Main Street Mobile Arcade: The cards, the cards, the cards will tell…

There’s certainly no shortage of Disney mobile games currently, and Marvel specifically might be the IP with the most games out there in the mobile space atm, but hey you know what we haven’t had yet? A Marvel CCG! So here to fill that void in the near future is Marvel Snap, just recently announced and coming to mobile platforms and at some point but not necessarily simultaneously, PC (I know it’s cliche to say at this point, but a Switch version seems like a really obvious idea and I’m surprised that wasn’t also announced).

I’ll be honest, I’ve never been a huge fan of card-based games. I don’t really enjoy games like Gwent or Triple Triad, and I really haven’t enjoyed games that are entirely based around deck-building either. It’s just something I’ve never been particularly adept at, and I always seem to run out of useful cards and just hit a wall early on.

However, the one exception to this was definitely Hearthstone. I don’t play it now and didn’t spend hundreds of hours on it when I was playing, but for a couple of months, it hooked me in a way no other card game has really ever managed to do. So, while I definitely am a little wary of another CCG, Marvel Snap coming from a team that includes former Hearthstone developers certainly makes me give this consideration I probably wouldn’t have otherwise.

Firstly, the look of Marvel Snap is pretty incredible. They clearly are trying to make a mobile card game as visually interesting as they possibly can. The cards are very animated, have voice samples saying iconic lines, and just have insanely cool artwork to boot. So at the very least, it seems like the goal is to never have a dull moment.

The big appeal of Marvel Snap supposedly is how fast rounds go. Turns go simultaneously and according to the devs rounds top out at around three minutes. Anyone who has played even a few rounds of a CCG game knows it can really drag when opponents are taking their sweet time, but I don’t really know if this solves that unless they give you a pretty short time limit to choose what card you are playing, which could certainly be the case but this was not specifically mentioned.

Completely omitted from the announcement trailer is any monetization mechanics, easily the biggest sticking point of any F2P game. They say you can play forever and never spend a dime and have a great time and that’s likely true to some extent at least, but you’ve got to wonder at what rate do you get new cards, and what does dropping some money on the game in some fashion get you? We’ll just have to wait and see.

For me personally, though, the biggest disappointment and the reason that while I’ll certainly give Marvel Snap a shot but I doubt that it’ll hold my attention very long, is the lack of a campaign mode. Granted this isn’t Hearthstone and maybe I shouldn’t be expecting Marvel Snap to be the be next Hearthstone, but that’s what really kept me playing Hearthstone as long as I did and this being from former devs of that game, a robust campaign mode would be a welcome option as opposed to just being a game you solely play against other people.

We don’t know exactly when Marvel Snap is launching but there’s a closed Android beta happening soon and mobile games usually have a pretty short window between being officially announced and release so expect to see it on your mobile platform of choice in the next few months. I’m certainly interested enough to check it out which is already saying a lot for a CCG I just wish there was more to it than really quick 1v1 matches.

That’s it for today, I’m unlikely to have another post this week unless some unexpected news drops but Star Wars Celebration is happening this weekend so maybe if something comes out of that I’ll have another entry (though that still may wait until next week). Either way, see ya real soon!