Death of a Game: Magic Legends

sry for my voice I had allergies my dudes
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#DOAG . Death of a Game is a series dedicated to uncovering the mysteries surrounding the death of a game or company. nerdSlayer defines the term "death" in the context of the show as either... 1. Literally dead. 2. Had a mass exodus of players and never recovered (expectations etc). 3. The company ceased to exist. We follow a timeline of events, to uncover clues concerning why a game or company doesn't do well, and attempt to put it all together at the end for a deduction explaining how or why the game failed based on the evidence gathered.
Sources:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic:_...
www.ign.com/articles/magic-le...
www.polygon.com/2021/3/18/223...
www.rockpapershotgun.com/magi...
venturebeat.com/2017/06/08/pc...
www.pcgamesn.com/magic-legend...
www.polygon.com/2021/1/28/222...
www.playmagiclegends.com/en/n...
www.epicgames.com/store/en-US...
www.ign.com/articles/magic-le...
www.pcgamer.com/magic-legends...
www.freemmostation.com/news/m...
www.mmorpg.com/news/heres-why...
www.freemmostation.com/news/m...
www.invenglobal.com/articles/...
www.rockpapershotgun.com/magi...
venturebeat.com/2017/06/07/ma...
www.playstationlifestyle.net/...
• Magic: Legends | PAX E...
• PAX East Gameplay Demo...
www.nerdmuch.com/magic-legend....
/ magic_legends_was_not_...
/ magic_legends_has_a_90...
gamerant.com/magic-legends-be...
www.polygon.com/22555993/magi...

[@eyeh0]

I heard about this game once. The second time, it’s dead...

[@Marinealver]

Three players maximum in an instance. Game Company: "It's an MMO!"

[@PenguinDT]

This was my exact experience also.

[@UltimatBlitz]

Right? I didn't even realize it was out.

[@montgomerynovak2194]

That's how it be sometimes

[@voltronxxx]

This game was pure trash!

[@MonsterTeegs]

21:03 fun fact, the highest resolution image for "magic card back" is a fake back made with 6 colours instead of 5, with purple being the fake one. Most people don't notice but it appears in videos from time to time simply because of its resolution and easy to miss 6th colour.

[@RrraverCrow]

It could very well be a real back. There were originally supposed to be 6 colors with ‘purple’ being the sixth.

[@Koleisus]

One major thing that was not mentioned (or i missed it) was: the Ability names, description text, art etc had nothing to do with magics IP a lot of time, being random and generic names and not drawing their counterpart from the what 30000 cards available in the game

[@tsukamesuccess7332]

just noticed they gave the green walker an ability called "Wild Slash", as if they forgot that's already a red card

[@kennydarmawan13]

Man, it's just obvious Magic: the Gathering has difficulties trying to expand its own franchise to other forms of game media. They need dedication and commitment. Not just brand-name power.

[@Lascax]

It's Hasbro making another Monopoly mess with WotC's IPs. Even D&D is heavily suffering ( latest example: Dark Alliance ).

[@kennydarmawan13]

@@Lascax True. One day, Hasbro will realize more about how to expand their franchises and IPs. Also, we're talking about MtG, not D&D. Thought since the latter had a full set with the former, I can see where you're coming from.

[@phyrexian_dude4645]

I will tell you this, the only spin-off game that Magic has suffered from what you just said was MTG: Battlegrounds, the gameplay was there, it worked just fine and for the time the they actually managed to make decent looking 3D models. But the insane lack of content, dept on the gameplay and the nonsensical plot killed it. It really needed more time to be an actual good game. For the rest... it was more of keep hiring awful studios and greed. MTG: Tactics was a bland turn strategy game and it dared to pull a bait and switch saying it was "free to play" and right after the tutorial ended it shoved a paywall. MTG: Puzzle Quest its just an awful generic phone game with 0 merits to it. And now Magic: Legends, which at the first moment i put my eyes on it, i just saw an instant failure didnt even bothered to subscribe to the close beta when it was offerd to me.

[@kennydarmawan13]

@@phyrexian_dude4645 Yikes. All I know, Hasbro and WotC should just hire Nintendo to make an MtG spin-off game. Anything Nintendo makes can already be a something.

[@Aredein]

So that makes Shandalar the most successful game based on MTG, which was made so long ago.

[@luufia]

The craziest thing to me is that they didnt take magic card art for their card sistem , instead they made new generic and bland card arts!

[@nerdSlayerstudioss]

And not even the same cards either lol 😂

[@akba666]

This is like one of those episodes where they show you the murderer in the beginning and you are just waiting for conan to explain the clues. This game missed the mark so badly no one knows what they were even targeting.

[@MaximumCarter]

It's Hasbro and Wizards of the Coast... they were targeting money. Absolute fail is what they got in return and they deserve it.

[@ademuran]

For a moment I was confused imagining an angry barbarian solving a mystery .

[@Marinealver]

Monk

[@nicholasfarrell5981]

​@@MarinealverColumbo

[@jayabber7323]

The fact that Magic Online, a game that looks like a virus from the '90s is still the best Magic game is both hilarious and sad. The lore is built in a way that you could make up basically anything, and it would fit the Magic canon, yet they can't do anything with it.

[@nerdSlayerstudioss]

Looks like a virus 🤣. A eShop designed visual look

[@WandererTheLost]

Shandalar was pretty good.

[@Madchaskon]

isn't that the one where you can rage and tap opponent's cards?

