Riot Games recently launched Riftbound, a trading-card game based on the wildly popular League of Legends franchise. While the first thought that comes to mind when coming across a new TCG in an overcrowded market is usually “another one?” I’m here to tell you that not only does Riftbound have a strong foundation for a casual/competitive game, it actually improves and fixes many mechanics seen in other TCGs. Most notably, Riftbound addresses my biggest issues with Magic: The Gathering and its 30-year-old design that at times feels wildly outdated. Here’s a breakdown of just some of the many improvements I noticed while playing Riftbound as a seasoned Magic player. Casual Yet Competitive One of my least favorite aspects of Magic is having to juggle multiple decks for multiple situations. When playing Limited, I have to build a 40-card deck. When playing Pauper or Vintage, I have to maintain 60-card decks. When playing Commander with friends at the local brewery, I have to carry around a 100-card behemoth of a deck. The different formats all carry their own restrictions and decklists and it can be a lot to maintain for a single card game. This issue doesn’t exist for Riftbound, as any 40-card deck you buy or build is good for use in 1v1, 2v2, and three- or four-player Free-for-All. While any TCG can inspire the “grinding” mindset that comes with entering competitive play, I find myself regularly playing casual Riftbound matches simply because the game scales so well without deck modifications. It encourages the mindset of building a single deck and being able to play it in multiple formats, and means my Jinx deck that I’m so proud of can be shown off a lot more. To learn a bit more about this design choice of scalable formats, I talked with Nik Davidson, game design architect over at Riot Games.Continue Reading at GameSpot

The new League of Legends trading card game takes familiar mechanics and streamlines them in smart ways.

Although Dragon Quest is one of the most popular game series in the East, it has never quite caught on in the West. Released under the banner of Square Enix, the series was often overshadowed by sister series Final Fantasy. While this never stopped any mainline entry from being released in the West (except for X, which is an MMO), I can’t help but feel that Dragon Quest never got the due it deserved. Its pedigree and influence is rooted in some of the earliest examples of role-playing games, and each game in the series utilizes that inspiration to craft a wonderful experience with mass appeal and its own ingenuity.. With all that said--and the recent release of Dragon Quest I & II - HD-2D Remake--it’s time for you to finally play Dragon Quest. The case for playing Dragon Quest begins with the start of the RPG genre as a whole. When Wizardry: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord released in 1981, it helped define what would later become known as the dungeon-crawler, a type of role-playing experience that asked players to form a party of various heroes with gear and venture into an unknown space to fight monsters and seek treasures. Wizardry streamlined the dice rolling and stat math of Dungeon & Dragons and condensed it into video game form, allowing players to venture into the same peril of their tabletop on their glowing screens for the first time ever. Ultima followed soon after, and took this new, streamlined version of tabletop role-playing games and added an explorable open world to the mix. What was once relegated to hexagonal graph paper and imagination was now fully playable in the digital realm of entertainment. Wizardry and Ultima were some of the first examples of what gamers everywhere would come to know as RPGs.Continue Reading at GameSpot

Hot off the heels of its introductory set Origins, Riot Games is already expanding on their popular League of Legends trading card game Riftbound with a new set. The set, titled Spiritforged, is set to expand the mechanics of the approachable yet deep card game in new and exciting ways.Glorious Executioner and Spinning Axe cards. First up, are the new Equipment cards. These are a new subtype that can be attached to units to make them even more powerful. The best part about Equipment? Even if your unit is killed in battle, they stay in play for you to equip another unit providing a great deal of value. One of the most exciting new pieces of Equipment is Draven’s signature Spinning Axe. This piece of equipment can be played as a Reaction instantly, and provides a +3 bonus that’s sure to catch opponents off guard. Combine this with Draven, Glorious Executioner's effect to draw a card every time he wins a combat and your opponents won't know what hit them.Continue Reading at GameSpot

Minor spoilers for Hades and Hades II to follow--read at your own discretion. Since its inception, Supergiant Games has built up a reputation around high-quality story experiences with deep gameplay systems to match. Yet while all the San Francisco-based studio's games are worthy of praise, it was the first Hades game that raised the bar when it came to roguelike games and their storytelling. It only makes sense, then, that it also became the first Supergiant title to earn a sequel. Hades II carries over a lot of the features that made its predecessor such a beloved title, with one exception: its protagonist. This shift presented Supergiant with an exciting opportunity to explore new themes, making it disappointing that the end result instead plays into matronly stereotypes. While the first game had a protagonist who started out a cocky, sarcastic jackass before undergoing a deep and meaningful character arc, Hades II forgoes this in favor of making its female protagonist overtly stoic and duty-bound, playing into the misogynistic societal expectations for female-identifying people.Continue Reading at GameSpot