https://steamcommunity.com/games/583...24505115920089

TL;DR: The game has bombed. Valve is working on a complete overhaul of the game, which is expected to take "a significant amount of time." The current version of the game will be in maintenance mode until then.

Where's Kirbynator at

Pretty much expected. It was so long without a patch that it was clear they were either going to overhaul or quietly abandon.

My prediction is the game coming back with dota 2 model, cards free, grind/pay cosmetics.

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They will have to overrule or convince Garfield. My understanding is that he is opposed to this type of structure on moral grounds. Doesn't want to contribute to the gaming culture of grinding your life away.

My understanding is Richard Garfield is no longer employed by Valve.

https://techraptor.net/content/artif...field-laid-off

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he gets credit for creating magic 25 years ago but that doesn't mean he's any good at designing a ccg now

I would love it if they did a Dota 2 model of having all the game content free and then they monetize cosmetics. The monetization system and scarcity of cards is what ruins Hearthstone and most CCGs.

The scarcity of cards is what makes CCGs work.

Game was mega confusing and at launch there was very little information about the actual rules or how to play the game. As is to be expected with any ccg, the best cards were expensive but probably more so for this game than most. That the best heros were $20+ a few weeks after the game was released was super lame. This made the launch pretty bad after a lot of hype and that is enough to kill a game.

A lot of the choices in the gameplay were just weird, like the random lane assignment, where in the lanes stuff spawns, how many creeps spawn in whatever lane. Like some randomness is needed but a lot seemed very unnecessary. The colors seemed arbitrary, why weren't the colors red, green and blue, didn't they play actual dota? Heros could cast other heros special moves which was also weird but didn't really passively have any abilities of their own, just passive buffs. The ccg was 'based' on dota and had dota-like elements, but in a lot of ways it wasn't dota-y enough imo.

I disagree. Why does scarcity of resources work in CCGs but not in virtually any other competitive multiplayer game? MOBAs, fighting games, RTS, FPS, etc. In no other game can you and your opponent be potentially playing with vastly different resources. It also warps the meta because decks with fewer rare cards tend to be more prevalent. It encourages the companies to print lots of crap, filler cards so players don't get all the good, rare cards too cheaply. And it's expensive as ****, in terms of time and/or money.

Because almost all CCGs have used this system of opening cards of different rarities in packs, players are conditioned to think that it's normal but it's terrible for the games and only benefits the companies who are trying to gouge their customers as much as possible.

Pretty much all mobile games work like this.

isn't "unlocking" stuff as you go part of those games? new characters in fighting/moba games, weapon classes in shooters, etc.

obviously at the highest competitive levels it never matters in anything

All mobile games do it, but it's done purely as a way to increase profits for the game. Imagine if Starcraft went the F2P route. You create a new account and you have access to the basic units, buildings and upgrades. Then over time you unlock better ones or you can pay to unlock them quicker. Clash Royale, for example, uses this exact monetization model.

I understand why companies do it, it's way more profitable for them. My point is that it's terrible game design.