[@goransekulic3671]

Well, what's wrong with Cockatrice or Forge?

[@Volgrus]

Yeah, Magic Online is amazing compared to Arena. You could buy individual cards to build a deck you actually wanted to play and you could play against more than one person... idk why they made Arena so shittily.

[@nebufabu]

City of Heroes "still thriving on community servers." So great to hear that after all those years. And hopefully, it would be enough out of a legal gray area someday that you can tell the story.

[@snazzydrew]

I actually play on the CoH private server and they are extremely active.

[@shortafroman4]

Still as good as I remember too. Good story quality all over the place, too. Hidden sometimes but it's there.

[@nebufabu]

@@shortafroman4 Souvenir: "The Real Faultline by Dr. Delilah Stein."

[@electromancer2645]

Can anyone direct me to the community servers for CoH? I'd like to play again but Idk how

[@electromancer2645]

@@shortafroman4 thank you!

[@RicardoAlmeidatm]

"Remember when this game died?" I don't remember it even existing

[@Marinealver]

Would it be considered an Abortion?

[@Tooamazin]

Yea, he says that there was a heavy push on advertising, me and a bunch of my friends check for new games all the time and try most. This is literally the first time I've ever even heard of the game and honestly it looks rather good too, a lot like Lost Ark.

[@theCrazyJohn]

What if we get a series called “Survival of a game” in which we talk about how a game surpasses its competitors and how it’s still alive today?

[@dima5467]

FFXIV

[@DestroyerArcher]

He already has a video titled "Life of a Game", just that series hasn't had more than 1 video so far (FFXIV).

[@itchylol742]

I would be totally for this, especially for long lived games (5+ years old)

[@Alex-hy9cw]

I wouldn't call it 'surpass' but titanfall 2 is a good example.

[@silverbullet230]

no man's skyyyyy, one of my favorite games, and it started as an absolute shitshow

[@aliendragon17]

I was so excited to play as a custom planeswalker in the Magic universe, free roaming between the planes and having my own adventures. When I saw this game became an ARPG and looked nothing like Magic, I was hugely disappointed. WOTC has also gone pedal-to-the-metal on predatory monetisation lately, so that wasn't surprising to me either. Also the card back shown at 21:05 is wrong, that card back includes a proposed 6th colour of Magic (Purple) which isn't in the game :)

[@Agrus_Kadeen]

it's also shown right at the start

[@NeoShark89]

What's cool is that that card-back is a reference to the Time Spiral Set, that was designed with the idea of it taking place in an alternate universe (our universe not the magic multiverse) where the game was created with 6 instead of 5 colors. For a while the developers tossed around the idea of adding a 6th color to the set, purple and who's land card would be a city. The idea was scrapped though because no other set would ever support the 6th color and a normal person would have a lot of trouble building out a deck and getting lands, among other issues.

[@dillonoickle5841]

there is a current popular theory that alot fo the aggressive money grubbing the last couple years is building up to them selling mtg to like amazon or another big purchaser (Amazon is the big guess though) and its to inflate the selling cost.

[@MonsterTeegs]

The reason that card back is used is because its the highest resolution image when you google magic card back. I've seen it in a few places where people didn't notice it was fake

[@F14thunderhawk]

@@dillonoickle5841 none of Hasbros business practices with WotC have correlated to any standard proceedures except rapid expansion. the people spreading the "Pump and Dump" rumors are retarded and reading into a set of changes that arent there. a Pump and Dump is very visible when it happens because basically anyone not at the top of a project's structure becomes replaceable. and WotC only has 4 people in the entire MTG team who are not, and thats MaRo, MaGo, Aaron, and whoever does staff allocation to projects.

[@Rocjhead118]

The game, to me (as an MtG fan) doesn't have any magic IP in it. The spells aren't named after almost any recognizable spells from mtg, the art cards for the spells are generic light energy that you can find in most ARPGs (or ESO), and the mobs don't feel MtG either. MtG has so many different environments, planes, creatures and styles that could have been used, but those defining aspects are missing... something like the conquistador Vampires of Ixalan or the steampunk-esque humans of Khaladesh are iconic. Even the goblins seem to be a miss, despite most planes in MtG having them. Ral Zarek is one of the few identifiably MtG pieces of the game, but one character isn't enough to make it mtg...

[@boonsaplenty3924]

The aesthetics were honestly THE most important element to get right if you're trying to get a bunch of MTG fans onboard; you get the art fans, the vorthos fans, the old school players looking for nostalgia bait, the new players who are excited by the new worlds they're discovering, etc. But very little of this game feels or looks like Magic: The Gathering. Ffs, Bloodborne looks more like an MTG game than this, Innistrad+Ravnica that it is.

[@dreadgrave3379]

Feeling a little spicy and wanna say my interpretation of the term MMO has pretty much always been "We skipped adding gameplay so more people could be on screen." Tell me I'm not at least a little right XD

[@nerdSlayerstudioss]

Absolutely these days

[@darthelmet1]

MMOs are the diners of video games. They have a little of everything but none of it is as good as what you could find elsewhere. Also there’s like one in town that’s always too full then a bunch that are spookily empty but somehow stay open 24/7 forever.

[@ProtoZealott]

As someone who enjoys playing Summoner classes in ARPGs, the gameplay was something I found enjoyable on a mechanical level. One thing you missed in the collection of issues was a complete lack of proper endgame. After you've hit the softcap of 30, you've basically seen all the content in the game. You can either then continue to grind the same content over and over with stat inflation for small gains, or use special world modifiers that gave you less loot than just selling them on the auction house. So even if you liked the game, and could excuses its many flaws, there was just nothing interesting to do at endgame.

