Tag: Magic Arena

SOTG: Checking in on Old Friends

Izlain2 Comments

For Memorial Day weekend I ended up going to visit my Mother and as she lives in the same town as my best friend, I ended up paying him a visit as well. One game that we’ve been playing together for a very long time is Awesomenauts, but through the years we’ve picked up quite a few different titles that we’ve spent some time on. In that same vein, we’ve been picking up some of our old favorites, and I thought I’d use this fuel for a new round-up post. As I’ve only mentioned Awesomenauts to this point, I suppose that’s a good place to start.

Regular readers will probably recall my history with this game, but to briefly recap, I received the game for free via Playstation Plus when it first released in 2012. I played it with my friend and he loved it, picking up a copy for his Xbox 360. We’d play splitscreen when at each other’s houses, and eventually he got a PS3 and we’d play together online. I picked up the Steam version of the game at one point because I was frustrated that a bunch of new characters and features we being added to the game on PC and not the platform that it started on. Later, the game would get expansions and a new version called Awesomenauts Assemble was released for PS4. My friend and I came back to the game at this point, and though I already owned the expansions on PC, I had to pick them up again via a bundle purchase on Playstation. This was fine as I enjoyed the game and wanted to support it, but a little more frustration came my way when I learned that the title went Free 2 Play earlier this year on PC, and the console version has not followed suit. When we picked up to play this past weekend, there were a few more characters released and I had to drop $6 to get them. Apparently with the PC version being free to play means that there is an in-game currency that allows you to buy individual characters, while there are bundles to buy them all along with skins for real money. I suppose that makes it the same sort of deal but I think the virtual currency should make it’s way to console as well… going free to play will likely bring in new blood though I haven’t had trouble finding games anyway. Here’s the new additions since I last played (around the time Overdrive released).

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I’ve managed to play a handful of games with some of the new characters and they seem about on par with what you’d come to expect from this 2D MOBA.

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I’m not disappointed with the game all that much. Owning it on two platforms gives me options but honestly I play the game because my best friend loves it and we’ve put a lot of time in.

You remember H1Z1? Yeah I talked about it way back when, I was there when it first came out, playing what would later become Just Survive. I remember when they added the Battle Royale mode. It was fun and something new and different, but now BR clones are a dime a dozen and the most popular ones are PUBG and Fortnite. By the time H1Z1 was split into King of the Kill and Just Survive I had already uninstalled the game, and I haven’t really kept up except for hearing that JS is about dead and Battle Royale was coming to PS4. I never played PUBG but it seems like the same sort of shit, and Fortnite’s BR mode is garbage. It’s too light and kiddie for my tastes, and though I’m sure PUBG is great I don’t want to pay to play it. Enter the H1Z1 PS4 Beta. It’s free to play and it’s the same Battle Royale that I remember, but then it’s been clearly worked on for a long time. Much has changed to this point, but the game looks and plays pretty much the same as I remember.

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I think if I am in the mode for some Battle Royale, this is the one I’d play just because I don’t have to think much and I don’t have to pay for it. So win/win.

The other Hi-Rez title that I used to play quite a bit has seen some changes as well. Paladins got a bad rep in recent months by trying to do some cash grabbing, but it appears that the UI and the character customization has changed a bit too. The card system isn’t anything like I remember, having set cards for champions and only the ability to raise points in your build which in turn makes the card’s rarity change. It’s a dumbed down version from what existed before, but perhaps the streamlining was good for newcomers.

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That’s really my only complaint. It looks great and still runs perfectly. I still have the game down pretty good as well, as my score below will attest. There are a handful of new champions but I’m not sure about map changes. There are some different modes that I don’t recall, but as I said there have been many changes in the year or so since I last played. One thing that stuck out was the season pass sort of thing that the company does with Smite, where you have to essentially buy in to receive rewards for playing, but the rewards aren’t exactly guaranteed unless you grind out some games. So yeah, a bit cash grabby, but I’m not going to give it to them.

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Still a fun shooter in short bursts.

The granddaddy of Hi-Rez titles for me, and it’s been a year since I played this one as well. That’s one thing, playing MMOs or persistent account games like MOBAs/CCGs/BRs is that you have to spend a lot of time to keep up with the patch to patch changes, new characters, shifting metas, etc. I was shocked to see how much just the UI has changed in a year:

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I didn’t take much in the way of screen shots, but my bff and I played a few rounds the other night and won them all. Between this game and Paladins I also had a shit ton of rewards given to me when I logged in, and the only reason I can think of is because I’ve played other Hi-Rez games in the meantime? I have been playing Hand of the Gods: Smite Tactics and even recently tried out Paladins Strike. I assume some cross promotion exists, and maybe there’s even some sort of welcome back rewards, I’m not sure but I had 100s of notifications between the two games. I’m not complaining by any means but it was a nice surprise. I’m looking forward to playing more of these games, as the itch still hasn’t been scratched.

