A few months ago, Wizards of the Coast had announced a partnership with the UK company Stainless Games to produce an online downloadable card game. It was recently announced the widely popular Collectible Card Game (CCG) Magic: The Gathering, will be available on Microsoft’s XBox Live Arcade and later on the Mac and PC. Though there haven’t been more details regarding the game, many people expect it to be a card game (as opposed to an adventure/RPG title). Though the first XBox game, Magic: The Gathering - Battlegrounds was an utter failure, the Magic Online game has been well received and popular amongst the Magic community. There has been some speculation that the game could utilize the XBox 360 camera and create a game similar to the card-based game, Eye of Judgement for the Playstation 3. Basically, the concept is that when you place a card onto the playing field, the camera and system should recognize the card and be able to create an animated representation of the card (like in Yu-Gi-Oh!). Though the concept sounds neat, I’m sure it’ll cost a fortune for both Wizards and players to implement.

I personally would want to have a self contained game similar to the Yu-Gi-Oh! video games where you can purchase packs in game (but with no actual money involved). Though this does sound appealing to me as a Magic player, I’m finding more promise in the Magic Workstation program since you able to play with virtually every card in existence (provided you have the database files) and create a playtest decks which would otherwise cost you a small fortune (the game is free to use!). If you are interested, you can check out the site here. The only downside however is that you aren’t able to play more than 2 players (one on one) and the game mechanics and rules are dependent on the players (the program doesn’t recognize card types, rules, phases etc.). Till then, I’ll probably continue to play Magic with real cards with actual physical players.

-Stephen