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The creator of 'Magic: The Gathering' knows where it all went wrong

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Re: The creator of 'Magic: The Gathering' knows where it all went wrong

#31

Post by Dwedit »

hobs wrote: post #27
mxwsn wrote: post #13

Part of the original magic that Garfield talks about, the player experience of discovering a world of cards you've never seen before, is captured by recent video games like Inscryption (especially) and Slay the Spire. Dominion is also an excellent game as the progenitor of the deck-building game genre, where you build a deck from scratch inside each game (and Inscryption/Slay the Spire descend from), rather than outs…

And I will never be unsad about dominion.isotropic.org shutting down with its dead simple and fast dominion implementation, they promised to take it down if the company ever did its own thing and they did and you had to buy every expansion and it generally sucked.

There's two Dominion Online games now, one from Temple Gates Games where you buy expansions, and the other one from ShuffleIt which is subscription-based.

At least the Temple Gates version honors past purchases made on Making Fun dominion, even if they came from a Humble Bundle.

Re: The creator of 'Magic: The Gathering' knows where it all went wrong

#32

Post by paulpauper »

itsdrewmiller wrote: post #12

The guy who invented the power 9 complaining about these new designers making rares that are too good… right. Also the hate on Arena is bizarre - it’s not perfect but it is polished and works well on (at least) iPhone PC and Mac.

The power 9 became so powerful when later on it became possible to make combo decks that could win within 5 turns

Re: The creator of 'Magic: The Gathering' knows where it all went wrong

#33

Post by preordained »

getwiththeprog wrote: post #4

Linked from the article are the pre release testing cards.. According to Garfield - it all went wrong after this! Magic with it's twice a year new sets and pay-to-win is not what he had envisioned. https://www.magiclibrarities.net/955-rarities-alpha-beta-gam...

"pay-to-win"

Yah, good luck with that. Anyone who has played competitively knows you will absolutely get stomped by a higher skill opponent even if your deck is more powerful on paper unless the discrepancy is ludicrous. Garfield made his game too well to fall to such trite criticisms...he outdid himself, its immune to his own potshots, lol

Re: The creator of 'Magic: The Gathering' knows where it all went wrong

#34

Post by chii »

_aavaa_ wrote: post #29
itsdrewmiller wrote: post #12

The guy who invented the power 9 complaining about these new designers making rares that are too good… right. Also the hate on Arena is bizarre - it’s not perfect but it is polished and works well on (at least) iPhone PC and Mac.

> Also the hate on Arena is bizarre - it’s not perfect but it is polished and works well on (at least) iPhone PC and Mac. The hate against arena isn't due to lack of polish or it not working well, it's about what it's trying to do. It's not about collecting or trading cards anymore it's about opening as many loot boxes (packs) as possible. MTGA let you purchase specific cards, Arena does not and likely never will. Th…

but physical card packs have had this "issue" since inception of magic the gathering. Understandably, the digital cards don't have the same physical manifestation and thus feel like it could be taken away at any time, but the loot box mechanic is no different to the random booster packs you'd buy.

Re: The creator of 'Magic: The Gathering' knows where it all went wrong

#35

Post by sshine »

awithrow wrote: post #26
mxwsn wrote: post #13

Part of the original magic that Garfield talks about, the player experience of discovering a world of cards you've never seen before, is captured by recent video games like Inscryption (especially) and Slay the Spire. Dominion is also an excellent game as the progenitor of the deck-building game genre, where you build a deck from scratch inside each game (and Inscryption/Slay the Spire descend from), rather than outs…

Its probably the nostalgia talking but a lot of the early magic was the art as well. It was professional enough to look good but not so polished that it didn't have its own character. I had favorite artists and it was always fun just admiring the art. The new cards just don't capture me the same way. Something about them is too polished or too homogenized. They don't leave any room for imagination. I feel the same wa…

They have a lot more narrative control over the artwork now.

A thing I disliked (as a kid) about the old cards, as they transitioned to these more homogenised styles, was how wildly different the cards looked. It didn’t feel like one game, and there were many artistic styles I simply didn’t like.

But looking back now, the old cards artwork is so much more iconic; in part because of the nostalgia, but in part because each card is different from those drawn by other artists, you remember them better apart.

Re: The creator of 'Magic: The Gathering' knows where it all went wrong

#36

Post by mrbluecoat »

> We send all the flattened Magic packaging and booster packs to the prison and the inmates do the product fulfillment.

Was that a joke or serious? I was enjoying the article until that abrupt end and it just felt dark. A company forcing imprisoned humans to distribute their product?

