The Best Game You've Never Heard Of: Spectromancer

What if I told you that Magic: The Gathering designer Richard Garfield had created a Magic-esque video game that included online leagues, a replayable single-player campaign, and didn't require shelling out for collectible cards? You'd be falling over yourself to hand over the $20, right? I thought so. You guys have great taste, and I applaud you.

Spectromancer is that game, and it came out in 2008. I can't fault you for not knowing about it, since it's literally my job to know these things and this one slipped under my radar, too. Now that it's got its teeth in me, though, I can't put it down. It's the perfect storm of accessibility, depth, and entertainment. Matches typically take between three to 15 minutes, and are packed full of tense strategic decisions. Best of all: you can beta test the expansion right now – which adds three new classes and new modes for both single- and multiplayer – for free.

The basic gameplay is much simpler than...well, anything. Each turn, you play one card – either a creature onto the field or a spell that has an instant effect. Then all of your creatures attack. That's it. Unopposed creatures hit the enemy's life total, and the first to hit zero life loses. It's simple but far from easy, as we'll see in a moment.

Playing a card doesn't remove it from your hand, nor do you draw any cards during the game. The twenty spells available to you at the start can be played over and over for the whole game. Thus the whole card advantage metagame of Magic, which ultimately determines the outcome of nearly every duel in that game, is not present in Spectromancer. Instead, the game hinges on tempo and mana advantage.

Tempo is a concept familiar to any experienced competitive strategy game player. Based on the condition of the board (here, what creatures are out and how wounded they are), one player is going to be active while his opponent is forced into a reactive state. At the most basic level, consider this:

Player A has three Trolls on the board, while Player B has two. If it's Player B's turn, he has an uncontained threat (the third, unopposed Troll) that he has to deal with or face getting smacked in the face for six damage every turn. He has to react to the threat, which limits his tactical options. Clearing the board via a powerful card like Stone Rain would eliminate his disadvantage, but would merely net him a one-Troll gain (since he'd lose his own two Trolls) for the high cost of casting Stone Rain and leave Player A with the next move anyway. Playing a creature strong enough to take on the unopposed Troll would even the odds, but likewise leave Player A with the advantage as it would be A's move with an even board.

If it's Player A's move, he can do whatever he wants. He could play a mana advantage card like Meditation, securing a better position moving forward while minimizing his exposure to "reset buttons" like Armageddon that could wipe out his whole army. He could play another creature, pressing his advantage and going for a kill. He could play Natural Ritual to heal up one of his Trolls (and himself) and thereby solidify his strong position without overextending himself. This is what having a tempo advantage does for you, and the gain and loss of tempo is as critical to Spectromancer as a Purple Jesus fumble in the NFC Championship is to football.

The second primary strategy vector is mana advantage. In Spectromancer, every one of your mana types (Fire, Water, Air, Earth, and your specialty) increases by one every turn. Playing cards drains this built-up mana. More expensive cards are obviously more powerful, letting you pack more punch into each turn and thereby gain a tempo advantage. Mana generators like Priests of Fire are tremendously powerful, as they increase the growth of your Fire mana by one every turn. Being able to play a massive Dragon instead of a puny Forest Sprite is a big deal.

These mana-producing creatures weave a second layer onto the battle for control of a duel's tempo. Elf Hermits and their attack power of one aren't a huge threat to your life total, nor do they control the board with any authority. Generating two Earth mana per turn and thereby accelerating the dropping of beasts like Hydras or Trolls is a game-changer in its own right. Protecting your mana accelerators while killing your opponent's can determine the outcome of a match on its own.

The variety and fantastic balance between cards elevates Spectromancer from a neat ruleset to a great game. Since the cards you draw at the beginning of a duel are your arsenal for the whole game, and you only have access to four spells at a time from each house, every match is different. A simple set of rules determining what you can get (you won't ever get stuck with all high-cost spells in a single house, for instance) keeps things reasonable, as does the outstanding balance between the different special houses. Garfield, along with co-designers Alexey Stankevich and Skaff Elias, has learned a lot since the days of Black Lotuses and Channeled Fireballs.

Spectromancer's multiplayer support is fantastic, with smooth matchmaking and global rankings. The expansion, League of Heroes, promises even more multiplayer bells and whistles. Since the demo allows online play with a single class, you'll unfortunately run into a ton of whichever free class is unlocked, but that's about the only bad thing I have to say about it.

In single-player, a three-act campaign slowly introduces you to new cards while throwing unusual duel conditions at you. One scenario might have a Fetid Swamp on the board that damages every creature in play each turn, while another features a creature you have to keep alive for a certain number of turns. Jacking the difficulty up and playing different specialties can wring hundreds of hours of gameplay from the single-player. The upcoming expansion features a whole new mode as well.

At $20 (or less from time to time, by the fickle whims of Steam sales), Spectromancer is a steal. I dare any of you to buy it and come back here and tell me you didn't get far more than your money's worth in entertainment out of it. Depending on my mood, I might even love it more than fellow low-price-point gems Plants vs. Zombies and Torchlight.