Cards And Tankards Review - The Best VR Card Game On Meta Quest and PCVR
At first, I thought that the idea of a VR digital trading Card Game was unnecessary and kind of stupid. Why add VR controls to a digital card game when you can represent the same mechanics with a flat screen and a mouse, or even a phone?
After experiencing this game I realised I was dead wrong.
Cards and Tankards is the BEST VR Card Game around, and in this review, I'm going to tell you why. I first came across this game when researching the possibility of writing an article over at realityremake.com about the Best VR Card Games.
A game of Cards and Tankards
While I did find some other good examples of VR card games, none kept my interest quite as much as Cards and Tankards, and none fits the mold of what I'd consider a Virtual Reality card game nearly as well. Cards and Tankards VR is exactly what you would expect of a VR Card Game. You draw cards and use your available mana to play creatures and cast spells to defeat your opponent by draining their life points to 0. It’s the classic competitive card game formula but in VR.
Cards and Tankards can be played against the AI or competitively against other players and features quite a few different cards that you can put in your deck to use during your matches. They even recently released a whole new set of them.
You can get new cards from packs earned with the currency you receive by playing games, win or lose, and you can customize the starter decks you receive in the game and even build your own from scratch. There are all sorts of combinations that you can pull off with the right cards. You might call Cards and Tankards “VR Hearthstone” and I’m sure somebody out there has, but there are many notable differences between this game and Blizzard’s.
In Cards and Tankards you end the turn by flipping over an hourglass
A Game That Makes You Feel Like You’re Actually Playing Cards With Someone Else
Before I talk about the mechanics of Cards and Tankards I'll start with what makes this a truly unique in the trading card game scene, and that's that it can be played entirely in a VR headset. It can also be played without a VR headset for those without one, but for this Cards and Tankards VR review I'll be talking about how the game feels and plays when tried as originally intended, in Virtual Reality.
What's best about playing Cards and Tankards is how much more immersive the entire experience feels when compared to playing a digital card game on a flat screen. Since the release of Hearthstone, there have been a lot of digital card games, but none has captured the feeling of playing a game with another person at a table like this VR game has. The addition of VR makes Cards and Tankards feel like you're actually at the table with someone else.
The open mic and casual communication with your hands that you can do in Virtual Reality gives the whole experience a sense of presence. It feels like you're placing cards down across the board from another person. It's also very easy to find a game, easier than in real life, because you can play with people far away, and I never had to wait more than thirty seconds or so in the queue to find a match. I often found a game instantly.
Playing a creature in Cards and Tankards VR
Everyone I played with was really friendly too, and a casual conversation about the game we were playing naturally ensued during each match. Instead of relying on emotes to convey each player's experience of the game, you can just talk and gesture casually like you are really there.
The hand controls that VR provides also translate nicely to the actions that you take when playing the game. Your cards float above your left hand and can be plucked out and placed on the board with your right hand. Actually performing this action instead of clicking and dragging on a flat screen felt really right to me, and then seeing that action play out with 3D animations and models looked great as well.
The sense of spectacle and that you really are doing magical things with the cards you are playing come across much better in VR. To attack you have to actually grab one of the 3D models of your creatures on the board and place it in the attack position, and gesturing and pointing to designate targets for spells feels great as well. Some creatures even come with activation abilities that you use by tapping them on the head. You end your turn by grabbing and flipping over an hourglass instead of just clicking a button.
These all sound like little things, and at first, I thought they were inconsequential fluff, but the more I played the game the more I realized that all of these little touches serve to make you feel like you really are at the table just like the ability to freely talk and gesture to your opponent does.
You can even walk all the way around the table if you want to and see the game from multiple angles. It's really great.
Look at that game board
Looking at the game is also a pleasure. The developers over at Divergent Realities didn't miss the opportunity to use your immersive VR view of the game board to add some spectacle.
Your creatures on the board are actual 3D models, and have death and attack animations that play out with the action. It's a lot more satisfying than seeing a number go down and an icon on a screen explode. Spells create wisps of magic and fire through the air as they hit their targets. I always enjoyed looking at the effects of my cards on the board.
The Gameplay Mechanics Of Cards And Tankards
Now that I've fawned over how much I love the execution of a VR card game and the immersiveness of it all, let's talk about how Cards and Tankards actually plays.
To summarise. You get an additional maximum mana each turn, and each player starts with thirty health. The first player to have zero health loses. You play spells and creatures with mana each turn, and each creature has a damage and health value. If a creature’s health goes to zero it perishes.
Each turn after you play your cards until you don’t have the mana to play more you can attack with all unexhausted creatures and then end your turn. Creatures are exhausted right after you play them and after you attack or activate them. If a creature is blocked it and the blocking creature fight and even if the attacker survives it doesn’t do damage to your opponent.
Your opponent blocks with their creatures and then their turn starts when they’re done blocking. They do the same thing you just did, play cards, and then attack if they want to. Over and over until someone’s health hits zero.
Hitting an enemy with a spell
Hopefully that gives you some idea of how Cards and Tankards is played. There are clearly some elements borrowed from other card games, but the end result is a unique set of gameplay mechanics that is still very accessible and straightforward to understand.
The tutorial also explains things very well, though there were a few gaps in what it teaches you, like the maximum amount of creatures on the board (10) or what the maximum mana cap is (also 10). Cards and Tankards feels even more unique when you get into deck building and the difference between factions.
