Trading Card Games (TCG) was the second hobby that I delved into as a teenager after video games, and Magic the Gathering, being my first TCG, has always been my standard of a good card game.
In fact, Magic the Gathering seems to be the international standard for TCG since it has survived the test of time. Since its launch in 1993, a lot of other TCG have followed in its footsteps like the Pokémon TCG, Yu-Gi-Oh, Star Wars and many others that have since come and gone.
The Official Cyberpunk Trading Card Game is the next in line to come into the arena, and whether it survives or not, depends on its gameplay and its competitive scene. We were lucky enough that WeirdCo and CD Projekt Red sent us an Alpha Kit to test out the gameplay and check out some of the cards they have designed.
On the offset, I am going to be honest and say that I have not gotten around to playing the Cyberpunk 2077 role-playing game yet, though I have watched Cyberpunk Edgerunners and know some of the lore and characters from the universe.
The Game
Like most TCGs, the Cyberpunk TCG uses the hand-to-resource system, where some cards have the “credit” symbol, which means that it can be put down as resource to pay for the cost of cards.
The cost of the cards is displayed on the top left of the cards, while the power of the cards is displayed in the bottom right of the cards, and the abilities as well as flavour text are written at the bottom centre of the cards.
The design scheme of the cards does follow most of the other card games, but what makes it stand out is the art, which takes up the centre of the card and brings the vibrant world of Cyberpunk to life.
What sets this TCG apart from others is the “Leader” system, which refer to 3 Leader cards that are set apart from the deck, shuffled, and placed face down in front of you. The other is the “Street Cred” system, which are 6 “Gig” dices placed in front of you and rolled at the beginning of each turn to represent your Street Cred.
All of the leaders are different characters from the universe that you may know, and the six dices are different sided dices (D4, D6, D8, etc.), but we will get back to them later when I talk about the pros and cons of the game. For now, I will briefly talk about the gameplay, how to win, and what are the types of cards available in the game.
The Cyberpunk TCG has 3 types of cards apart from the Leaders, which are Units, Programs and Gear with each belonging to different colours (so far, I have seen 4 different colours) that represent the clans, organization, or company they belong to. The 3 Leaders that you have represent the colour of your deck, and based on the Alpha Kit, it seems that you can represent 2 colours in a deck.
Units are cards that you pay and play on board to steal Street Creds or block your opponents’ units from stealing your Street Creds, but more on that later. Programs are one time use cards that affect the gameplay, like boosting your units, or removing your opponent units, and goes to the discard pile once used. Gear, on the other hand, are upgrades that can only be played on a Unit to either give it an ability or boost the Power of the Units and are removed when the Unit is removed.
Each turn begins by drawing a card, rolling a Gig dice to gain Street Creds equal to the result, and read all spent cards. Then on your turn you may, once per turn, sell a card for “Eddies”, i.e. putting your card won as a resource, flip 1 of your Legends by paying 2 resource, or play cards in your hand by paying their costs. The last phase is the attack phase where your Units may turn sideways or “Spent” to either attack an opponent’s Spent Unit or steal your opponent’s Gig dice.
When a Unit attacks another Unit, they compare their Power and the bigger one wins, discarding the Unit that lost, while a Tie will result in both units being discarded. If a player has 6 Gig dice at the start of their turn, they win. Or if both players have 6 Gig Dice, then the first player to steal and obtain the 7th Gig Dice, wins.
So, what do I think about the game?
The thing I love the most about the Cyberpunk TCG is the centre artwork of the cards. The artists have put their hearts into representing the Cyberpunk universe and it shows. Each artwork is slick, futuristic, bleak and action packed, which perfectly illustrate the Cyberpunk world from the RPG and animated series.
The cardboard itself is high quality with the printing showing no errors or fading which some other TCGs suffer from. The most prominent quality of cards are their Alternate Art Foil Cards which are beautiful in itself. I have nothing but high praise for the card quality and printing and may just buy a few of the cards I like for collection’s sake.
The gameplay itself is standard, other than the winning condition being the 6 Gig Dice. There is nothing wrong with designing a TCG with the hand-to-resource system that has been tested and proven to be easy to learn and play.
I do love the addition of the Leader system which represents the “Hero” or “Main Characters” of your deck, with their abilities being the direction and playstyle of your deck. I also love that the Leaders are “hidden” until you pay the 2 resource cost to bring them out randomly, thus your opponent won’t know what Leader you bring to the game until you play them when and where you need them.
The only problem I have with the game is the 6 Gig Dice being the win condition and a main part of the gameplay. I will be taking the Alpha Kit rules into consideration as that was the gameplay given to us with the Kit: rolling 1 Gig Dice at the beginning of each turn, rolling the D20 last, and you win when you either start with 6 Gig Dice or you steal the 7th Dice.
This turned the experience into a very quick game of whether you have a Unit to steal your opponent’s Dice and whether you have a blocker to block your opponent from stealing it back. There is no other nuance other than these 2 main points, which makes the game a quick game with a slow resource system.
The 6 Gig Dice in itself is useless other than representing the win condition, as the amount of “Street Cred” does not represent anything other than certain cards requiring a certain amount of “Street Cred” to be played, or for a bonus of the card to apply.
Since the resource system is a slow system, most of the cards that have “Street Cred” as a requirement does not matter since you will be playing them on the 3rd or 4th turn where you already rolled 4 different dices, and unless you are unlucky and low roll all of them, the amount won’t matter to the cards you are playing.
This dichotomy of a slow resource system while having a quick winning condition to me is detrimental to the game’s health, as you will only be playing until the 7th or 8th turn, playing a few cards before the game ends. Therefore, what is the point of having a 30 or 60 card deck if I won’t be able to see 70% of my deck as the game ends so quickly?
During most of our playtests, we would end the game when the opponent steals the 7th Dice and I could not steal back due to there being a blocker, with each player only having played 1 unit per turn. Even the Leaders felt useless as you have to either spend 2 resource to either play a Leader that may or may not help, or play a Unit to start pressuring early, or even worse, your hand is bad and you have no Units thus losing before your 7th turn.
I hope that the developers change the winning condition to something a bit slower pace to match the slow resource system. Other TCG uses the “Health” system, like Magic the Gathering or Star Wars TCG, or even the “Point” system like Lorcana TCG; which can be slow paced or fast paced depending on the deck style, but grants players enough time to plan and play the cards.
The Cyberpunk TCG currently is decided by a single turn of stealing your opponent’s Gig Dice where the player might only get to play 2 or 3 cards before the game ends abruptly. My suggestion would be that the “Street Cred” plays a larger role as a win condition, where for instance, you might reroll the Dice when you steal them and collect enough “Street Cred” to win, or there is only one Gig Dice that you roll every time you attack your opponent and gain that much “Street Cred” in exchange.
The Verdict
The Official Cyberpunk Trading Card Game is an easy to learn and easy to play TCG, although its quick gameplay and slow resource system doesn’t lead to long-term replayability. Since the game is currently in Alpha with a Kickstarter Campaign coming soon, I hope the winning condition or the “Gig” Dice system is adjusted before launch.
Still, there is a lot of depth to the Leader System and its stunning art direction indicates a future in shining neon lights for this official TCG spin-off. We will definitely be looking forward to the launch version of the game. Until next time, nerds.
The Official Cyberpunk Trading Card Game is coming soon on Kickstarter. Follow and back the campaign for a free Foil Nova Rare Lucy.