[@blahlbinoa]

When I first heard about this, I was hyped because it was supposed to be an MMORPG, but as soon as I saw it was a Diablo clone, I checked out. Not surprised it died so fast

[@Chloroxite]

I was the opposite. I heard it was a diablo clone and my attention was caught. I kept my eyes on it, so seeing it die was sad.

[@michaelgussert6158]

I was really excited for the ARPG but the randomization elements... who thought that would ever be a good idea in an ARPG?!

[@IAmAnEvilTaco]

If they couldn't do that with Marvel at the height of avengers, and make it work, they couldn't do it with a card game.

[@nathans1787]

Likewise. I was a dedicated Magic player for decades, and always thought it would be the perfect IP for an MMO. But I also realized it would take a *lot* of dedication, commitment, and resources to pull off successfully, which are not terms that could ever be used to describe Cryptic. As soon as they gave up on it being an MMO, I gave up caring about the game.

[@IntrinsicPalomides]

It was the ridiculous card swapping in your slots mechanic that killed it, probably a solid game underneath set in the Magic universe.

[@danielsecara]

„It went up in flames faster than a mono red rush” I admit, I chuckled.

[@Jolfgard]

5:00 That's not entirely true what you're saying here. As a card type, planeswalker are "only" 11 years old, but pretty much since the early days of MtG, the idea was that you, as a player, take on the role of a planeswalker when playing MtG. So the player taking on the role of a "generic" planeswalker in Legends is not too far-fetched.

[@yarrun]

Granted, but planeswalkers were originally powerful demigods who could warp the world into being at the drop of a dime. The perception of planeswalkers as 'traveling magic-users' comes from the Mending in the mid-to-late-2000s, and their use as MTG's primary branding tool was set in stone with the Gatewatch in the mid-2010s.

[@soapboxk2203]

@@Vinterloft Mmmmmhmmm, tell us more about how you're too cool for things lots of people enjoy.

[@pascalsimioli6777]

@@soapboxk2203 If you are so emotionally invested in something to reply with such childish behavior you might want to step back and do some introspection.

[@soapboxk2203]

@@pascalsimioli6777 seems like you're the one getting emotional my friend. I just pointed out how someone felt the need to let everyone know they were too good for the things all the plebs enjoy.

[@xekon14]

In the beginning you were playing as a wizard, not a planeswalker. Planeswalkers at that time were on the level of Urza and the likes, super powerful beings. After said mending where the planeswalkers gave up a lot of their power did the game shift into what it is today, two planeswalker battling it out

[@Lakefront_Khan]

This looks like it could have been a really fun Diablo clone.

[@I8one2Many]

Heard there was glitch that never was patched and you could max lvl in a week.

[@Darkprosper]

@@JohnSmith-ox3gy I mean, Diablo has the grind of a gacha game, it just doesn't have the gacha part...

[@spikeychris]

Imagine diablo with absolutely all of the fun sucked out of it and a terrible ability system. That sums up Magic Legends lol

[@Obelion_]

having played it, no it couldnt. every aspect of it was ultra cookie cutter and sadly just not even remotely fun. and the idea of randomly shuffeling you ability bars around after each spell cast meant you would most of the time just mindlessly spam all abilities on cooldown

[@regesteel548]

I played it and personally I found it really unfun. Not anywhere near as fun as Diablo imo

[@Jedda678]

This hopefully does not mean there won't be more MtG ventures into the ARPG or MMORPG genres. But Perfect World and subsequently Cryptic Studios should've been red flags about this project tanking. Their games have never been HUGE successes. Just moderate, like enough to keep them running and provide some content updates but never truly feeling like massive hits that everyone should be playing. Not to mention the reason they shut it down in open beta was due to it not meeting their financial expectations...like really? In open beta when your game needs MASSIVE overhauls to a lot of your systems, world, and classes you weren't making a buck so you pulled the plug? Kudos to them for refunding everyone who bought into it, but still a huge shame on Cryptic and Perfect World for trying to use MtG as a cash grab rather than putting any heart and soul into the game.

[@snowsource13]

“An MTG game that failed so fast, the game never even launched.” New to WoTC shenanigans nerdslayer? Us MTG players all expected this to fail horribly. Wizards has a track record for underinvestment of anything digital.

[@lukasz1kier]

Which makes it really surprising, that their tournament app is actually functional and even runs on phones that are older than 1 year.

[@JuanWonOne]

@@lukasz1kier that's because they've never bothered to update the app. They made it, dumped it and then forgot about it.

[@Next0gen0]

It sounds like this is a classic case of "Alot of ideas, without good direction".

[@StonehengeHurricane]

Death of a Game: Speed Running Edition

[@lorecollector]

I've been looking forward to this one. I don’t think anyone was surprised this game flopped in the end.

[@mrrudigaer]

Its really sad that all magic games that arent card games almost always die

[@rolling4everywhere]

Agree

[@Lascax]

@@mrrudigaer Magic Duels says hi.

[@mrrudigaer]

@@Lascax aint that a card game?

