Game:

Neverland Card Battles (2008)

Category:

Let's Play

Duration: 40:31

4,676 views

65

Geometry Duel is a little-known DTCG (Digital Trading Card Game) presented by Takara back in 1998 to little fanfare. Some people might say that most card games suck or that they're boring, but I happen to like many card games and find them thoroughly engaging when the right criteria is met: Easy to learn but hard to master gameplay, a practical system that makes most / all cards viable in some fashion (Ex: Weak cards with low costs, strong cards with high costs, etc.), and (in video game form) a serviceable soundtrack and pleasing illustrations certainly don't hurt. I've spent many hours playing "Final Fantasy VIII and IX's" card mini-games, "Yu-Gi-Oh!", the "Pokemon TCG", "Magic: The Gathering", "Culdcept", "Neverland Card Battles", "Gaia Master", and "SNK vs. Capcom: Card Fighter's Clash" to name a few, and have enjoyed them all in one form or another, so I'm not foreign to their appeal. Why is it then, that Geometry Duel seemed to be so poorly received in Japanese gaming communities and quickly relegated to bargain bins? I imported this game about two years back but never took the time to sit down and give it a play until recently.

It starts off rather well, with a cool Cyberpunk setting and lovely opening depicting various main characters and cards while foreshadowing things to come, which will easily make most curious enough to dive into the game. Throw in a few beautiful women to add small romantic undertones, edgy characters to do battle with (most of whom are one-dimensional but at least have illustrations), and the ability to buy or earn enhancements or new cards, and you generally have a winning formula. The basic plot is that you're an aspiring hot-shot card battler named Ride who is trying to make a name for himself by becoming the no.1 battler at the popular "Sick Boy Amusement Center", but between your girlfriend Marie (who worries and isn't always supportive of your lifestyle choices) and Sara (a mysterious and spunky female with a sexy wild streak), you get swept up in drama, conspiracies and an illegal underground syndicate, losing your citizenship I.D. badge in the process and learning that fame isn't always what it appears to be.

The game is broken into attacking and defending phases with a sort of "preparation" phase in-between (drawing an additional card, using an item card, etc.) where cards are placed to protect the "master" who loses when sustaining too much damage. In addition, cards are broken into different categories (Red, Blue, Yellow, Purple) which specialize in different areas from attack power, hit points, support skills, and sub abilities. While this seems complicated enough at a glance, many cards share similar skills, so it's not so imperative that you have a specific card as it is determining which category suits you best. While you can have any number of categories at your disposal, each category has its own "energy" cost and energy cards eat up a lot of deck space, so it's usually best not to have more than two categories at any given time. Certain cards play multiple roles while others can only be used for defense, support, and things of that nature. In the beginning, your opponents will greatly outnumber your deck card-wise, causing you to be very conservative and have a narrow strategy, but as you progress, you can buy upgrades to increase the size of your deck. This has pros and cons: the pro is naturally that you can increase your overall strategies, but the con is that it can take longer to draw the cards you want. Playing well and having the right deck means you can gather energy faster and get the first move, utilize support cards quicker, and intercept enemy attacks. It is possible to win a battle without sustaining any damage. Player 1 always goes first.

While it had the right ingredients at its core for an entertaining TCG, Geometry Duel has a few drawbacks. The biggest drawback is perhaps the presentation; while a game of this kind doesn't necessarily need a flashy presentation, it's hard to overlook how bland this game is compared to its competitors, especially when this indirectly affects gameplay. Character illustrations and general locales are gorgeous, but cards don't have nice illustrations (just tiny thumbnails), but possess abstract and basic 3D models and attacks. While this is ambitious, the game's framerate jumps up and down and battles move VERY slowly as a result. Even with the battle animations turned off, the game is unappealing to look at and this game shouldn't have performance issues as not much goes on to begin with. The music is not much better, being limited in number and of fairly low quality. The gameplay is functional, but while the game possesses hundreds of cards, many of them share too many similarities, making it feel like there aren't as many cards as actually listed.

Geometry Duel isn't a terrible game, it's just not a good example of games within this niche genre. This is a video of some things in the game. Enjoy.