I'm very proud to report that the starter decks are actually really viable. I racked up quite a few wins without even modifying them.
I also found myself opening quite a few card packs. While progression does inevitably slow down, I was getting a lot of in game gold from the Quest system, all the games I was playing, and the free battle pass for the current season. I was opening quite a few packs without spending a single penny. Not enough to create entire decks from scratch, but enough to introduce some new cards and keep things interesting.
Deck building is also fun in this VR card game
If you want more specific cards you can also see what's for sale in the public tavern at the bar. Also while you're there you can hang out with and play games against others, or just watch players that are much better discuss the current meta and play against each other.
The social aspect of Cards and Tankards comes alive even more if you play in the public tavern, and I think this VR game benefits so much from having a public space where you can just hang out, share decklists, and play some casual games.
So Cards and Tankards, at least for now, doesn't have the problem that a lot of trading card games have. That is, to be able to have a chance against more experienced players you have to buy a lot of cards, copy somebody else's deck list, and then figure out how to play the deck. Sure you can do all of that, or make your own, but you don't have to. You'll start out with four mostly viable decks.
I played quite a few ranked games before making this review and won more than I lost, even against opponents with custom made decks. Personally, I had the most success with the first one you get, the Plundering Guild.
The Plundering Guild can enhance cards with coins, like you saw earlier, and has a lot of cards that buff cards in your hand before you play them.
The Dungeon Master faction gets a “Master” to represent you on the board
The Dungeon Master faction focuses a lot on combos and direct damage cards to burn away your opponent's health or slowly gain control of the board. I especially love that you actually get a Dungeon Master creature on the board that shares a health pool with you, giving you as the player a direct representation as a creature on the board. Also, some of them have some really great abilities.
The Augur Order faction has a special mechanic where they can use contract spells which have a constant effect on the whole game as long as you meet the requirements for it. Like their best spell of all those I tried, which makes all of your creatures deal damage equal to their health, as long as you have three creatures with more health than attack on the board. With a lot of high health, low damage creatures, this card is really powerful and can tip the balance of the whole game. Additionally, they can place a card in their hand at the bottom of their deck in order to draw a new one from the top of their deck once a turn. This gives the Augur Order a lot of flexibility.
The last faction is the Wild Horde. I played this one the least since I had no idea what their signature mechanic was and it was never tutorialized. Turns out the Wild Horde can “Reserve” a card each turn for an additional mana on that turn. This card is then placed in that player’s reserve of cards. The Wild Horde has many card synergies that complement reserving, like giving cards in your reserve bool power bonuses or playing them outright. In addition, they do also have some pretty unique cards and seem to focus a lot on buffing creatures to deal a lot of damage, and drawing and playing a lot of creatures to overwhelm your opponent.
The only reason I realized how the Wild Horde’s and Augur Order’s unique mechanics function is due to comments from readers and watchers of Reality Remake. Thanks to them, though this does, unfortunately, highlight that Cards & Tankards should really have better ingame tutorials to explain these factions.
Playing the Augur Order’s best card
There is so much more to talk about in this game. Entire books have been created to cover the ins and outs of card games and as in depth as I like to make my reviews, I can only scratch the surface of the intricacies of a VR trading card game as enjoyable as Cards and Tankards in a single article.
No VR Game Is Perfect
I do have a few minor gripes with Cards and Tankards VR. Some of the models and animations, as much as I like them, do miss opportunities to be more impressive.
I wonder what sort of spectacle this game could be if the developers really went all in on the effects and made the animations for creatures a little more expressive. Mostly they just whack each other. If I have a wizard creature on the board I'd rather they throw a fireball or something instead of just swinging their staff to do damage. The presentation of the board is still leaps and bounds beyond what a non VR card game looks like, but it could be even better.
The same goes for the sound. It's a little basic and could use some more love. Though overall the presentation is on par with other quality VR games on the Quest. You also can't see how many cards are left in your deck exactly, though you can estimate based on looking at it. It would be nice to know the exact number when a game really drags on.
It would also be nice to have an easier way to share decklists between players instead of having to manually copy another player's decklist from their collection menu. Lastly, the VR controls aren't always the best. Often your hands will clip into the table temporarily or something on the board will be frustrating to grab for a few seconds. This never killed the pace of the game for me, but was a minor annoyance.
The VR hands that you get in this game sometimes feel awkward. This is all really minor stuff that could easily be changed in the future.
You can hang out in the public tavern any time in Cards and Tankards
My biggest takeaway from this game is an even greater appreciation of the immersion that Virtual Reality can bring to all sorts of experiences.
Playing a card game in VR is a much more personal and enjoyable experience than playing with a faceless, wordless stranger on a flat screen. I've had a lot of fun against so many different opponents and felt like I was really there playing this card game with them. Cards and Tankards is free, so if any of this sounds remotely interesting, and it probably does if you've made it this far in the article, give the game a try.
I haven't spent a penny on it and I've had a ton of fun with it. You can find Cards and Tankards on the Meta Quest Store and Steam for the low price of zero dollars. There's a great tutorial to explain all of the nuts and bolts, and finding a game was always really easy. It's clear a lot of people enjoy Cards and Tankards from the fast queue time alone.
Enjoy yourself out there in VR, and hopefully, you'll also enjoy the best VR card game out there.