Finally, I’ve been getting in some time with MTGA as well. Still not doing great at it though. My mind has been so wrapped up in EDH for the past year and a half that I don’t really look at other formats all that much. Since I’m going to GP Vegas during the middle of this month, much of the events going on are drafts. I have never drafted in MTG. As such, it seemed like a good time to try it out, as this past weekend there were Dominaria drafts going on. So I paid my entry fee and got down to business. Things did not go well.

I didn’t get a single win, but I did learn a lot about the format. Sealed and Constructed are so much different than a draft, and in this case I ended up building a trash BR deck that almost won me a single game before the draft was over. I know now what I should have been focusing on, and I might do another draft or two before the Vegas trip, but as of now I’m still not that big on this type of Magic. I know that the event will have a lot of drafting going on so I’m sure I’ll participate in a couple, but I also don’t want to spend a ton over the weekend so I’m limiting myself. I think I might end up doing Battlebond again, but I’m really hoping to just play some EDH with random people from around the country. Speaking of, if you’re a regular and happen to be going to Vegas that weekend, drop me a message and maybe we can meet up!

That’s all for this time.

TWR: Thoughts on MTG Arena

Izlain2 Comments

A few months ago I was invited to the Magic: The Gathering Arena alpha test. There was an NDA and all at the time, but I found it a pleasant enough experience, with what little I tried. At that time, they launched with only the cards from Ixalan, and because at the time I had already played with and bought a bunch of packs of Ixalan in real life, I wasn’t too excited to play. Fast forward a few months and the NDA is dropped. They’ve finished the Ixalan block along with adding the Amonkhet block. Recently they added Dominaria, and I assume they will add the Kaladesh block before it rotates out to give the full standard experience. Or maybe they won’t. I have other thoughts as well.

I’ve played most of the digital versions of Magic in existence. The yearly Duels of the Planeswalkers series was interesting, but such a restrictive package. Magic Duels that was out a couple of years ago seemed like Wizards of the Coast’s answer to Hearthstone, but they didn’t get too far in before they stopped supporting it. Magic Online seems to be the only place where people get a near table top experience and it’s the only version I haven’t used. I’ve seen it in action though, and though it looks a bit archaic it still seems to be the best version of the game available in digital form. I think that with Arena, Wizards of the Coast are trying to revitalize their aging OG platform by bringing the graphics and gameplay up a notch.

I would be sharing screenshots but there is no built in screen shot button, and I was too lazy to use a work around. At the end of the day, Arena looks great and plays smoothly. The animations are well done, the sound effects are immersive and the cards look great. At this time it doesn’t support ultra wide 2k resolutions so my monitor has a lot of wasted real estate, but I’m sure that sort of support will be added in the future (along with a screen shot button). This is one of the first digital versions of Magic that I’ve played that actually feels intuitive. Some cards in this game require you to search your library or draw a set amount of cards and then put cards on the top or bottom of your library, etc. The interface with which these actions are completed is fast and makes sense. I feel like new players and old veterans who haven’t played in years will be able to pick up and go.

Now for the bad stuff. You’re given a few packs to get started with, and this means you’ll have random chances to either get something worthwhile or get a bunch of crap. The preconstructed decks work okay, but none seem competitive enough — particularly when playing against someone who has been playing for quite some time and is dropping Teferi’s on the board. Packs can sometimes come with a “wildcard” which will allow you to essentially craft a card of your choosing of the wildcard’s rarity. That’s a nice way to pick up a  Teferi of your own, but it isn’t necessarily going to win you the game. Getting packs takes forever. You’ll have to complete 2 quests a day to get a pack. At that rate, getting a decent deck together means grinding out with a bunch of draft chaff doing the daily quests for gold, and hey if you manage to get 5 wins you’ll get a pack, but if you just keep on losing, well you get the idea. There’s a missed opportunity here to be more like Magic Online, where there is a marketplace for singles and you can just create a deck and buy it outright. I’m a firm believer that it’s not the cards but the pilot who chooses their own destiny, but at the same time I’d much prefer to be able to throw down some cash to make a decent deck and be done with it. When I play the game in real life, I build decks using a combination of existing cards and singles purchased online. I want that same sort of experience. I’ll take the rewards slowly as they come, but I’d like to build a decent deck outright.

Some things I can see happening with the platform: I could see the above store option working well. The problem there is that it still won’t compete with Magic Online, because there’s still not the whole 25 years worth of cards available in Arena. One option I do see them having the ability to promote is Brawl — the new EDH variant that works with Standard-only cards. The problem there though is that like standard it is a rotating format, so how do they justify removing part of the cards from the program as they add new sets? What do people get for credit for the cards they already purchased? Unless they do go ahead and program this game to be the new version of Magic Online I think that I won’t be putting money into it. It’s an okay time waster, but I just don’t care about Standard enough to want to play this that often. I’d rather go to a store and play EDH with strangers face to face. If Brawl is added that might at least give me a reason to both play Brawl at all, and to play Arena as my go-to for Brawling.