A game that launched a new phase in hobby gaming, Magic: the Gathering is a collectible card game, the first of its genre, which has enchanted me almost continuously since 1999.
Back when I started a club devoted to one of my long-time hobbies, there were mixed responses on Wesleying. Some showed outright enthusiasm, others disgust, and others mixed feelings of nostalgia and distrust.
(For an interesting sociological perspective on this, look at the comments)
The premise is simple, while the rules are not. Collect cards that represent lands, creatures, ancient artifacts, spells, and their ilk, and take sixty cards of your choice to make a deck. Use this deck to strategically to defeat your opponent with his or her deck, preferably by reducing the life points of your opponent from 20 to 0.
There is no doubt that this game has had an impact on modern and popular culture. An infamous short of “Family Guy” has a suicide bomber encountering his seventy-two virgins as nerds. One says, “We’re playing Magic the Gathering. Wanna join?”
It also made an interesting appearance in Junot Diaz’s novel “The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao”, as the protagonist believes Magic Cards to be a step below role-playing games and their tendency to allow anything to pass.
But what’s it about this game that makes it elicit strong responses?
(1) A fantasy world is involved—and some people will treat that with favor and others not so much. The modern world seems grounded in reality. Elves, dwarves, merfolk, zombies, vampires, seem to some to be the manifestation of childhood, a bygone past of myth, a delusional world.
Note that consistently popular games among all groups include those grounded in relative reality—such as Chess, Monopoly, The Settlers of Catan and Risk—all portray aspects we know of in a real world, and as a result appeal to a greater audience. Not so with a game that takes place in an “infinite multiverse”, such as MTG.
Granted, no game can ever be truly realistic—as Reggie from the British Stage Comedy “The Norman Conquests” notes that horses jumping sideways and bishops walking diagonally are clearly not grounded in realism.
But on some level, people are more attracted to knights and bishops in a game then, let’s say, Surrakars (don’t ask me what they are…I’ve seen them, but I still have no clue)
(2) It is a form of self-expression—some people like games in which they can express themselves—but for many others, not so much. Because they need to build decks involving countless strategies that suit them, Magic: the Gathering players thrive on being different from one another to make the game interesting. My opponent may have a taste for mammalian behemoths, and I can have a taste for phantasms.
Again, in many popular games, such as those I mentioned earlier (Chess, Settlers, Monopoly)—all players receive relatively equal chances short of the die roll. There is no phase of self-expression that occurs before the game, as occurs in MTG with deckbuilding and Dungeons and Dragons with character building. To build a good deck or a character that fits, one needs to do some experimentation, but even more importantly extensive soul-searching.
(3) The sheer expense of the thing—“I can’t afford it”, “buying it becomes addicting”, and, perhaps more vulgarly quoted from the Wesleying comments, “that shit’s like crack”.
I have played this game for over a decade. I have met people who played the game but never owned any cards (they always borrowed someone else’s). I have met people who have established a collection entirely by means of other people’s gifts—Pentagon’s collection was one such acquisition. (Anyone at Wesleyan is free to trade with it).
Especially with the rise of free software, the expense can be little of an issue. With that advent, I can enjoy all of the 10,000+ cards currently in Magic without having to buy any. But just doing that will definitely limit your audience, to say nothing of your creativity.
(4) The demographic associated with playing the game—confirmation bias is at work here. The anti-social, the poorly dressed, and the frightening types are those commonly associated with games like these. But with more than 1 million players worldwide, I have noticed that there are many outside of these boundaries that play the game—and play it well.
Virtually everybody knows someone who has picked up the game or the cards at one point. Most of them do not conform to the negative model.
The fact that the inventor is a math professor of good repute, that Mensa has lauded this game’s strategy (one of its top five games, in fact), and that it is a member of the Games Hall of Fame still has not shaken off the stigmata attached to it for these reasons above.
This treatise does not have to be an invitation to play, but certainly it is an invitation to hold your judgment when you hear Magic: the Gathering mentioned. It doesn’t deserve such harsh treatment.
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