For a while now the board game and video game world has been experiencing some cross over; especially in the form of some fantastic app versions of our favorite tabletop games. Today I will take a break from my norm to discuss one such digital interpretation of an analog game; Magic 2015; Garruk’s Revenge. This is the expansion to the most recent set in the Duels of the Planeswalkers series.

Having played the last few incarnations of Duels of the Planeswalkers I was more than slightly intrigued by the prospect of a new addition to the DotP family, and I was excited that we would get to play with more cards and thus build more decks. It was thus without delay that I delve into the game upon its release last week. We will be looking specifically at the expansion; perhaps in another review I will look at the base game or the series as a whole.
The first question most people will ask when looking at an expansion is; “what do I get with this add on?” In the case of Garruk’s Revenge the answer is; a mini-campaign of five new opponents, access to new cards (note these cards were previously available through purchase), and frostings (avatars, achievements, etc).
As someone who has played magic off and on since middle school… let’s not say how long that has been…I love the mythos that has been built up around the game. I thus had no choice but delving into the mini campaign and discovering what was taking place after the base game’s ending (don’t worry no spoilers here – but the expansion is called ‘Garruk’s Revenge’ so… you can probably guess someone his hunting vengeance…)
The campaign has you take on the role of the hunter playing with his green/black deck as he travels through Alara seeking… well… revenge. The campaign wasn’t exceedingly difficult (granted I wasn’t playing on the most extreme difficulty… yet) and I found myself completing it with only a few games in which I called an early GG due to mana flooding. I would argue my only complaint from the campaign would be I wish it was longer.
Then there is the deck itself, compared to the other decks players begin with; this one is insane. It is not uncommon to drop a first turn Bayou, play some mana ramps then crash upon your enemy with some early game creature/instant combos; my prefered form was with my Spiritmonger… yes you read that correctly… my Spiritmonger. The deck was easily my favorite part of this expansion as it enabled me to play with a fun mix of old and new(ish) cards alike.
The Alara cards that now are accessible from the campaign add an additional dose of fun; though there has been slight outcry about the fact that they were previously available at cost; though to my understanding those who paid that cost were granted free access to the campaign; so really they got a free expansion; hashtag first world problems if there ever was one…
There are a few aspects I would love to see; such as a draft mechanic in which you can choose not to open boosters you claim upon beating your opponents, then use those boosters in a booster draft though the counter argument is clearly use MTG Online for your drafting desires.
As a whole the value of entertainment is, in my opinion well worth it; compare the low cost to that of going to a movie in the theatre; the entertainment per dollar ratio is ridiculous. If you don’t own the base game I would recommend picking it up and giving it a shot. The game is available on Android, iDevices, Steam, and Xbox at a fairly reasonable rate.