[@entothechesnautknight1762]

One of the most telling things about this game is that they had a spell named unearth, an iconic resurrection spell in the card game, and made it deal damage... Also I legit thought I was looking at StarCraft in some of those levels. But like, a bad StarCraft. And I think the most disappointing part, personally, was the lack of *any* meaningful customization, visually. I mean, magic's got so many different iconic humanoid creatures to choose from; Goblins, Elves, Merfolk, Minotaurs, Vedalken, Trolls, Viashino, Scarecrows, Leonin, Naga, Loxodon, Demons, Homorads and Celaphids, just to name a few, and yet all we got was humans. From the studio that brought us city of heroes, that's just... Disappointing. And again ignores what magic players want, as "[Blank] Tribal" is such a common meme that people absolutely flip when they see the new crab commander, or the new turtle lord, or what the hell clerics got up their sleeve this time, or, hell, even just what's going to come outta elf ball or the goblin warrens next. Even fucking *HUMAN* tribal is beloved, playing with so many different races is a core aspect of modern magic, and, well, seeing it missing here is just asking to flop.

[@entropyad]

Encapsulates everything I had issues with succinctly. Perfection. I will add: the drop rates were atrocious for so long I never even saw half the mythics, and I farm like I'm a character in a nursery rhyme.

[@magicmanmagicman5955]

I think thats it is a wider problem... my fav game is a HoMM3, where each faction had a 7 creatures, and it is a FEW humans and most of the creatures was a unicorns/dragons/nagas/etc. This days regardless of genrie, if it is a fantasy thats all your options is a 90% humans and one token fantasy creature. And I`d love to play as a Loxodon.

[@nicholasfarrell5981]

Honestly, having the player options be all/primarily human fits with the racial spread of Planeswalkers in the lore. The 'walkers we've seen printed are majority-human, and it's not common for a nonhuman 'walker (outside of a select few) to get multiple new versions outside of Ajani and Nissa. At least, not to the extent that we get/got new Chandras, Jaces, Lilianas, and Gideons.

[@furrys.1304]

Hearing Asheron's Call gets some props brings a big smile to my face!

[@garethfairclough8715]

The death of this one nearly took out cryptic as a whole. They bet literally *everything* on it succeeding, taking everything and everyone they could from their other games, to the detriment of those games. They left STO with one programmer. ONE. Then, when magic failed, they laid off basically everyone involved. It'd be cryptic to blame. Their team is good, but the management and team leadership is *awful*.

[@wenlocke]

This is possibly the most annoying part. Having hoovered up most of the talent from STO, when the game failed, they pretty much ditched everyone from Magic legends, without really trying to move them back to STO.

[@Nocturne989]

I uninstalled it within twenty minutes... In the Closed Alpha, BEFORE the monetization was added.

[@Lizard1582]

Same. I like the MTG ip, but the characters and story felt incredibly bland and there was nothing fun about the gameplay (like why would I play this over diablo or poe?). I was the target audience of this game but like you, 20 mins in and I was like "nope".

[@Aliens1337]

Same, the gameplay loop was so incredibly boring. The “deck building abilities” mechanic they have was cool but very shallow. Combat is dreadfully boring, visuals are outdated and looks like a mobile game. Every mission is just literally a repeat of the last one. 2 hours were enough for me to feel like never wanting to play this again.

[@chadbusch8541]

Same like I know alphas are rough but daaaaamn

[@thedofflin]

I'm still very keen to see a game that accurately reflects the art of MTG. Such an epic and awesome world.

[@fletcherw32]

How is such a thing even possible when many of mtg's most iconic pieces of art are crafted in diverse styles by different artists? I feel theyd have to lock down a single plane like Innistrad or something, where everything kind of has a similar visual theme.

[@christopherharris8312]

@@fletcherw32 get multiple artists working on it and each plane having different art styles would reallyy make the game unique

[@howareyoumoreofaclownthanme]

@@christopherharris8312 I think that could actually work. Heck, I've seen it in action with Alice: Madness Returns. The contrast between the gritty real world, the whimsical Vale of Tears and the Japanese inspired mantis realm are stark but work nonetheless.

[@HowdyHowdy_]

Dang, Magic Legends died faster than me clicking this video.

[@awanderingcommenter]

Don't get me wrong, I would LOVE to see a truly story-based RPG in this universe. There is A LOT of potential for this, and it would be disappointing if it was never realized. However, this attempt is not how a Magic video game should work. It seemed to lack a heart and a purpose besides just "making money". Imo, games should be made to make memories, not just money.

[@pumodi]

I was offered a job on this game in June of 2020. Based on everything I've heard in the past few weeks makes me very happy I politely declined the position. I would've had to move to the opposite end of the west coast in the middle of the pandemic only to potentially not have a job just a year later. Really a shame as it could've been great.

[@Serevarno]

Damn, that was quick. XD

[@toastman1992]

I remember playing a lot of the Neverwinter MMO heavily for about 5 months, before I realized I felt absolutely nothing while playing it, and haven't touched it since.

[@dragonfire14x]

I signed up for the alpha as soon as it was available. I got it to the first test and my main reaction was "this is super boring". That is the game's biggest flaw for me it was boring. That combined with a lot of small issues like the camera, RNG in the deck system, and no gear (at least when I played it there wasn't). Not sad to see it gone, WotC seems to be milking MTG as much as they can, they got me out of the card game too.

