Artifact [PC] - 28th November

[DjchunKfunK]

The game has gone up for pre-order on Steam.



I've been having a read of the FAQs and I'm not enamoured with the reward structure. This is how the paid events break down.

1 Ticket Entry (Expert Constructed & Phantom Draft):
3 Wins: 1 Event Ticket
4 Wins: 1 Event Ticket, 1 Pack
5 Wins: 1 Event Ticket, 2 Packs
2 Ticket + 5 Packs Entry (Keeper Draft):
3 Wins: 2 Event Tickets, 1 Pack
4 Wins: 2 Event Tickets, 2 Packs
5 Wins: 2 Event Tickets, 3 Packs

For both events you can only lose twice so if you have a 50% winrate you are getting nothing from any of these events as you need to hit a 60% winrate in order to make back the money you put in. It's pretty stingy and ranks at lower than Hearthstone which is saying something considering the stinginess of that game.

[Snowy]

Not the least interested. When did Valve actually make something worthwhile?

Does anyone remember that article about how great they were to work for, how you chose your own project to work on based on what interested you? What the fuck happened, been a damned long time since L4D!

[Jez]

Agreed. Valve are just into making moneh now

[Alan]

When you’re rolling in money why bother making something you have utterly no hope of living up to the expectations of?

[DjchunKfunK]

Not the least interested. When did Valve actually make something worthwhile?

Does anyone remember that article about how great they were to work for, how you chose your own project to work on based on what interested you? What the fuck happened, been a damned long time since L4D!

I think what you mean is when did they last make something you were interested in.

That's exactly what happened, people can choose to work on whatever they liked so hardly anything ever gets finished.

[Mantis]

Now officially out and it's getting pretty mixed reviews. People seem to think it's genuinely a great card game with very interesting mechanics, but the microtransaction economy is apparently one of the worst ones in any game ever and you literally need to pay through the nose to build a competitive deck.

[Alan]

I feel it’s a mix of that and people’s expectations of free stuff. It certainly seems way way cheaper than when I used to play Magic Online and I’ve never felt any ill will for what I spent there because I had a real good time playing it. This combined with Marketplace which is almost definitely going to drop almost all non-“foil” cards to pennies within the first year and add to that the ability to actually sell and trade which you’ve never really been able to do in a c-ccg before. I think the model is fine, not great but fine.

I think illl buy it the first time it’s on sale -_-

[DjchunKfunK]

Yeah it's tough to get a handle on whether the payment model is good or terrible. Being able to buy the individual cards you want is actually a cheaper way of building a deck than buying packs hoping you get the cards you want.

[DjchunKfunK]

The slow decline of this game continues. Down to below 1,500 concurrent players yesterday and a full set of cards on the marketplace costs just £78, down from a high of around £228. Just for reference, at the time that it was below 1,500 there were more people playing Portal 2.

[Sly Boots]

Have you played it, Dj? Just wondering whether in and of itself it's a decent game. I've played Hearthstone, obviously, which is my sole experience of digital ccg's. I know that I've glanced at some of the others being brought out and thought either 1) it looks far too complicated or 2) I don't have the time or money available to be able to build a decent deck.

[DjchunKfunK]

I have played it. It's an OK game and I like the idea that you can play draft for free so every time they release new cards you will be able to play with them, and the tournament system is neat, allowing you to play with friends, but it has issues. Games are a bit too long, I don't really like the payment system as the best decks and cards end up costing the most and it just hasn't really grabbed me. The only time I play it now is when I play tournaments with friends.

I think some of my ambivalence is due to MTGA which I think is a much better game, despite it's more random nature. However ultimately Artifact just doesn't grab me. There is something about playing a game in it that just doesn't sit right with me, it's hard to put a finger on. Maybe it is to do with the length of games. If I've played for 15-20 minutes and felt I've lost due to the random placement of the cards in lanes or because my opponent drew better than me it feels worse than losing a 5 minute HS or Magic game due to RNG.

[Sly Boots]

Cool, cheers. Yeah, I think shorter matches are probably the way to go for these games.

[Alan]

Try Magic Arena Sly, it’s very good and they are absolutely throwing free cards at you.

Try Artifact when they roll it out for free in an attempt to save it.

[Sly Boots]

Maybe will check it out. I don't have a burning CCG hole in my life right now though, was mainly wondering whether Artifact flopping was due to its quality or other factors.

[Mantis]

I imagine it's a combination of having strong competition, being quite convoluted and having a pretty poor monetisation model; not as many people will stump up £15 for a game where the main focus is paying MTs for other cards, particularly when all the competition is free to play.

I think they banked too heavily on converting the DotA2 crowd to CCG players with this.