Re: The creator of 'Magic: The Gathering' knows where it all went wrong

#37

Post by idle_zealot »

chii wrote: post #34
_aavaa_ wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Also the hate on Arena is bizarre - it’s not perfect but it is polished and works well on (at least) iPhone PC and Mac. The hate against arena isn't due to lack of polish or it not working well, it's about what it's trying to do. It's not about collecting or trading cards anymore it's about opening as many loot boxes (packs) as possible. MTGA let you purchase specific cards, Arena does not and likely never will. Th…

but physical card packs have had this "issue" since inception of magic the gathering. Understandably, the digital cards don't have the same physical manifestation and thus feel like it could be taken away at any time, but the loot box mechanic is no different to the random booster packs you'd buy.

When people want a specific physical MtG card they will purchase it from another person or broker, not open loads of packs hoping to get it.

Re: The creator of 'Magic: The Gathering' knows where it all went wrong

#38

Post by throwup238 »

chii wrote: post #34
_aavaa_ wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Also the hate on Arena is bizarre - it’s not perfect but it is polished and works well on (at least) iPhone PC and Mac. The hate against arena isn't due to lack of polish or it not working well, it's about what it's trying to do. It's not about collecting or trading cards anymore it's about opening as many loot boxes (packs) as possible. MTGA let you purchase specific cards, Arena does not and likely never will. Th…

but physical card packs have had this "issue" since inception of magic the gathering. Understandably, the digital cards don't have the same physical manifestation and thus feel like it could be taken away at any time, but the loot box mechanic is no different to the random booster packs you'd buy.

You could still buy individual cards from people who opened physical packs which meant that the price of a booster box didn't hurt so bad. You could sell a bunch of cards in it and the whole system worked because everyone had 10-100x more cards than they could ever use, creating a great secondary economy.

Re: The creator of 'Magic: The Gathering' knows where it all went wrong

#39

Post by _aavaa_ »

chii wrote: post #34
_aavaa_ wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Also the hate on Arena is bizarre - it’s not perfect but it is polished and works well on (at least) iPhone PC and Mac. The hate against arena isn't due to lack of polish or it not working well, it's about what it's trying to do. It's not about collecting or trading cards anymore it's about opening as many loot boxes (packs) as possible. MTGA let you purchase specific cards, Arena does not and likely never will. Th…

but physical card packs have had this "issue" since inception of magic the gathering. Understandably, the digital cards don't have the same physical manifestation and thus feel like it could be taken away at any time, but the loot box mechanic is no different to the random booster packs you'd buy.

The physical game absolutely does not have this issue.

1. First of all, you could print proxies when playing with friends to try out card.

2. You could buy individual cards from other players or your local game shop.

3. You could sell your cards.

The previous iteration (MTGA) had both 2 and 3 as part of the game. What's more, they would let you "cash out" your digital cards for physical cards.

You were not required to get cards by opening packs (which I agree is the ancestor of digital loot boxes). But Arena got rid of any way of getting cards outside of "lootboxes" because they want to get as much money out of your as possible, not because it's better for the game.

Re: The creator of 'Magic: The Gathering' knows where it all went wrong

#40

Post by johtso »

awithrow wrote: post #26
mxwsn wrote: post #13

Part of the original magic that Garfield talks about, the player experience of discovering a world of cards you've never seen before, is captured by recent video games like Inscryption (especially) and Slay the Spire. Dominion is also an excellent game as the progenitor of the deck-building game genre, where you build a deck from scratch inside each game (and Inscryption/Slay the Spire descend from), rather than outs…

Its probably the nostalgia talking but a lot of the early magic was the art as well. It was professional enough to look good but not so polished that it didn't have its own character. I had favorite artists and it was always fun just admiring the art. The new cards just don't capture me the same way. Something about them is too polished or too homogenized. They don't leave any room for imagination. I feel the same wa…

I agree, I find so much of the art of modern magic cards completely uninspiring. They all look the same. Old magic cards had an element of the strange and the quirky. Sometimes the designs bordered on naive. Hand painted illustrations had a distinctly human touch. And the illustrations were punchy and had contrast. You knew exactly what a card was from a distance. A lot of the modern art is just polished, air brushed fantasy cliche. Muddy. Too much detail. A distinct lack of the surreal or abstract. Too thematically consistent.

Just compare an old set to a modern set: 1995 https://scryfall.com/sets/4ed 2024 https://scryfall.com/sets/mkm

An abstract oil painting https://scryfall.com/card/4ed/104/stasis An unsettling watercolour https://scryfall.com/card/4ed/181/cave-people

Sometimes less is more! Realism is boring.

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