The Elder Scrolls goes a long way from the classic RPG to an immersive online world where players compete with each other to gain control over certain castles. The Elder Scrolls evolved over the years, constantly trying to improve a successful formula. The community loves the classic RPG and they went nuts when The Elder Scrolls Online released for the public. All these different games with different features were always part of something much bigger, the game’s success is all thanks to the big amount of lore within this game! We’ve had the classic RPG’s, our online MMORPG but now it’s time for Bethesda to conquer another popular area “the world of TCG” where the World of Warcraft and the old but popular Magic The Gathering franchises are dominating. Bethesda takes on the fray with a new TCG game set in the Elder Scrolls Universe…. The Elder Scrolls: Legends!
Familiar and yet mysterious
The game is all about one goal ” bringing your opponent’s life total to zero” with the help of a deck of cards full of legends, equipment and devastating spells. The deck’s total is a minimum amount of 50 cards. Just like Magic The Gathering, you’re able to build a deck with a bigger amount of cards, but the quality of your deck will be low as it takes for ages to get that “one card” to reel in the victory. Magic The Gathering uses “land” cards to give the player fuel to summon certain spells or creature cards, this fuel in Legends is represented as Magicka that builds up, the longer you play. The higher your Magicka points will be, the bigger the monsters/ spells you’ll be able to summon. Your deck consists of creatures, equipment cards and spells that can either be offensive or defensive.
If you played Hearthstone, this game’s mechanics will look pretty familiar but Bethesda has a few more twists up its sleeves. The game’s battlefield is not always one big lane, sometimes the battlefield is divided into 2 lanes and each lane has its own mechanic going on. First of all, monsters can be divided among these two lanes, but you’ll have to keep in mind that monsters in a certain lane can only attack monsters within the same lane. Creature summoning abilities can, however, influence monsters from a different lane and all creatures can attack the player’s health total, unless there’s a guard creature which has to be destroyed first before the player’s life total is out in the open. Second, each lane can have certain characteristics, for example, the right lane can have the following feature “Shadow Lane”, this allows the player to summon creatures into this lane with the cover of shadows. This means that the summoned creatures cannot be attacked by other creatures unless these creatures reveal themselves by attacking first. Another feature can be a more active form of characteristic, for example, there’s this “special” lane that randomly picks a creature after each player’s turn and puts it on another lane. Lanes can also be neutral!
Third but not least, there’s also this “rune” mechanic which can alter the battlefield in an instant. Each player starts off with a life total of 30 points and 5 rune points. Each time you lose an amount of 5 points, a rune will break and you’ll draw a card. This feature is cool, to have a certain card advantage, but it’s a bit more than just “card advantage”. Some cards have the type “Prophecy” and if you draw a “Prophecy” card on your rune breakdown, you can play this card for free, no matter how high the cost. This makes the game very interesting and mysterious, you’ll never know what the next move might bring.
A story with a twist
To learn to play the game, Legends offers a good story mode that can be influenced by your own personal touch. Sometimes, after certain battles you’ll have to make a choice about “how the hero (you) reacts to a certain outcome”. These choices don’t really influence the story, but it influences the cards of your deck. In the beginning, you’ll have a pretty standard deck but the choice you make can “evolve” existing cards within your deck to a “next level” card. A standard warrior card can be influenced by a certain choice and it will evolve in “a better warrior with higher attack/ defense points and a certain ability” or it can evolve into a warrior with an extra set of equipment, in other words your warrior will evolve into something stronger and at the same time, it’ll give you a new equipment card that can be added to your deck.
By playing the game, you’ll get to know the game’s mechanic and you’ll receive rewards for completing a certain chapter. These rewards can be cards or even coins which you can spend on buying certain card packs. Once you’ve obtained a lot of cards, you can really start to modify your deck and become an even greater legend. The story is interesting enough to keep playing and it actually prepares you for online competition. You’ll also unlock different deck types which can be modified. The same leveling mechanic can be achieved by completing certain challenges.
Next to story mode, the game offers “practice”, “solo arena” (play matches against 8 AI. opponents and one boss. It’s one on one and you can lose 3 times before you’re defeated.), “versus arena” a game mode like “solo arena” but with real players.
Hearthstone with a different skin and a few interesting mechanics.
My impressions of the game are pretty good, it looks promising but we can’t go around the fact that Bethesda took a lot from Hearthstone and made the game their own which isn’t actually a bad thing. Often developers take the good things of a certain game and adapt it to the setting they want. The Elder Scrolls: Legends is a good example of how a game can be developed by looking at the competition. The Elder Scrolls: Legends uses a lot of the basic mechanics of Hearthstone but they’ve added a couple of interesting twists which will certainly be well received by the community. The game has a lot of potential to become a game that can compete with Hearthstone. The lane and rune feature brings the game to a higher level than Hearthstone. You’ll have to think a bit more than your average Hearthstone game. It’s definitely worth checking out. You can sign-up for the beta at Bethesda‘s website.