[@FrostiKing]

I remember watching the VGA when they dropped the trailer for this at first I was like "Eh, this looks like magic." to "Eh...this can't be magic." to "Oh, yeah this is great I can go to Ravnica!" However even at the time I started thinking on how that would work, how you could play as a planeswalker and go to the different worlds. I mean, Blizzard still has trouble expanding into whole different worlds opting for islands or small continents rather than things like outlands again. So I thought about it, roughly a new world comes every three months, Im sure wizards would like to push that aspect, but designing a new world every three months for an MMORPG would be absurd. Much less multipal fleshed out worlds, were they just going to be doing small vertical slices from every world we have had? When you offer that kind of choice people have their favorite planes they want to play on, to be apart of, to have an end game with. Were they just going to do a few worlds, Magic's Greatest hits, that's still alot of worlds, off the top of my head, Dommenaria, Mirrodin, Ravnica, Zendikar and Innastrad? That's still asking alot of an MMO. I was super excited and the more I thought about it the less feesable any of it seemed. I was hopeful to the bitter end but canceling this was probably for the best, I think it would have done more damage than good, and it looked to be leaning into pure phone game territory.

[@mangodonut98]

I appreciate the work you put into these videos. Love the graphics and the format. Hope to see more~!

[@spahghettiboi4150]

1:37 Solid intro buddy. Especially that red rush reference

[@hyenawolf147]

The MTG game was pronounced to be a MMORPG, it even was written on there website when they told the community about it, but when the Beta came out it became an ARPG wich is a very big difference what was told to us at first & that was one of the biggest drop of trust & hope to the game, plus the game looked like a mobile game that was ment to have lootboxes or other stuff to spend real money on.

[@ryanadams0922]

I really enjoy your format on presenting the dead of a game keep it up especially the whole noir aesthetic my favorite thing about it.

[@piratesofthedeepweb9873]

I love how you use the Detective Conan/ Case Closed theme in your conclusion. I loved that show.

[@justnice1601]

can't wait till you do a DOAG of Evolve :) love that game but this series is awesome

[@yomejjuan]

This is what happens when you give your IP’s to Perfect World.

[@lucasoyarzun9902]

Wotc + perfect world, two shitty (customer wise and monetization) companies, 100% expected

[@Obelion_]

nah this was guaranteed wotc being wotc. they asked for a few million to finish the project and wizards as usual was too afraid to invest anything so they cancelled the project and made an asset flip diablo clone out of it.

[@IAmAnEvilTaco]

I used to build one of the wikis for champions online, I was a beta player. They murdered us to make Star Trek Online. Flat out, no content for like 6 months, the servers flat out lost the ability to USE TEXT for like a week and it didn't get fixed until we freaked out on the forums. Then they did it again with us and STO with Neverwinter. And they did it to STO and Neverwinter (champions now has literally one dev) with this game. Which didn't even *launch*! Cryptic has a bad history on its own, though. Selling it to PWI so they could hand it to Cryptic is like giving it to Ea so Bioware could make it at this point. I was positive this was dead from concept phase. And even more sure it would be a lock box filled mess, Cryptic was doing those before PWI even bought them. You'd unlock a loot box and get the shoes from a super hero costume. And another one, maybe, the gloves. Can you imagine if Overwatch only gave you new pants for Tracer from an outfit from a lockbox?

[@yomejjuan]

@@Obelion_ I agree that WOTC holds a lot of responsibility in this one none of their spin-offs have ever done well. But I think PWI takes the cake on this one. They’ve been involved in over 20 Games, only a handful have done well in the west. Heck they continue to exist only because the Chinese market, which is their primary one, pours liquid gold into their coffers. I think wizards of the coast wanted their game to succeed in China which would have netted them more money than it ever would have in the west. So a Chinese game was made. A cheap, poorly-made, product who’s only purpose is to make money. Chinese companies are always heavily involved in their products. They learned that from their government.

[@NicoNoInteresa]

I always thought that you must miss some things since you are only researching and not playing these games live but having played it i think you nailed every single issue, amazing research skill. you were fair to the developers while highlighting the issues. incredible video

[@nerdSlayerstudioss]

Thank you Nico! I had a lot of help from the fans (and not fans) of MTG Legends!

[@antman7673]

Just stumbled across this video. The production quality is through the roof. -The intro animation. The magnifying lens hovering over the source. Some true love for detail. Not sure, this is my content, but definitely above average editing skills are present.

[@zyncra3965]

Only after 3 minutes of this video playing, I realized that I have in fact played this game. That's just how forgettable it is, folks!

[@PreviewAvailable]

Imagine putting this money into your major digital titles instead of throwing caution to the wind and making a dumb diablo-like. Think of all the content you would have created for people that are paying good money to enjoy your current projects. All the issues that could have been fixed. The updates that could have been had. You slash prize-support for tournaments and cut costs every chance you can. But are loose with your money the minute you happen yourself upon a get rich quick scheme. Don't mourn the loss of this title. It was doomed from the start. Be glad that it's over and that so many people weren't conned into playing it. This game is like Artifact. No one asked for this game and the ideas were rotten to the core. You will never see another good mtg game because the owners aren't interested in making quality products. They're interested in squeezing as much money out of the consumer as possible.

[@michaellooks8397]

Didn't play Legends, but I do keep myself very up-to-date on all all things magic (and play it quite often), and yeah.... this isn't much of a surprise to hear.

[@Velacroix]

The mention of Perfect World at 1:08 divulged more than enough.

[@DeltaDragon79]

Hey, just heard their beta testing this new Magic the Gathering game aaaand it's gone.

[@temjiu9915]

I tried the beta. As soon as I was able to try out the "random skill" system, I knew it was dead. Some game systems just don't work together. They would have done better by just making an open world MMO based on the Magic universe. no cards (unless they're collectable summons or universal skills that are permanent!), no RNG on skills, just a normal MMO.

