The Digital Card Game market is vast and varied. While there are your legacy titles like Hearthstone and Gwent, there also plenty of other options. Games like Teppen and Shadowverse serve as secondary options for those looking for something different. Today a new TCG juggernaut may have entered the ring. DC Dual Force has been revealed via a brand new announcement trailer, along with some gameplay details.
Developed by Cryptozoic Games, the card battler will have players put together teams of two heroes and/or villains (hence the name) from the DC universe. Gameplay consists of building a deck of 40 cards to battle it out on a 3×2 grid. Cryptozoic has a long history in the physical TCG space having developed both the former World of Warcraft Trading Card Game, as well as the current DC Deckbuilding Game. Both games are fantastic and did a great job of bringing their respective IPs to life on the tabletop.
To build a deck you pick two heroes or villains as your “leader” cards, the core pieces of your decks. You then make a 40-card deck of the other two card types: Minion and Action cards. Each leader comes in one of five colors: Tactics (blue), Might (red), Energy (green), Anarchy (orange), and Tyranny (purple). Cards will have four rarity levels, which are common, rare, super rare, and ultimate. Skipping an “uncommon” rarity is interesting, and might lead to rare cards being slightly lower on the power scale than is typically seen in TCGs.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SSP5zAJzIsQ
Blue Devil better be in this game or I’ll be sad
No gameplay has been shown yet, but we do know a little bit about how the game plays out. Players can only play two cards per turn, be that an action and a minion, or two of each type. Like the Score and Panini Dragon Ball Z card games, having such a limited number of actions per turn means that any cards that bypass that rule will become incredibly powerful.
Once per turn you will gain “charges,” which seem to be the game’s primary resource. These charges can be used to power up your leaders and minions, as well as grant them special keyword abilities. Once both of a player’s leaders are defeated, they lose the game. As of now, it is unclear if your leaders and minions can move on this grid or if they must remain where they are placed when played.
Comic history
One aspect that the game’s early marketing is touting heavily are weekly PvE events that will revolve around a story from DC’s 80-year history of comics. Players who complete these storylines will be rewarded with three free cards. If a player misses a week, they can catch up via a subscription service that has been confirmed for the game. The subscription will also come with five card packs equal to the value of the service (which, as of now, is currently unknown). Players will also be able to get eight free cards a month with this service, and new expansion sets will release about once every four months. Quarterly sets are standard for most TCGs, but it will depend on how big these sets are to determine whether the subscription will be worth it or not.
DC Dual Force will release sometime next year in 2022, and no platforms have been confirmed as of the time of this writing. However, considering the game’s clear intent to target the Hearthstone crowd, as well as casual comics fans, a release on PC and mobile is most likely. You can check out the game’s official website for more information. You can also sign up for the game’s newsletter to be the first to know when beta information starts dropping. More information might also be available at this year’s DC Fandome event as well.
