Card games are wondrous inventions, they allow for hours and hours of endless entertainment with hundreds, maybe even thousands, of variations that all add a new way to play. I'm not just referring to your standard fifty-two card deck either, games like Pokemon, Yu-Gi-Oh, Magic: The Gathering and now, Nightbanes are all extensions of card games.

Now, I love every part of MTG, which my friends have accurately called “crack for nerds”, and I understand why it's so popular. The widespread attraction of games like this reaches beyond just the world of cards, it stretches into the realms of video games, music and even film; it's a massive industry. It's no surprise then, that other companies or studios might decide to take a crack at this now gargantuan market.

And the reason I mention, or draw parallels, to another franchise you ask? Because Nightbanes is essentially a carbon copy, except without the intellect and soul of the other games. I mean that as politely as I can, because I understand that Diviad must have really put their collective hearts and minds into this game, but it's a little embarrassing.

For those who aren't familiar with MTG, I won't write out the rules and a guide to playing because it'll probably take me about three thousand words and more so, to comprehensively explain how to play effectively.
However, for those who do understand, this entire game plays like it but for five year olds in comparsion. Seriously, a designer from Diviad must really look up to Wizards of the Coast, because Nightbanes matches it in every way.

But unfortunately, it takes away the tactics from a players deck, removing the need for any sort of thought or actual planning. You can actually just win by constantly playing a random creature from your hand then pressing the 'skip' button, that's not a joke by the way, I won three 'duels' alone by just playing a card that looked fancy, then pressing skip.
What Nightbanes does then is very basic, it relies heavily on repetitive, sometimes mundane, gameplay that doesn't exactly grow on you as you force yourself to keep playing in the vain hope that it'll get better.

To make matters worse you're actually encouraged by the ever present Times New Roman tutorial text, to actually repeat the same duels over and over for “increased rewards” linked to your respective guild and level. Repeating the same banal task again and again is actually a mechanic that Nightbanes seems to take great pride in, as it's mentioned an awful lot.

But the duel mechanics are less than interesting overall and actually needlessly complex, with a string of side rules, counters and abilities that you probably won't understand fully unless you fancy playing the tutorial a few times through. Which you won't want to because it's so tedious that you'll fall into a never ending sleep.

Despite the lack of depth to the dueling and the fact micro transactions are seemingly a core part of the game when changing up decks, which is just fantastic by the way, love micro transactions, Nightbanes is a good time waster is you're stuck in on a rainy day. But between the uninspired combat, the mediocre menu options and the lack of any intense card game action, Nightbanes isn't something to write home about.

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