[@twinsen1949]

Man I love the sound of having a "build your deck of abilities" sort of thin in an ARPG. This had so much potential, had it been made by literally anyone else.

[@montanax8127]

There already was a successful instanced MMO that relied on concept of magic the gathering in it's original design. It's called Guild Wars 1. They should have went with something like that and easily raked in many players.

[@purplebunz]

One thing that's fun about mtg is how every Planeswalker has a unique magic power. This game didn't do that at all.

[@Galardomond]

Have you thought about making a DoaG: Ragnarok Online? That game died (local Servers, European Servers, FRo, international, ...) and was reborn again so many times, would make a good video.

[@nerdSlayerstudioss]

Of course, RO is a legendary game

[@gnardawgyt]

Great video and looking forward to the next one! Realm Royale was so much fun at launch. Easily my favorite BR.

[@GenesiisDavid]

Another game I haven't heard of, another video I'm gonna watch regardless cause I love this channel's format.

[@MrBrandonplaysdrums]

Man, I sunk a lot of hours into this game, and while it was mediocre, it was still a fun time waster ARPG. Not to mention the abhorent monetization (which I steer very clear from that monstrocity), the game ran fine on my machine, so I didn't notice any frame rate issues. But I think it was also a giant misstep towards the design of the game. At one point, very early in the beta, I had to look up what I was playing, as I didn't think this was a MTG game until they introduced the card mechanic, which, in my opinion, was shoe horned in. Still, it was fun while it lasted. I'm sad that it ended so early in its development, but I see why it ended this early. It was an "just okay" ARPG, but it wasn't a Magic game and this had "rush this to market" written all over it.

[@300IQPrower]

*TLDR: Planeswalkers being advertised as a gameplay element rather than story element is missing the point from the start* Not only did you release this a couple weeks after I got back into collecting MTG cards, I also got an ad for MTG Arena Mobile on this. Twice. You were dead on about the perception issue and it applies to the opposite end: I always assumed this was a full blown mmo and never took interest for that reason. To go to that line about mtg’s perception of planeswalkers though, the distaste for them is strictly a competitive thing. I for one adore planeswalkers; They’re the entire reason I got into the series. This game though utterly misses the point of them. Planeswalkers don’t really serve gameplay in MTG in any constructive way. They’re almost always one of two things: A complete gimmick, or utterly broken (Hello Liliana). The real value of Planeswalkers is an entry level benefit: giving people a story, something beyond collecting and competition to get attached to; the idea of planeswalkers from the start is _you the player_ are one. The storytelling behind MTG is absolutely unparalleled imo with incredible use of environmental storytelling. Pardon the meme but in terms of storytelling its almost like the “Dark Souls of Card Games” with its use of witty flavor text, gorgeous visuals, and ludonarrative effects (ESPECIALLY with double sides cards) to effectively construct background stories with JUST what they have to work with in the cards, but for those who straight up want a written story they have on to of that fanfic-like _canon_ articles uploaded to the official site. The story of MTG is genuinely amazing and the planeswalkers act as the core pillars of the stories. Chandra and Nicol Bolas in particular are two of my favorite characters in fiction. So yeah…Making a game whose selling point is playing as some random one akin to how you’re some random one in the card game is missing the appeal of Planeswalkers from the start, let alone the appeal of the series as a whole. They REALLY didn’t understand the IP they were working with and that seems to cripple this game on a fundamental level. Can’t wait to see a Hi-Rez episode. Everything they’ve ever done reminds me of a certain Owl saying “How has this company not burned to the ground?” They’re one of if not _the_ best example of keeping their own games from realizing their potential because they’re too busy monetizing them. It’s the sheer disgust at an all time low performance as they put out *$100* skins that led to me quit Smite outright.

[@nailinthefashion]

THIS!!!!!!!! I WOULD EAT A STORY DRIVEN GAME RIGHT UP GIVE US A REASON TO CARE ABOUT JACE! EXPLORE THE IZZET'S INTRACACIES!? WHY ARE PLAINS AND SWAMPS OPPOSED? NO???? UUUGGGHHHHHHH

[@ZekromZero]

I second for a episode dedicated to Hi-Rez

[@300IQPrower]

@@nailinthefashion Zendikar is _literally based on a DnD campaign_ i swear the amount of ideas wasted is painful. An RPG or Action-Adventure exploration game on Zendikar, a narrative driven game or straight up VN about navigating the politics of Ravnica, a Castlevania Lords of Shadow 1 or Darksiders 1 take on Innistrad with separate campaigns from Sorin, Avacyn, and Arlinn/Ulrich’s points of view, a horde battler from when the Gatewatch fought off the forces of Bolas on Amonkhet that explores the escalation of HoD, There’s a ton of middle shelf budget options for MTG games that highlight specific stories/planes but i fear it’d be like Warhammer games, where they focus entirely on pandering to an existing fanbase who ignore blatant lack of quality over the novelty of seeing a part of the series they recognize get adapted. But even then there’s a couple of Warhammer games that ended up good. And by that I exclusively mean out of like 40 games Gothic Armada 2, Space Marine, Space Hulk Tactics, and Vermintide 2, and MAYBE Necromunda. And hey that’s five more fun games we got than if they had never bothered at all.

