Magic The Gathering: Arena of the Planeswalkers Game

Multi-player game has a lot of replay value, 1 v 1 would likely get a little repetitive with the 4 included planeswalkers over time. It requires a large play space as it hangs over the edge of our large coffee table. A kitchen table would likely be fine. We're looking forward to some squad and planeswalker expansions and new terrain - interested to see what price point they come out at.The rules are complicated enough I wouldn't go below 10 year old for the game, and only then with adults who are willing to learn the rules.I actually like that the squads are solid colored, rather than intricately painted, it makes it easier for me to keep track of mine, but they are pretty cheap compared to the painted planeswalkers. The box packaging is pretty "meh"; another 35 minutes of design and 35 cents of cardboard would have resulted in a box that allows everything to be stored neatly/securely. For instance, cards out of shrink wrap cannot fit in the same space as cards in a shrink wrapped cube. Additionally, there was a missed opportunity to double the amount of terrain by printing game material on the other side of the terrain cards, so the terrain is limited to a desert arena.Overall, I enjoyed playing multiple games and will likely be playing again.

I love this game. Sadly I can't find people to play it often. However I do enjoy each game session and highly recommend this game. Three quick points I want to make.1. It's essentially Heroscape. Which is an amazing compliment because that game is still a blast. Quick, easy, army building, and strategic.2. It's MTG TCG in tabletop miniature form. Basically the planeswalkers of MTG are physically wallking around the battlefield casting spells and summoning creatures. Awesome! Perfect blend of Heroscape and Magic TCG.3. The game is straight forward, easy to set up, and the parts are well produced for being such an inexpensive game.One flaw I feel is the lack of terrain pieces and options for spell/creature customization. Expansions should fix that though.I recommend this game to people who want to get into quick battles without buying into the trading card game format and if you want an quick easy to learn tabletop miniature game.Also for other MTG alternatives check out Epic from White Wizard Games, my new Mtg replacement!

Whether you are a Heroscape fan or not this game is a blast to play. Pick a Planeswalker, take their card, spell deck, creature cards and miniatures, set up the board and play. Simple enough to pick up quick but the strategies can evolve over time as you learn how the Planeswalkers work. I have run Gideon up on Chandra and got into a hand to hand battle which ended for her and I have had played Gideon against Liliana and while I was using my abilities which required me to keep my troops together I had a zombie get blown up and cleared out three of my six creatures on the board in one hit. Great fun, a lot of dice and some strategy make for a really good time. My downside (which is less of a downside now as an expansion and a new base set has come out) is that the deckbuilding and creature choice is limited in the box. Pick Chandra and you have a prebuilt spell deck and two red creatures, with no other options. Still a lot of fun and that downside can actually be a good thing when playing with new players because they don't have to take their generic deck and play against your tuned deck. The miniatures are fine, not amazing but with the games price they do the job. I am always happy to play this and have yet to have a bad time whether I win or lose. If you like it pick up he expansions.

When this game was first announced and teased about, many people were intrigued yet skeptical. We've always known Magic the Gathering to be just a trading card game, so how exactly would the mechanics that make the game what it is translate smoothly to a board game? Turns out the answer is: amazingly well. If you are familiar at all with the game Heroscape, a hex-based strategy game from Hasbro that was discontinued in 2012, then this game will be very familiar to you as the basic rules are the same. However the integration of Magic means a revamped system with some new and different mechanics, making this a fresh experience for even Heroscape players. For everyone else who has never played Heroscape (such as myself), this game is definitely worth playing.The game takes place on a constructable battlefield composed of cardboard tiles that interlock with each other like puzzle pieces, featuring a grid of hexagonal spaces where the figures will stand. A few plastic hex tiles are included to provide a third dimension to the game as height-based terrain, which was a key factor in Heroscape's popularity. Cardboard props act as obstacles, making some hexes inaccessible and providing cover from line-of-sight. The overall gameplay is an army-based strategy brawl, and various included scenarios provide guidelines on how to construct the playing field based on how many people are playing. The game can accommodate 2-5 players, with a 2v2 team variant.Players choose one of the Planeswalker figures to be the leader of their army, each representing one of the five colors of Magic and thus have gameplay strategies based on the color philosophy from the original card game. White focuses on team-wide effects and higher defense, blue uses many disruption tactics to counteract or stall other players' plans, black has fast ways to destroy units while being able to revive its own, red goes for hyper-aggressive tactics, and green is incredibly mobile and can strike from afar more effectively than other colors. I have played with all five colors, and there isn't one I didn't like; all feel well balanced with great potential for more creative strategies as I play them more.The basics of the gameplay involve summoning creatures to expand your army, trekking across the map to get in position, and then ultimately take down the opposing Planeswalker(s). Units have abilities that can create variance in the game, so a session isn't simply a prettier-looking version of checkers. Players also have access to a small deck of cards containing spells that when cast provide a wide variety of effects; this is the most notable difference between this game and Heroscape, which did not have spell cards. Figuring out when is the best opportunity to cast a certain spell adds a new layer of strategy to the game, and the combination is much smoother than many of us have anticipated. Putting all of this together, you have a surprisingly simple yet elegant strategy game that actually only takes about 30 minutes for two players. Many war-style games with armies and fleets tend to drag on for hours, which can be off-putting to people who don't want to lose an entire night of board gaming to a single game. If you have a war-based strategy gaming itch you need to scratch, Arena of the Planeswalker is a fantastic choice.Despite all this, why did I only give this product 4 stars? The included rules are oddly vague. Certain weird interactions that come up often are not thoroughly explained in the rulebook, and many interactions involving spell cards are implied to work in a certain way only if you apply the rules taken from the Magic card game instead. This is not surprising of course, but to people who have never played Magic these interactions do not seem obvious and create confusion. If the game wants to appeal to a larger crowd besides just Magic players, a much clearer set of rules is necessary.Most notably, however, is the fact that the game is built to support expansions and customization of armies and decks. However none exist at the time of this review and expansions are said to show up in 2016. This game has the potential to be deeper and more complex with customizations, yet we have no access to that power. That doesn't necessarily mean this base set is bad without it, but it's difficult to tell how well expansions will work if we don't even have any to use as examples.Overall, the game is solid. It's an amazing bargain at only $30, and well worth playing by anyone with a passing interesting with the concept. Magic fans will enjoy a chance of pace from the usual card gaming, and others will definitely enjoy the fast-paced army combat experience. Do not let this game fly under your radar just because of the idea that it's some weird Magic board game, for it is much more than that.