I have been back into MTG since Eldraine Standard(Eldraine, Ikoria, Theros, Zendikar, etc) and since that was also the era of covid, almost the entirety of that was spent on the MTG Arena client, and now Arena on Steam. Arena is a shockingly good example of Magic as a game, with the absolutely absurd number of cards available somehow not breaking the entire system over its knee, even with new sets being released at a frankly upsetting frequency. Almost every single card interaction possible works exactly how it should, with very few exceptions.

the quality of life additions to the game, such as automatic triggers for card abilities in reaction to a change in the game state(such as cards with "when someone casts a spell" automatically activating in response), or automatic tapping of lands to cast a spell, and the auto tapper USUALLY selecting lands intelligently so you don't accidentally lock yourself out of casting other spells by wasting all of a particular mana type, these are AMAZINGLY GOOD features. So many times in paper magic, my opponent or I would miss triggers or incorrectly activate things or whatever, but arena eliminates that human error for the most part.

the aesthetic of the game is top shelf. simplistic displays for cards can be expanded to show full details, the sound effects are generally perfect for each card, the visuals are generally pretty basic but just feel right. a really weak creature like a 1/1 hitting the opponent directly basically makes a "TINK!" sound, while a massive 15/15 monstrosity walloping them in the face makes a suitably appropriate and crunchy "THUD-BOOM" effect. They used to be far more interested in giving special cards lots of flair, lots of mythic rares and some lesser rares would get visual effects on the field; playing Korvold, Fae-Cursed King would have the dragon himself fly in and land on the card before disappearing, or casting the "destroy all creatures" part of Realm-Cloaked Giant would have a giant hand extend over the battlefield and "grasp" the field, crushing everything, before pulling away again. It was a neat effect, but as more sets came out, you could really see the dev team get stretched thin as fewer and fewer cards got special treatments like that, until they basically stopped altogether. I miss the over the top effects when someone played a game-ending legendary creature or ultimate spell.

community interaction is minimal at best. you can get basic emotes of short quotes from zendikar rising and "good game" or "hello!", or emojis from each set of characters doing a short animation(often referencing some meme, like doge or drakeposting). friends list exist but might as well not. you cannot directly interact with other players outside of those emotes and emojis, and those can be turned off to eliminate even that connection. and honestly, good. magic players are often pretty toxic and get super mad if they're losing, last thing the game needs is a chat function, half the player base would be banned for slurs within a week. there is a "time rope" function to prevent people from taking too long during their turns or give people enough time to reconnect if they disconnect, but this can be abused by awful people to drag out a game, sometimes for half an hour longer or more than it should be, if they're really dedicated and wasting every second. it sucks, but I'm not sure what the alternative is.

the economy is garbage. straight up. it's pretty easy to START playing for free, but it's way more difficult to KEEP playing for free. the starter decks are reasonable and have lots of good cards in them generally, but to get to be competitive versus top tier decks, you're gonna have to put in a lot of time or drop some cash. I used to be fine with buying stuff like the battle pass for each set, you get a TON of stuff worth way more than the initial cost if you reach the end of it, but nowadays I don't even bother. the grind is real, and imo they should just institute a monthly subscription plan to allow people access to the entire card library in exchange for like 10-15 bucks a month. it'd certainly be worth it compared to buying paper mtg packs, have you seen the prices they're charging for magic cards these days?

opening packs in arena gives you less cards than paper packs, but rares and mythics are duplicate protected, meaning once you have 4, you won't get any more of them until you have every other card in the set they're from, and once you DO start getting those, it'll give you gems(the real money currency) instead of the excess dupes. not too bad, imo. as well, opening packs earns you Wildcards, either through number of packs opened progression(guaranteed in addition to the cards in the packs, every 6 packs = a rare WC, every 18 packs = a mythic WC, and common/uncommon WCs are much more frequent than that) or as random inserts in the packs themselves, and Wildcards can be used to craft any card you want of the given rarity, 1 per wildcard. there's an option to buy a wildcard bundle, but never get that, it's a scam for lazy bums, you basically get that many just opening the equivalent money amount of packs anyways.

playing draft or sealed, where you open packs and build a deck with multiple other people and then compete to earn wins to basically recup the cost of the draft/sealed you just did, is an absolute blast. there is an up front cost, but you keep any cards you get from them, and if you manage to reach 5-7 wins, you not only get some extra free packs to open, but also get back the entry fee plus a bit extra. so if you're good enough at drafting, you can "go infinite", and make enough from drafts to play indefinitely as well as supply you with all the cards you'll need.

all in all, Arena is a surprisingly polished, incredibly complex game that has managed to incorporate even the most obtuse rules of the game into itself(they recently added Emrakul, The Promised End, which literally lets you take control of your opponent when you cast it and play as them for a turn), but there are certainly downfalls to it. the time commitment or monetary cost can be significant, and there is zero community inside the game itself, all that has to be done outside of it, so if you are looking for that you won't find it here.

but if you just want to play magic, it's the best digital rendition of the first and best trading card game ever made.

