So I bought a game about a year ago, and it has been sitting on my shelf all this time, while I thought I wouldn't have a great time with it, yet I would still give it a shot. Holy crap, Culdcept Saga is amazing. Granted, I'm aware the game won't be for everyone as it appeals to a certain type of gamer, hell let alone a certain type of nerd. The best way I can really describe the game is a combination of Monopoly, Magic: The Gathering and a slight flavor of Mario Party even seems to be present. I can tell you that normally, this type of game wouldn't appeal to me as I long since grew out of Monopoly, feel Mario Party is only fun when utilized as a drinking game and Magic: The Gathering, well, I could still play Magic, I just need to find someone who has a deck. My point is, this idle freakin' gem was sitting on my shelf and for a very long time, I forgot I even owned it.

The game begins predictably with your character having a dream. After a bit of droll dialogue describing how special you are, your character is bought by a slave trader. After some very minor character customization, and by minor I mean imagine Fallout 3 and toss ninety-nine percent of that out the window, you'll be led out of town by this slaver only to have a young woman stop you both and begin offering to buy you as your value is quite immeasurable apparently. During this conversation a woman dressed in black and red, with a clearly evil persona, stops everything so you can battle. This is where the mechanics of the game begin to shine.

Aside from the storyline, which I've been skipping as much as I can, only really serves to play as a vehicle to the real meat of the game and that is the board, cards and the actions therein. The game takes place on a board, which consists of four colors (red, blue, green, and yellow) reflecting the four elements (fire, water, earth and plains). For anyone who has ever played Magic, this will make sense to some degree. To the people who haven't, prepare for a learning curve that will feel like scaling the Matterhorn. Players start their turns by drawing a card and may never have more than six cards in their hand at any given time, as drawing a seventh will force the player to discard. Prior to moving, a player may cast a spell card, which can help themselves, hinder their opponents or somehow benefit a creature in play. After casting, players are free to roll the dice and move. Depending on where they land a couple of actions are possible, which brings in the Monopoly elements.

Say you land on one of the element spaces, you can usually deploy any drawn creature to it unless the card specifically prohibits it. However it will always be beneficial to place a creature on an elemental space that share a common trait, such as a blue ogre being placed on a water space, which grants additional hit points and strength making the creature stronger as it digs in on that space. Furthermore, there are forts scattered about the map that the player must land on before returning to the starting space, where a castle is located. Conversely, landing on the fort spaces as well as the castle grant the player magic in order to purchase upgrades to spaces under control as well as activate creature abilities. Ultimately, the goal of every game I've played so far has been the gathering of total magic. Upon gathering enough magic and reaching the beginning castle you win that particular match.

Like I said, it feels a bit complicated at first. If it makes you feel any better, I didn't even start writing this until I clocked at least ten hours with the game.

Overall, I think there is something worthwhile here, but that doesn't necessarily go for everyone. Keep in mind, I grew up playing D & D and Magic along with the wicked amount of video games I found the time to play. Yeah, kind of a geek, nerd, or social outcast - really I just call it as I see it. So, if you are, in fact, into this kind of game and want to give it a while it should be able to be procured pretty cheap or rented somewhere, if you can find it. Otherwise, I'll do my best to make more sense of it once I've clocked a far more notable amount of time into it.

--Andrew
hitpoints, mana!