does follow the rules and principles of Magic: The Gathering, with cards designed to look identical to those in the physical game. It has all of the cards available in the current rotation, and, based on the three hours I had with the game, absolutely appeared to stay true to core MtG. What’s more impressive, though, is that it also manages to be a fast, flowing game experience, with so many thoughtful ways of representing cards and what they do without cluttering the screen with text. Apparently all of this is much easier said than done, too, with three of the developers in the room telling me this was their most difficult development experience, topping even MMOs.
Letting you play Friday Night Magic 24/7.
Matches start with, of course, your deck of cards on one end of the playing field, and the opposing player’s on the other, with real-time animations to show you when they’re looking at a specific card, or if they’re moving things around in their deck. You can’t see their actual cards, but this is intended to give you a sense of their deliberation so it really feels like two players teaming up against each other, rather than two characters with avatars. From there, standard play has been modified in a few ways: - one is that every card on the field will be facing you, so that there’s no struggle with trying to read what your opponent has in their arsenal. Cards that are tapped don’t actually rotate, either, instead being a little greyed out with an arrow on top of them to indicate they’re currently in play.
I was impressed with the attractive conciseness of it all.
The usual text box disappears when a card is put onto the playing field so they feel slightly more like their own characters than like cards, but they’re also uniquely animated based on ability. Flying cards float, cards with summoning sickness have a circular pattern on their face, and things like trample or rage are visually represented, but usually only when they’re relevant to play, in the interest of keeping things clean, though you can always hover over a card to read everything it says. The same applies to turn-based countdown timers, which are always there, but hidden up until the point that a player might be running out of time, so that it doesn’t cause any unnecessary anxiety. All of these components, like the visualization of states and abilities that exist in Magic: The Gathering’s card game, have been translated into their own language, unique to each card, to make a faster, sleeker game experience. While some of these are still a little unclear and there is likely to be a learning curve to identify them, I was impressed with the attractive conciseness of it all.
Plenty of things are automated as well, with cards that can be played or attacked glowing green and any card that allows you to draw a specific thing from your deck immediately showing you the cards that comply (though you can see all of your cards, in case you want to use that opportunity to look through your deck). You can choose to block with everything or attack with everything at the click of a button, but Arena also has a “full control” mode, designed to give the more experienced players who might want it complete ownership of the playing field.
Beyond their unique visual states and animations, cards have fitting sound-effects, with the dinosaurs of my deck roaring upon summon. The sound design was all fairly pleasant, and the Planeswalkers -– which are basically Magic’s version of Superheroes -– are fully voice-acted for one of the first times ever. Planeswalkers take a special place on the field, away from other monsters, giving them an elevated status that was a cool touch for me as a Magic player, as was the map I played on. Maps in MtG Arena are designed to look like the different worlds in Magic, with the specific map I played featuring animations with butterflies swaying leaves, serving no purpose but to enhance the aesthetic appeal and immerse players deeper into the rich lore of the series. In every way, it’s intended to feel like a visualization of the world of Magic, without fully replacing cards with animated creatures, with the logic that that makes it feel less true to the visual identity of the game.
It's all about staying "true" to Magic.
Staying “true” to Magic was something that was brought up a lot while I was playing, as well as the importance of player feedback to the team. They’ll be launching a closed beta later this year, and consider fans to be a hugely useful resource for ensuring the authenticity of the game. It’s comforting to hear that, and there does seem to be a long-term plan to support the game. It’s set to launch with a tutorial for new players, and different game modes and maps will be added in, as well as a ranked ladder with matchmaking that’s ultimately designed for players to have a 50/50 win-loss rate, but those, and eSports plans, are still being worked out.
There were definitely some design decisions in the build that I didn’t love, like having to click to confirm that I wanted to attack with all of my monsters twice, once with a big green button, and second with a slightly smaller one above the ‘cancel’ button. Each time I mentioned something like this, though, I was met with acknowledgement and agreement, which hopefully contextualizes that this was an early alpha build. I’d mention more of the very minor complaints I had with Magic: The Gathering Arena, but I don’t doubt that most of them will be altered before the game reaches beta later this year.
Alanah Pearce is a writer at IGN, and has far too many Magic cards. Seriously. Send help.
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