TCG

In Platonic philosophy an archetype (or Form) is some intangible ideal exemplifying a trait or object that subsists outside of our perceptions of space and time. If you want me to pull out the Cave Allegory, anything and everything we perceive are mere shadows of the 'real' thing, it's essence. But fuck that noise, right? And not just because that creates a hell of a bloated ontology; you want to play a game... right? And not one that would take you out of your comfort zone design-wise or thematically, it's not like you want to play a game about an old man in a hospice or anything. Pokemon was cool, no? Gotta catch 'em fuckin all. And every nerd, self-respecting or otherwise, has played a TCG in his or her day. I sheepishly admit to being addicted to both when I was younger, and thankfully our pal Stephen 'increpare' Lavelle provides a double dose of both in the form of a Flash title. This is a game with meaning attached, but if you like rolling dice you'll have fun. I swear. And therein lies the message, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

Mystic is a card game released in 2000. Like James Ernest's Brawl, it came in several standalone sets (there were four in all, two under the label "Domination" and two more under the expansion set "Companion"). Each set came with two playable decks of cards, so you could play a two-player game right away, and more cards allows more players (up to 5 at a time). While the decks of cards are pre-constructed, players are able (and encouraged) to construct their own custom decks according to certain restrictions; it is therefore a customizable card game, but not collectible.

I was there at Carnegie Mellon's gaming club in 1994, ground zero for the explosion that was Magic: the Gathering. I witnessed people taking their paychecks down to the local game store and exchanging them for boxes of cards. I saw these same people begging others to take their boxes of old Commons that were useless. I saw people trying desperately to find ways to organize their collections so they could build a deck in some reasonable amount of time.

It turned out that collecting was fun, trading was fun, building decks was fun, playing was fun... but organizing thousands of cards into some coherent system was tedious and boring. Somewhere along the line I stopped bothering with it; it took too much time that was better spent playing games. If I play these days, it's with preconstructed decks... just so I don't have to think like a librarian.

Dominion solves this problem in a unique way. It's a standalone game where the players build their decks during play as part of the game.

Pirates -- there have been several iterations now, starting with Pirates of the Spanish Main, with Pirates: Rise of the Fiends being the latest -- is a trading card game. Sorta kind. Or it's a miniatures game in which you don't have to paint the damn miniatures, which is what always stopped me from being a miniatures gamer. Any how you look at it, though, it's a damn clever little thing, and given how kitschy pirates are in general, it's amazing it's been a commercial success. I mean, Wizkids has gone through 10 expansions from the originals now, they actually ran TV commercials for the damn thing, and you can find it at Walmart -- I have to assume it's a commercial success.

Bellatorus is obviously inspired by trading card games (TCGs) like Magic: The Gathering, but it isn't a -trading- card game exactly; you get all the (virtual) cards with the game (and can download more from the developer's site) and edit decks with the provided editing utility--then play out games, either against remote opponents or an AI.

In other words, all the cards are available to you at all times, and you don't have to pay for more.

The Noks is a very weird game--if it's a game at all.

Partly, it's a system of collectibles. There are several hundred "Noks" in the world at present, and the developers plan to add more over time. You can think of Noks as something like, say, Magic: The Gathering cards, except that they aren't cards. They're animated 3D avatars with backstories. Some of them sing songs or perform music. And most have something to tell you about the game itself, or the backstory of the Noks universe. To understand that universe, you'll need to collect--well maybe not "them all," but lots of them.

If you took a trading card game (TCG) like Magic: The Gathering, added some board wargame mechanics, and threw in an online player-matching server, you'd have something very much like SpiritWars.

As in Magic, you have a 'hand' of spells you can cast, with your hand replenished one card per turn. Some of the spells create power sources (think Magic lands), of differing colors; others create defenders who do not move, but can be used to block attacks of enemies nearby on more vulnerable creatures (think walls). Still others are units that can move and attack--think creatures.

Magnant is a charming little indie real-time strategy game in which you control a colony of intelligent, technologically sophisticated ants waging battle against other ant colonies and the evil bees and beetles. It has all the usual RTS tropes--resource extraction, building construction, and real-time combat--as well as a pretty cool version of online play.

Astral Masters is a fantasy-themed trading card game (TCG). In other words, it's something like Magic: The Gathering, albeit simpler. It has two big things going for it: First, the interface is slick. Unlike some digital TCGs that try to replicate the tabletop TCG experience too closely, it's easy to figure out what each card does and how to deploy it effectively. Second is the price--a mere $20. Magic Online charges you by the card, and your cost can accumulate pretty rapidly; many other TCGs also have a "boosterpack" or subscription model. For a reasonably low, fixed price, you can play Astral Masters forever.