Despite the amazing visual design and solid mechanics, regretfully I cannot recommend it due to many other issues plaguing this game.

This includes unnecessary fights, repetitiveness, low player choice, time consuming battles and a few others which I will discuss below. Although I will say that the devs are fixing some of them with balance patches.

I will say that I like the base mechanics. To explain them briefly, everything revolves around having a board with numbered cards that drop down each turn. Once they reach the bottom they can stack and their values add up creating a new number. The goal is to have the bottom value be an exact number and each time this is achieved your attack power increases. The cardplay comes into effect through cards that can manipulate the cards on the board by pushing, swapping, and changing values. It's simple, but works well as a support mechanic for a story rich game. Unfortunately, the game is torn between trying to be a (kind of) roguelike deckbuilder and visual novel that it doesn't do particularly well in either.

From the roguelike deckbuilder perspective there are several issues. Enemies are always in the same place, and combat is slow and can become tedious quite quickly. The unnecessary battles don't help either. Apart from the lack of variety in enemies, the dialogue choices are the same with same results and sometimes you just need to quickly click through them and get it over with.
The card play is interesting, but often the decisions are obvious, deckbuilding minimal, and frequently the best move is to skip the turn. Having a miss chance is absolutely frustrating as a miss often means 3 turns of setup are wasted.

Honestly, a good story, along with the interesting theme and visuals, could still carry the troubled combat, but unfortunately is equally troubled. Sometimes you will encounter NPCs that act like you know them but you don't. Sometimes you will see them once and never again, never finishing their part of the story because you clicked on a different map node. There are also a lot of inconsistencies - one time my character found that the person they were looking for is dead, but in the same area comments how they hope the character is home (nope, still dead). Some encounters just suddenly end. I encountered some cultists (who were apparently in my property I guess) and after defeating them, there is nothing. No comment, or tying it to a greater plot or explain why were they there. This is a common theme unfortunately. Everything feels disjointed. When the ending came, it similarly also had a distinct lack of closure, because there was no proper build up leading to the resolution. Everything of importance only seems to happen on the last level and then it ends as quickly as it began.

Speaking of the ending, the good ending is locked behind a RNG stat check, so if you didn't upgrade that stat you will only have 25% chance to get a good ending. I have no idea why it was designed this way.
I wish there was a 2nd attempt to make this kind of game, because the idea and building blocks are there. Unfortunately, the story feels scattered around in small independent fragments, while the combat doesn't have enough depth or variety to warrant replaying the game more than a few times.


+ Visual and sound design.

+ The card mechanic is simple but interesting. It either needed a better story or have more complexity to carry the game by itself.


* Bugs. Ranging from cards being unusable to forcing repeat on certain battles. However, these are being actively squashed so you might never see them.


- Story feels unpolished and all over the place. Same with characters that often only appear once.

- Combat can be unsatisfying. It's slow, there is a miss chance, combat decisions are too obvious and deckbuilding is unsatisfying.

- Not much replayability. Not many different branching paths and low enemy variety and deckbuilding options.

- There isn't enough variety in how to approach combat and the few items they are in the game often do a similar thing.


Despite the visual appeal and solid concepts, the game struggles to keep either a cohesive story or have strong gameplay to carry the game. You can see a lot of effort poured into the game, so I hope there will be an another attempt. But as of now, unfortunately I can't recommend it.

[h1] A Card Game KING review [/h1] Despite the amazing visual design and solid mechanics, regretfully I cannot recommend it due to many other issues plaguing this game. This includes unnecessary fights, repetitiveness, low player choice, time consuming battles and a few others which I will discuss below. Although I will say that the devs are fixing some of them with balance patches. I will say that I like the base mechanics. To explain them briefly, everything revolves around having a board with numbered cards that drop down each turn. Once they reach the bottom they can stack and their values add up creating a new number. The goal is to have the bottom value be an exact number and each time this is achieved your attack power increases. The cardplay comes into effect through cards that can manipulate the cards on the board by pushing, swapping, and changing values. It's simple, but works well as a support mechanic for a story rich game. Unfortunately, the game is torn between trying to be a (kind of) roguelike deckbuilder and visual novel that it doesn't do particularly well in either. From the roguelike deckbuilder perspective there are several issues. Enemies are always in the same place, and combat is slow and can become tedious quite quickly. The unnecessary battles don't help either. Apart from the lack of variety in enemies, the dialogue choices are the same with same results and sometimes you just need to quickly click through them and get it over with. The card play is interesting, but often the decisions are obvious, deckbuilding minimal, and frequently the best move is to skip the turn. Having a miss chance is absolutely frustrating as a miss often means 3 turns of setup are wasted. Honestly, a good story, along with the interesting theme and visuals, could still carry the troubled combat, but unfortunately is equally troubled. Sometimes you will encounter NPCs that act like you know them but you don't. Sometimes you will see them once and never again, never finishing their part of the story because you clicked on a different map node. There are also a lot of inconsistencies - one time my character found that the person they were looking for is dead, but in the same area comments how they hope the character is home (nope, still dead). Some encounters just suddenly end. I encountered some cultists (who were apparently in my property I guess) and after defeating them, there is nothing. No comment, or tying it to a greater plot or explain why were they there. This is a common theme unfortunately. Everything feels disjointed. When the ending came, it similarly also had a distinct lack of closure, because there was no proper build up leading to the resolution. Everything of importance only seems to happen on the last level and then it ends as quickly as it began. Speaking of the ending, the good ending is locked behind a RNG stat check, so if you didn't upgrade that stat you will only have 25% chance to get a good ending. I have no idea why it was designed this way. I wish there was a 2nd attempt to make this kind of game, because the idea and building blocks are there. Unfortunately, the story feels scattered around in small independent fragments, while the combat doesn't have enough depth or variety to warrant replaying the game more than a few times. [h1][b]The positive[/b] [/h1] + Visual and sound design. + The card mechanic is simple but interesting. It either needed a better story or have more complexity to carry the game by itself. [h1][b]The neutral[/b][/h1] * Bugs. Ranging from cards being unusable to forcing repeat on certain battles. However, these are being actively squashed so you might never see them. [h1][b]The negative[/b][/h1] - Story feels unpolished and all over the place. Same with characters that often only appear once. - Combat can be unsatisfying. It's slow, there is a miss chance, combat decisions are too obvious and deckbuilding is unsatisfying. - Not much replayability. Not many different branching paths and low enemy variety and deckbuilding options. - There isn't enough variety in how to approach combat and the few items they are in the game often do a similar thing. [h1][b]Conclusion:[/b] [/h1] Despite the visual appeal and solid concepts, the game struggles to keep either a cohesive story or have strong gameplay to carry the game. You can see a lot of effort poured into the game, so I hope there will be an another attempt. But as of now, unfortunately I can't recommend it. [code] [url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/36948155-Card-Game-KING/] FOR MORE REVIEWS ABOUT CARD GAMES, CHECK OUT OUR CURATOR PAGE: [b]CARD GAME KING [/b][/url] or [url=https://twitter.com/TheCardGameKing][b]TWITTER[/b][/url][/code]