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| Magic: The Gathering started it all. |
Ever heard
of
Magic: The Gathering?
Pokémon? These are “rabbit hole” games, otherwise
known as collectable card games or CCGs.
These are the greatest cause of grocery store checkout disputes since
the invention of bubble gum. Many of you
experienced parents have an idea of what these are. Some younger parents will soon find out, if
you didn’t already play them as a youngster.
Once you enter the rabbit hole, there is a lot of game space to be
explored. It comes at a price though.
What exactly
are CCGs? How do I avoid them? Can I avoid them? Do I want to avoid them? I know we have had these questions as our boy
has grown, and we seemed to hit on a solution that kept him happy an let us
keep our house. Let me clear things up a
bit.
Magic: The Gathering is the first and
most commercially successful of all of the CCGs. It was first published in 1993 and quickly
became a huge hit. When first published,
it was a completely new concept in game design.
Following right on the heels of the bad press surrounding Dungeons & Dragons, it rapidly came
under scrutiny due to the title and theme.
Parents wondered exactly what arcane things were really going on during
those late night sessions. Little did
they know that the game play isn’t the issue; the business model is the real danger.
Getting
started in a CCG is easy. Nearly all
CCGs sell “starter decks” which contain enough cards to begin play. The cards typically consist of characters,
locations and powers or weapons which all work together towards combat
prowess. Typically two players face off
with their decks of cards and play through various combinations in order to win
the game by defeating the other player.
Starter decks are built equally, so getting started is easy.
The genius
behind the business model lies in making the decks more powerful. After their starter deck, players can buy
booster packs of cards that can be exchanged with other cards in their deck. Customizing the deck this way makes it more powerful
through the cards or through the interaction of the various combinations of
cards. To play competitively, players
need to purchase better cards. There are
several levels of cards: common, uncommon, rare and “mythic rare” (number of
levels and terms may vary: these are specifically Magic terms). Cards get more
powerful as their rarity increases. The “gotcha”
is that the booster packs are random assortments, so players may need to buy
many packs to find specific cards. Cards
are always being retired from official play even while new cards enter stores,
creating an endless cycle. Now we are
fully inside the rabbit hole!
Because it
appeals to all ages, Magic maintains its
success nearly 20 years later, largely through tournaments held from local to
national levels. These tournaments are key
to the success of any CCG, since they drive the competitive spirit of the
game. Even in tournaments with
prescribed decks provided by the tournament, players want to be aware of the
combinations that might be possible. This leads them to buy their own
cards. Magic tournaments are common in any city, and there is even a
professional circuit now.
Before you
decide to just nix this whole idea for your child, I must say that there are
some benefits. Some of them are common to
many games, but one benefit in particular is unique to this style of game. Simply put, CCGs are an activity as well as a game. I have seen children sitting and discussing
the various merits of various cards (providing social interaction) and trading
each other for needed cards (developing negotiation skills) while customizing
their individual decks. Furthermore,
customizing and re-customizing decks can occupy a child for a fair amount of
time, which is sometimes critical as a parent!
In that
case, how does a parent handle this while keeping their child from spending too
much? I can give two approaches that
have worked for us as well as others, and I am sure there are other approaches
that will keep the expenses down.
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| Some games just never catch on |
The key to
both of these methods lies in this: without tournament play, CCGs are doomed to
failure. The gaming landscape is littered
with failed CCGs, even those covering popular themes: Star Trek, Star Wars and
Lord of the Rings to name a few. (Note that
there are several CCGs for every theme: it’s important to pay attention to the
exact title.) The first approach is
therefore to allow your child to pick
one
CCG, and only support it on a schedule. Our
son picked
Chaotic, since he loved
the cartoon, and we had specifically ruled out
Pokémon. (None of the kids
were playing
Magic .)
Chaotic
never caught on, and the danger was avoided for a couple years while it died
out. The one booster pack a month we
promised to support, at a few dollars each, did not crippled us. Soon, the cards were no longer available,
though he kept looking. If a child’s
game does catch on, don’t let them enter any tournaments until they can support
the habit; most tournaments have an age limit anyway.
Another
alternative, which works particularly well for Magic and Pokémon, is to
buy outdated cards in large lots on eBay or in a local game store. The tournament model also means that there
are a lot of cards, particularly for Magic,
that have either fallen out of favor or are specifically excluded from
tournament play. Failed games can also be
found this way as well as at thrift stores.
I have two games found this way: Star Wars CCG and Star Wars: The Trading Card Game.
(A trading card game is the same concept, but the term is often used to
produce another game with the same theme.)
The former has a good reputation, but I have found that customizing
decks is something I don’t have time to do, so neither game has ever been
played.
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| Wings of War may do me in! |
Of course, I
have found my rabbit hole anyway. (And I
am not talking about the elephant-sized hole that is buying games in
general!) Another type of collectable
game involves miniatures, and I am slowly starting to buy aircraft for
Wings of War (aka
Wings of Glory). The good
news is that there are fewer miniatures to collect due to the production costs. The bad news is that they are more expensive.
Carrot,
anyone?
