Shadow Era - Trading Card Game

This is easily the fairest, and funnest mobile TCG I’ve played. I’ve played MTG off and on for about 23 years, and at one time I came to prefer Shadow Era over MTGo. The cards are well thought out to avoid overpowering strategies, while remaining devastating in their combination. Getting a competitive deck together is blissfully easy for a free player, yet building a truly competitive deck takes skill. Wulven however, could really use a better plan, and more support. There have been very few cards added to a relatively small card pool since I started about 4-5 years ago. The post-release changes to digital cards makes buying the physical cards seem like a shaky idea. There didn’t seem to be much thought about tournaments when designing the UI so (the last I knew) they were setting them up using private battle function, since there were only 3 ways to play, Campaign(AI), Battle (Random opponent), or private battle (password to enter). This seemed like a very sloppy way to organize a tournament, and it would be much nicer to see it integrated into the UI, so players can enter and play tournaments through the menu. All that aside I still give it five stars, because it is a game that focuses on fairness and fun over being an overly flashy cash-grab, and that’s rare but it shows integrity. I’ve made several crystal purchases just to support Wulven for a job well done.

Most everything about the game is well balanced. The art is beautiful. While the game and its mechanics are very well thought out, I reserve one star because since it's inception, the user interface has always been lackluster. The movement of the cards feel too linear and sluggish when compared to something like hearthstone, which gives them a kind of light mass. The menus can be a lot more intuitive. The cards themselves look one dimensional objects. Even the card edges seem jagged at times. Also, everything seems very dark. I understand that it's a part of the theme, but things can definitely be brightened up a bit. Lastly, the music, visual, and sound effects are equally camp. Overall, while the development team have done an amazing job of implementing this digital CCG and its gaming components, they've left the actual experience of playing it wanting. It simply doesn't "feel nice," and this makes it seem like a low budget movie.

A good long while back i reviewed this game and had a few good things and a few bad to say about it. But now with the story mode update things are different. I really really like the story, and i love going through all over again with different hero cards and leveling them all individually as a ahow of my own mastery of that character and its abilities and cards. Something i really dont enjoy is how on any higher dificulty the bots begin to cheat. They automatically start with a free card drawn, and by the time you have enough allies to wipe the board they have enough resources to draw several out at once and just finish off your remaining health. If i were to improve that, or offer suggestion to do so, instead of letting them spawn minions immediately, upgrade their deck and make the AI smarter. Dont cheat for the bot but instead make them more challenging with really tough cards and smart enough to not just focus on your hero alone but react to what you draw. Unfortunately i want to give it more stars than i did the first time but i cant overlook that major issue, as well as the strange bugs that occur durring story mode play. Elementalis has given me several problems in battle where it simply stops playing after a certain turn count, or it draws a certain card and freaks out. If these things are ever changed my review will also change drastically to match the updates. But for now it will remain at 3 stars, definately worth playing.