‘Gears of War: The Card Game’ Review
Regular readers of Nerdly might recall that back in January we revealed that Steamforged Games – creators of Dark Souls: The Board Game and Resident Evil 3: The Board Game were about to release another videogame tie-in – this time based on Gears of War. This took me by surprise to be honest, since it’s been a few years since Gears of War 5 was released, and I honestly didn’t know whether people were still interested or not. Nonetheless, I love the Gears of War IP and Steamforged Games have a proven track record of taking videogame ideas and converting them into tabletop games. With all that said, let’s dive into the review for Gears of War: The Card Game.
Gears of War: The Card Game can be summarised as a campaign-driven, head to head card battling game that draws touches of inspiration from most games that look and feel a bit similar – with perhaps Magic: The Gathering being the most obvious comparison. However, because Steamforged Games always find ways to make their games feel like the videogame that inspired them, Gears of War: The Card Game changes a few things through use of cover cards as a key mechanical element, and instead of using deckbuilding in the traditional sense, the campaign mode changes both the Locust and Serran decks by swapping in or out different cards based on the outcome of the previous fight.
Something about the timing of Gears of War: The Card Game‘s release (years after Gears of War 5) and the way this game feels – with its focus on a two-player campaign – has labour of love written all over it. Having met the Steamforged Games team on a couple of occasions, there is passion in every product they produce, but Gears of War: The Card Game feels quite niche because of how narrow the target audience probably is these days, but I really hope more people get to play it because I’ve really enjoyed my time with it. It’s entirely possible to set up the two decks and simply play a quick skirmish (and indeed that is how you should play Gears of War: The Card Game with someone approaching it for the first time) but the real meat of the experience here is in the campaign mode where wins and losses translate into strengths and weaknesses in future games.
I will talk about the campaign mode in more detail shortly, but first of all let me give you a flavour of how Gears of War: The Card Game – because having read a few forums on this, there seems to have been a lot of speculation about how the game would actually play. In a nutshell, each player shuffles their deck and draws a hand of five cards – the first scenario uses a static deck for each side, and each scenario that follows will have up to about ten (roughly) new cards shuffled in or taken out depending on what happened in the last battle. From this deck, each player will usually draw a hand of five cards and the game is ready to begin.
I mentioned the use of cover earlier, and in Gears of War: The Card Game this is a key element, with each scenario using different cover cards to set the scene. High cover, low cover, pillars and elevated positions all feature – and each confers a specific benefit or condition to unit that is “using” it. This brings me to the states that a particular unit can be in – which are either in hand, in the discard pile, in the players reserve or in cover. Cards are initially deployed into the player reserve (unless an effect says otherwise) and must be moved into cover during the combat phase of the player turn.
Without getting into low level technical detail, this mechanic is fantastic and really evokes the Gears of War videogame feel. As an example, if you want to move a unit from your reserve into cover, and that cover is defended, you must attack the enemy in cover and beat them based on your attack value versus their defense (and their attack will hit your units defense in turn.) If you win, you will take that cover, but as I mentioned earlier, most forms of cover offer a benefit that will give the defender an advantage. To counter this, you may need to use cards such as a grenade or buff effect that your opponent does not anticipate, thus affecting the board state greatly by not only removing their unit but also because your basic unit is now in potentially powerful cover.
To win the game, a player must reduce their opponents deck by dealing direct damage. Such damage is inflicted whenever a unit in cover attacks the enemy player, and that player does not have a unit in reserve with which to defend (or if they choose not to defend.) When direct damage is dealt, the player who is attacked must always discard exactly two cards (again, unless an effect says otherwise.) I should mention at this point, that as with all good card games, there are many, many effects that change the rules in Gears of War: The Card Game – especially in the later scenarios when some of the more well-known and notorious characters begin to appear. I should also mention that there are a number of cards that draw cards from player discard piles – which I think is welcome considering how much discarding players will do.
In addition to the cover system and the fact that health is linked to your deck of cards, Gears of War: The Card Game also has a unique way of allowing cards to be played. Where other games use mana, gold or some other resource (and debate rages about which is best or worst), Gears of War: The Card Game simply lets the players play a card for free as long as a certain deployment value is achieved. What is a deployment value? It’s how many cards you have in hand. So for example, if a card has a deployment value of three, then you must have found a way to play or discard at least two cards from your starting hand of five so that you can get down three cards in hand and play the card with a deployment value of three. This sounds convoluted when written down, but in terms of how a card game like Gears of War: The Card Game ebbs and flows, it’s actually extremely natural – and learning the intricacies of your deck (and that of your opponent) and which cards might work well together to support big turns is a key factor.
Turning to production values, and I have to say that I think Gears of War: The Card Game is just fine. The box is small – mercifully small – and should fit on your average bookshelf, perhaps even alongside your Xbox games (for those who don’t dedicate entire walls of Ikea shelving to their board game collection!) The cards are well done, using art that is either directly taken from the videogame series or at the very least created in exactly the same style, so it all fits and feels very familiar to a returning player such as myself. The instruction manual is reasonably good with decent examples and a walkthrough of the first few turns, and critically it explains how to setup each of the fifteen scenarios in a good level of detail – and that’s it. There’s nothing else in the box, and I do like that there’s no need to use counters or tokens to track life etc – Gears of War: The Card Game is a very clean and dare I say it minimalist experience that lets the gameplay do the talking.
I really enjoyed playing the Gears of War: The Card Game campaign, and I think that the core game itself is good enough to be worth your time and attention. The unique cover system, how cards are played and the use of your deck as health are all fun mechanical features that work really well, and the cover system in particular makes Gears of War: The Card Game feel as though it is part of the series. This is an easy game to teach, but the campaign mode gives it longevity that some card games lack. I haven’t yet explored the “post-campaign” side of the game, but there are enough cards in the box across the fifteen scenarios that mean an experienced pair of players could deckbuild easily whilst maintaining balance. In summary, fans of either Gears of War or card games in general really should check Gears of War: The Card Game out as soon as possible.