I have been back into MTG since Eldraine Standard(Eldraine, Ikoria, Theros, Zendikar, etc) and since that was also the era of covid, almost the entirety of that was spent on the MTG Arena client, and now Arena on Steam. Arena is a shockingly good example of Magic as a game, with the absolutely absurd number of cards available somehow not breaking the entire system over its knee, even with new sets being released at a frankly upsetting frequency. Almost every single card interaction possible works exactly how it should, with very few exceptions. the quality of life additions to the game, such as automatic triggers for card abilities in reaction to a change in the game state(such as cards with "when someone casts a spell" automatically activating in response), or automatic tapping of lands to cast a spell, and the auto tapper USUALLY selecting lands intelligently so you don't accidentally lock yourself out of casting other spells by wasting all of a particular mana type, these are AMAZINGLY GOOD features. So many times in paper magic, my opponent or I would miss triggers or incorrectly activate things or whatever, but arena eliminates that human error for the most part. the aesthetic of the game is top shelf. simplistic displays for cards can be expanded to show full details, the sound effects are generally perfect for each card, the visuals are generally pretty basic but just feel right. a really weak creature like a 1/1 hitting the opponent directly basically makes a "TINK!" sound, while a massive 15/15 monstrosity walloping them in the face makes a suitably appropriate and crunchy "THUD-BOOM" effect. They used to be far more interested in giving special cards lots of flair, lots of mythic rares and some lesser rares would get visual effects on the field; playing Korvold, Fae-Cursed King would have the dragon himself fly in and land on the card before disappearing, or casting the "destroy all creatures" part of Realm-Cloaked Giant would have a giant hand extend over the battlefield and "grasp" the field, crushing everything, before pulling away again. It was a neat effect, but as more sets came out, you could really see the dev team get stretched thin as fewer and fewer cards got special treatments like that, until they basically stopped altogether. I miss the over the top effects when someone played a game-ending legendary creature or ultimate spell. community interaction is minimal at best. you can get basic emotes of short quotes from zendikar rising and "good game" or "hello!", or emojis from each set of characters doing a short animation(often referencing some meme, like doge or drakeposting). friends list exist but might as well not. you cannot directly interact with other players outside of those emotes and emojis, and those can be turned off to eliminate even that connection. and honestly, good. magic players are often pretty toxic and get super mad if they're losing, last thing the game needs is a chat function, half the player base would be banned for slurs within a week. there is a "time rope" function to prevent people from taking too long during their turns or give people enough time to reconnect if they disconnect, but this can be abused by awful people to drag out a game, sometimes for half an hour longer or more than it should be, if they're really dedicated and wasting every second. it sucks, but I'm not sure what the alternative is. the economy is garbage. straight up. it's pretty easy to START playing for free, but it's way more difficult to KEEP playing for free. the starter decks are reasonable and have lots of good cards in them generally, but to get to be competitive versus top tier decks, you're gonna have to put in a lot of time or drop some cash. I used to be fine with buying stuff like the battle pass for each set, you get a TON of stuff worth way more than the initial cost if you reach the end of it, but nowadays I don't even bother. the grind is real, and imo they should just institute a monthly subscription plan to allow people access to the entire card library in exchange for like 10-15 bucks a month. it'd certainly be worth it compared to buying paper mtg packs, have you seen the prices they're charging for magic cards these days? opening packs in arena gives you less cards than paper packs, but rares and mythics are duplicate protected, meaning once you have 4, you won't get any more of them until you have every other card in the set they're from, and once you DO start getting those, it'll give you gems(the real money currency) instead of the excess dupes. not too bad, imo. as well, opening packs earns you Wildcards, either through number of packs opened progression(guaranteed in addition to the cards in the packs, every 6 packs = a rare WC, every 18 packs = a mythic WC, and common/uncommon WCs are much more frequent than that) or as random inserts in the packs themselves, and Wildcards can be used to craft any card you want of the given rarity, 1 per wildcard. there's an option to buy a wildcard bundle, but never get that, it's a scam for lazy bums, you basically get that many just opening the equivalent money amount of packs anyways. playing draft or sealed, where you open packs and build a deck with multiple other people and then compete to earn wins to basically recup the cost of the draft/sealed you just did, is an absolute blast. there is an up front cost, but you keep any cards you get from them, and if you manage to reach 5-7 wins, you not only get some extra free packs to open, but also get back the entry fee plus a bit extra. so if you're good enough at drafting, you can "go infinite", and make enough from drafts to play indefinitely as well as supply you with all the cards you'll need. all in all, Arena is a surprisingly polished, incredibly complex game that has managed to incorporate even the most obtuse rules of the game into itself(they recently added Emrakul, The Promised End, which literally lets you take control of your opponent when you cast it and play as them for a turn), but there are certainly downfalls to it. the time commitment or monetary cost can be significant, and there is zero community inside the game itself, all that has to be done outside of it, so if you are looking for that you won't find it here. but if you just want to play magic, it's the best digital rendition of the first and best trading card game ever made.