Magic: The Gathering's head designer Mark Rosewater has revealed the brand new card game he's created, Mood Swings, which will be published by Wizards of the Coast and sold through the Secret Lair website from June 1. I say 'brand new', but actually he says he's been trying to get this game made since 1998. That's when the MTG set Stronghold came out!
The concept, as Rosewater explained at a recent press event where Mood Swings was unveiled, is: "How do we make the simplest version of a trading card game?" As a result, he was looking for what aspects of TCGs could be jettisoned. Mood Swings does away with concepts like mana, life points, and even deckbuilding, and keeps only the bare bones.
This 2-4 player game takes minutes to play and is simple enough that I can explain it in a couple of sentences. You start with five cards, each representing different emotions and each with a numerical value. Every turn, players pick one card to play, and the highest value wins the round. Win three rounds, and you win the game.
Where the strategy comes in is that each card has a different effect. For instance, Ambition lets you play a second card to add to your score. Wrath has a score of zero, but wipes out all other moods played that turn. There are moods that add other moods to the discard pile, others that turn into sixes if you can fulfil a condition, and so on.
The game is played with both players pulling from the same deck, meaning each copy of Mood Swings represents a complete game. However each Mood Swings deck contains a random assortment of 45 cards, from a total pool of 133: 48 common, 40 uncommon, 30 rare, and 15 mythic. So there's an incentive to buy multiple decks and it can still be classified as a trading card game.
Mood Swings makes use of Magic: The Gathering's color system and sketch versions of Magic artwork (hostility is Ancient Grudge, for instance), but it's not tied to the MTG multiverse. Rosewater suggests it could have different artwork in future, if more editions are made, but he says that the card back will remain consistent. "I hope there are future versions. Obviously the game needs to do well," he adds.
Mood Swings will first be available to play at MagicCon Las Vegas, in what has hitherto been called 'The Redacted Event', but it will not be available to buy at the convention. Instead, the 'first edition' of the game will be sold through the Secret Lair website. Copies cost $24.99.
It'll be interesting to see how Mood Swings performs. Obviously it has a huge leg-up thanks to its association with WotC and Rosewater, and I imagine plenty of Magic fans will be curious to give it a try. On the other hand, TCGs are a brutal market to break into. We'll just have to wait and see!
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