Gwent
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Gwent started life as a CCG in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt, and thanks to gamers the world over, CD Projekt RED has brought Gwent into the real world. Regardless of whether gamers play the mini-game or standalone version, the rules are the same: players use cards to win rounds, best two out of three wins the match. Since Gwent is meant to simulate a war between two armies, players need to think 10 moves ahead. It’s easy to use your best cards to win one round, but is it such a good idea if it leaves you with nothing for the other two? Gwent is the epitome of the phrase, “You may have won the battle but not the war.”
The Elder Scrolls: Legends
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Most CCGs feature one great big battlefield where creature cards can skirmish as much as they want, but The Elder Scrolls: Legends mixes up the standard formula with the introduction of lanes. No, it isn’t a CCG MOBA, but the lanes add a new layer of strategy. Do you place cards in an empty lane to sneak past powerful opposing cards and strike at your opponent directly, or do you place cards in an occupied lane so you don’t get steamrolled? Add in the “Prophecy” feature that lets players draw a new card whenever they lose a certain amount of health and potentially play that card immediately, and you have a recipe for a tug of war bound to keep both players on edge.
Chronicle: RuneScape Legends
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Chronicle: Runescape Legends just might be the most unorthodox CCG ever made. Instead of laying down minions and spells that damage opponents, players place enemies and treasure on a game board for their character tokens to encounter. Each card represents a step on a hero’s journey, slaying skeletons and looting legendary swords. As players progress through the match, they amass power, and everything culminates in a duel to the death between each player’s character, assuming one character doesn’t die along the way. Chronicle: Runescape Legends is fairly novel as far as CCGs go, which is always good in a potentially over-saturated market.
Fable Fortune
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Fable Legends might not be seeing the light of day anytime soon (or ever), but at least this game exists. Fable Fortune hits the same notes as Hearthstone and utilizes the morality system that made the Fable franchise famous. As players complete in-game quests, they can pick different rewards that also provide “morality points,” which can transform certain cards. The game also maintains the main series’ quirky British humor. If nothing else, Fable Fortune is probably the best entry in the Fable franchise since the first game.
Magic Duels
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Of course Magic Duels was going to make it on this list. It’s freakin’ Magic, the CCG all other CCGs wish they were. Magic Duels is just Magic: The Gathering reimagined as a free-to-play digital game. It doesn’t have any additional gameplay mechanics, but it doesn’t need any, because it’s Magic: The freakin’ Gathering.
Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Links
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It’s time to d-d-d-d-d-d-d-d-duel! Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Links plays out just like the physical version of Yu-Gi-Oh! but with several tweaks, such as smaller deck sizes and fewer duplicate cards — for the sake of faster matches. Oh, and Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Links provides a little extra spectacle with plenty of over-the-top voice clips from the show (or maybe they were re-recorded, I can’t tell) and 3D models/animations for the most iconic cards in the franchise. You can’t go wrong with a 3D Blue-Eyes White Dragon.
Hex: Shards of Fate
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Single-player is a major aspect of Hex: Shards of Fate. Players can not only collect cards and upgrade their decks to conquer the robust single-player campaign, they can also create and level up hero characters with talents, skills, and abilities that would be at home in any RPG. While gamers can’t use their custom characters in PvP matches, they have access to plenty of pre-made heroes with their own play styles. Many of the game mechanics in Hex: Shards of Fate might be familiar to those who have played other CCGs, but this game blows most others out of the water with its selection of heroes.
Duelyst
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A good strategy can make or break a match in a CCG, but usually that strategy revolves around predicting/countering an opponent’s moves and playing cards that synergize with each other. Duelyst adds a new wrinkle with the feature to move cards around the game board. Positioning is key, as many cards become stronger when next to each other, but doing so leaves them open to be wiped out with a single spell. If you’re a fan of tactical games like Fire Emblem and XCOM, you’ll love Duelyst.
Ascension: Deckbuilding Game
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Ascension: Deckbuilding Game is what happens when three Magic: The Gathering tournament champions create a fast-paced game with all the deckbuilding strategy of a regular CCG without forcing players to buy card packs for that one special, ultra-rare card. All the super-powerful cards a player could ever want are readily available in the game; all they have to do is win it during the match. As game sessions progress, players grow their decks with plenty of powerful cards that help them obtain even more powerful cards, but instead of fighting other players, players earn points. Whoever has the most points wins. Don’t let the end-goal fool you, though; Ascension is extremely competitive, and matches can turn around in just one move.
SolForge
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SolForge is as simple as it gets. Draw five cards, play two, battle, discard the rest and draw five new cards, let the opponent go, repeat until someone is defeated. This keeps matches fast-paced by replacing the mana systems in other CCGs with a leveling system. Each time a card is played, a stronger version is placed in the discard pile and reshuffled into the deck to be drawn later. SolForge is designed to make sure players stay on the offensive, and in the game, the best defense is a good offense.
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