With Gwent and The Elder Scrolls: Legends on their way, will Hearthstone’s dominance of the collectible card game genre finally be challenged? Tim reckons so, however there is another game which could prove a dark horse in the race for supremacy: Faeria.
In case you missed it, Faeria’s been in Early Access since March however developers Abrakam have today revealed the collectible card ‘em up will launch the first part of its expanded single player mode on August 24 and will go free-to-play to mark the occasion.
In short, this means version 0.8 will add new AI opponents and 20 hours of single-player features—growing the existing solo mode from “an important but small part of the game to a full blown single player experience.” With its eye on a September full release, from there Abrakam intends to support Faeria “over the coming months and years.”
Inspired by the classic tabletop Magic the Gathering, Faeria sees you tasked with not only defeating your opponent (known as gods), but also building the hex grid board as your game unfolds. Tiles can be placed as neutral ‘prairies’ or one of four land types: Forest, Mountain, Desert or Lake. Instead of being given land cards in your deck, a ‘power wheel’ allows you to create a land tile during each turn, and creatures specific to their habitat can only be placed on the relevant tiles.
“The synergy between card and board game genres gives Faeria multiple interweaving layers of strategy,” says Abrakam in a statement. “No two games look the same as each other, and low levels of randomness ensure that luck is always overshadowed by player skill.”
Ultimately, success in Faeria hinges on understanding the board, the game’s core mechanics and planning ahead and while it obviously gets a lot more involved than what’s touched upon above, like any card game it’s easier to learn the rules in practice. If that’s something you’re interested in doing, Faeria goes free-to-play on August 24 however is free-to-try on Steam until 4pm PT/midnight BST today.