[@ArkhBaegor]

Hi-Rez adding random non-god characters to smite makes me irrationnaly angry

[@300IQPrower]

@@ArkhBaegor it only really upsets me because they’re too cowardly to add biblical myth figures despite regularly using biblical themed skins

[@thegadjet8249]

This was a great Video. I am looking forward to see you Covering WoW

[@MrGouldilocks]

I remember watching a Fextralife gameplay video of Magic Legends a year or so ago. It piqued my curiosity; it seemed like the core concept was a good one. And then I never heard anything else about the game until I watched this video today. Such a bizarre game development and failure.

[@Lv1dog]

Changing the game from an MMO to.... THIS was the biggest slap in the face ever

[@bfeldz1023]

I would say the beta having a more complete real money store than actual game itself was a bigger slap.

[@TempestDacine]

As a huge fan of the card game its a real shame that the game continues to fail to expand into other mediums mostly due to a lack of focus. I'd be very willing to try a game style Im not normally into cuz of the ip. Cryptic failed to deliver and Hasbro clearly is too busy looking for easy money to make smart decisions.

[@Fox_Olive]

Have you ever played lost kingdoms 2? That’s what I want a magic game to be. Like they could quite literally copy its mechanics 1:1 and be just fine

[@NateDynamite]

Wow, not too often that I'm interested in a game and come to see it on this series after forgetting about it. I saw this and was like OH YEAH, where the hell did this game go?!?

[@mekelius]

I think using the mana colors as classes is a great idea. Youknow, a bit like how path of exile does it. Lead designer Mark Rosewater considers the colors to be the very core of magic and they probably should be a key aspect in any adaptation.

[@michaelsmallpalace720]

Great video! The thing that irks me the most is that WOTC is literally printing money and has an already established huge fanbase (both because of D&D and MTG), but both these things are hugely wasted on their products. They are so greedy and so disrespectful to their players that I'm beginning to think we're looking at a worldwide case of Stockholm syndrome.

[@Rogus27]

Huge MTG and MMO fan I couldn't wait to give this a try and when I got a closed beta key I dived straight in, the mechanics were a clunky mess, the world was dead save for the chat which was just people memeing about how bad the game was, I went out of my way to group up with another player and run through a mission together which consequently didn't scale the loot or XP so you were better off playing completely solo, absolute dumpster fire uninstalled it the same afternoon.

[@xkerberosx1]

I can't help myself, but the circle thing around the "Magic LEGENDS" looks as if the devs looked at GW2 logo and said "huh, that's cool, let's borrow it" cuz even the animation of the circle is pretty similar to the one of GW2's dragon appearing

[@nerdSlayerstudioss]

Lmao

[@GameUnCrafter]

I spent about 7 or 8 hours in the closed beta. I said mannnyyy words, but it came down to "I expected better from Wizards of the Coast"

[@samuraisokolata]

Putting all issues aside: this game didn't feel at all like MTG. Even Magic: Battlegrounds was a good MTG action game. Oh and the fact that you couldn't play with your friends until after going through 3h of content. *clenches fist*

[@I8one2Many]

Played neverwinter for like 6 years and cryptic is trash. I'll never give them the benefit of the doubt.

[@Marinealver]

At this point, what game company ISN'T trash?

[@coronaas]

@@Marinealver FromSoft

[@christiancolon8748]

@@Marinealver suckerpunch and naughty dogs

[@DagothDaddy]

It felt like they either had the game designed and at the last minute git told they got the license to MTG or Designed the game with the original main planeswalkers then got told at the last minute they couldn't use them.

[@nyft3352]

As a first day Alpha player of this game and years long MTG player I can say, Magic Legends has world record speedrun to get a DOAG video.

[@EdBurke37]

It should be noted: Not all players dislike Planeswalkers. They are, in fact, the most popular cards WotC puts out. It's only the amongst the most enfranchised, and therefore loudest, players that dislike for them arises and even then it's not universal.

[@300IQPrower]

And even then i think 60% is pure Liliana hate, the rest Jace The Mind Salter

[@GizmoHibiki]

Are we really surpried that Realm Royale was gonna be in this series sooner or later?

[@samuelhunter4631]

Another victim of the "Battle Royale" killer, Fortnite. At least I'm glad it's kinda dying out now...

[@Fox_Olive]

I mean, death of a game usually talks about failures that were catastrophic or unexpected. No game can last forever.

[@__-be1gk]

Are we really surprised another 0 effort Hi Rez trendchaser game is on this series The only reason Hand of the Gods isn't on is because absolutely nobody knows it existed

[@Baron_von_Koch]

Another great video. Please consider doing an episode about "Might and Magic: Duel of Champions"

[@asecondcycle]

Great video as usual. I'm curious to see what you'll say about New World considering I was interested in it as a Sandbox but the Themepark shift doesn't sell me in the slightest, and I'm not paying to find out when Endwalker comes out later this year

[@UsingGorillaLogic]

There was no magic in this game, just smoke and mirrors.

[@naramoro]

Wizards of the coast is so incomprehensibly incompetent when it comes to managing it‘s digital IP. Mtg Arena is the *only* game that hasnt been complete ass in the last few decades.

[@rafawillians7712]

Wizards cancelling Pioneer Masters and Pioneer format into Magic Arena: hold my beer.

[@RiseInAfterlife]

MTGA is ass as well. Stability of a early beta, maybe even alpha and predatory monetization everywhere. It literally completely breaks with almost every new set.

[@MonsterTeegs]

Arena is pretty bad, very unstable, each patch makes it run worse, and the economy is about as good as Magic Legends was

[@lezard2102]

19:27 in 2016 Champions Online revamped some old fights into open world raid fights. Initially the zones had a 200 player cap, but they had to reduce it almost immediately to 100 because bosses like a GIANT FRIGGING DINOSAUR would not load properly if you were standing 10 feet away from it if too many people were in the area...and that wasn't even enough so they had to reduce the zone cap to 50 players...AND THAT WASN'T EVEN ENOUGH and they had to reduce the zone cap to 35 players because the game's engine would stop registering attacks if too many people were using attacks at the same time.

[@silver_tongue_studio]

Upvoting before even watching because I've been WAITING FOR THIS!!

[@SpartanOfLuxon]

"Faster than a Mono Red Rush" That's true MTG knowledge right there

[@filipkotlaja8697]

At this point i'm waiting for "Death of a studio: Blizzard"

[@StripedJacket]

Just recently got into mtg last year lol and bam you make a video on an mtg game

[@DXRproduction]

I have 30 minutes on game, probably 5 or less were i play and 25 or more were i wait the "buffering". I had so much hype for this game. Life, sometimes, it's hard.

[@dragonomiconxxx]

The fact that you made this already is kicking it while its freshly down. Lol.

[@ewanwalker5967]

What also killed it in my opinion was having possibly the most mundane generic title imaginable.

[@DenizzMorozzov]

Have you ever thought of making a DoaG: Deadbreed? It was a MOBA set in a grim dark setting with some interesting ideas (like having your purchased items show up on your character). It was launched in 2014 and shut down in 2016.

[@hugoleo_rj]

this videos are so well produced!!

[@thegumonyourshoes]

Man, I wish for a good Magic MMO. There’s genuine potential there, but... well this probably killed that dream.

[@opag78]

maybe, maybe not as they at least had the chance to realize that only a proper MMO might work with the IP and fanbase. That said proper MMOs are insanely expensive to produce nowadays and I wager that not many companies want to take that risk

[@thegumonyourshoes]

@@opag78 Yeah that is true

[@thelonesomewanderer8359]

what i hated about this game: the fact that they butchered the likely only chance we'll ever get of a MTG MMORPG, hell, they didn't even make it an MMORPG when that's what they wanted to make it.

[@B00ndokz]

Great breakdown. As a huge Mtg and ARPG player I was super excited when I heard about this. Then everything was a miss. The random abilities was the biggest issue for me, and the disconnect with visuals for sure. Only thing you described poorly was the Planeswalker thing. In Mtg all players ARE planeswalkers. You then summon the other planeswalkers so fight beside you, thus the use of loyalty counters. Being a planeswalker is now just a title for those that can jump between planes, which would be a key component in the game to get different territories.

[@Mr.Mosquito89]

Somebody must've been sitting on a Counterspell, cuz this Magic didn't even happen.

[@nopens]

Words "legends", "origins", "revelations" and some others should be banned from game names.

[@nickandres7829]

As someone who was a day one Star Trek Online player, quit after the first month, came back after free to play and still occasionally plays to this day (as well as a City of Heroes fan), I was very excited for Magic: Legends. Even knowing it was going to be a Diablo-style ARPG, I was excited because I hadn't really enjoyed those types of games since Diablo II. I had been a hardcore Diablo I player back in the day, and that was one of the first multiplayer games I ever really got into. I could never really get into the Torchlight games, or Path of Exile. People have mentioned many of M:L's flaws. Yet despite many of the monsters and spells not being actual cards, I felt enough was on-theme that I didn't have any problem with it. I enjoyed the combat, the character classes, the spells and the settings. I loved having my own personal plane that I could develop and unlock, even if it was just the same old generic hub in practice. I understand most fans found this game disappointing and underwhelming, but I was really looking forward to it and am extremely sad it never got off the ground. As long as Online makes you buy all your own cards and Arena is only 1v1s, I'm still just waiting for everyday life to get back to normal so that I can get back to playing paper Magic again. Which seems to be the only way I'll be able to get enjoyment from the world of M:tG that I've been playing and enjoying since 1996.

[@coolboyyo654]

the whole idea of building a "deck" in a diablo clone to build your character is super cool and could totally be done well tbh

[@nicholasfarrell5981]

Yeah, I think that this type of game would be a good Magic tie-in . . . if you have a good studio making it. Not Cryptic.

[@MasterAarott]

I don't like Mtg or Wizards of the Coast, but I was still excited for this game because it looked like it would have elements from the 'Lost Kingdoms / Rune' series, an Activision/FromSoft game that likely won't get a sequel. I was actually looking forward to the deck and mana mechanics, but unfortunately they were not what I hoped, more amounting to spamming the buttons as they come unlocked to bury the enemy under particle effects until they hopefully died than anything tactical or weighty. And of course, there was no card discovery via exploration, with it instead being card discovery via microtransactions and grind.

[@Parodox306]

It sounded so good on paper (literally, the paper game is great) but MAN did they bite off more than they could chew.

[@GoyfAscetic]

21:05 Lol the sixth color of mana was idea that was created and abandoned over 13 years ago and yet its concept art still persists to this day.

[@gmradio2436]

This game had two events and one content update that added several story missions and a new class: the pyromancer. The pyromancer focused on DoTs.

[@Brendanj101]

As someone who attended Pax East 2020 with friends who are MASSIVE MTG fans(we even played Magic after attending Pax each day), they were barely even interested, and I'm not even sure if they even tried it. In theory, a draw mechanic ala KH:Chain of Memories sounds neat, but being an ARPG it adds randomness and luck that most people don't want.