Tag Archives: Marvel SNAP

Digital Playground

Marvel SNAP in the Spider-Verse

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Introduction

I last wrote one of these articles in February. I think I knew at the time that they planned to release a new “season” every month. Somehow, March, April, and May went by without me writing anything about the game that last year I called the mobile game of the year. Well, better late than never. And, honestly, what better time to rejoin the game than Marvel SNAP in the Spider-Verse?

Heck, my wife just texted us all in the group chat not to make any plans for Friday because she wants to go to the movies as a family. I felt bad reminding her that I got invited to one last Conant graduation for the seniors this year. Aiden also wrote that he made plans with friends for Friday. Oh well, she said, there’s always Saturday. The movie she wanted to watch? Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse.

New Locations

I wrote a quick blurb about the four new locations in Quantumania. Since they only released two new locations this time, I have some more room to discuss each one. As we will see with the card release, movement is the theme of this season. This location fits right in with that. I have a move deck that I play for fun sometimes. Hitting this location with a Multiple Man gives me the warm and fuzzies all over.

Now, this thing just looks bananas. If you get this one as the first location, that’s five turns of things getting moved. I suppose you can play around it by focus firing on this location, but that leaves the other two wide open unless you have cards that make cards like Sinister. I get the feeling that before long, unless I’m playing my move deck, this will be one of those locations that I grumble about when I see it.

New Cards

Spider-Ham

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On Reveal: Transform the highest-cost card in your opponent’s hand into a Pig, keeping its Power and Cost.

Okay, I admit to not understanding the functionality of the Spider-Ham card. Does it remove all effects from the card and just retain the power and cost? If so, then it acts like a polymorph of sorts and I can see that being a fun way to mess with your opponent. Silk plays like a reverse Juggernaut and can work to free up some space if you painted yourself into a corner by placing too many cards in one location. Ghost Spider is going right into my move deck for sure. And Spider-Man 2099 feels a bit too expensive, but with Ghost Spider can really put a crimp on your opponent’s late game.

The Verdict

Marvel SNAP in the Spider-Verse feels a bit less than previous updates. Four new cards matches up with what we’ve seen in the past. But, as I said to a friend, unless they start releasing different versions of cards, they have to be running out of characters to add to the game. Then again, I just Googled “How many Marvel heroes are there?” and it gave me the answer of over 80,000. So, there’s that.

The update only provides two new locations compared to the four from Quantumania and three from the Nimrod seasons. However, the last two updates only gave two as well, so maybe they run out of locations far before characters. One big update that I don’t care all that much about but other players do according to this article, is the Conquest mode. Who knows? Before long, I’m sure I will join you all there, SNAPers.

Digital Playground

Marvel SNAP in Quantumania

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Introduction

We last covered Marvel SNAP as our mobile game of the year at the end of last year. I think they either just released the new “season” at that point, so we went a couple of months without any real news about the game. Marvel Studios obviously considers the new Ant-Man and Wasp movie to be the launching point for Phase 4?5?6? and worked a deal with the game to promote it. As a result, when I opened it today, the game greeted me with Marvel SNAP in Quantumania.

I struggle with a way to properly preview a game like Marvel SNAP. I see people online sometimes denigrate it for the simple game play as too easy. While I admit that sometimes it puts me off that they took any “difficulty” even from a game like Hearthstone, I appreciate the quick games. But, without an actual set “release” and no way to craft cards yet, the game gives no guarantee that you will play with any of the new cards. Nevertheless, I already bought the season pass plus (14.99, the additional 5 bucks gets you 10 levels on the track) so let’s just dive in.

New Locations

Image from Marvel.com

Love them or hate them, Marvel SNAP remains committed to the concept of locations. Granted, they need something to add another level of strategery and I like most locations, but some are just gamebreaking and, as always, I feel like those ones always favor my opponent’s deck. Enough whining, what do we have?

Camp Lehigh: Gives each player a 3 drop in hand. As someone who already draws 3 drops at an alarmingly high rate, this one is a pass for me, dog.

Quantum Tunnel: Playing a card here swaps it out with one in your deck. This seems hella fun and prime for shenanigans.

Quantum Realm: When you play a card here, set it’s power to 2. Either they have a combo in mind that I haven’t considered, this is troll, or you can steal a win from big decks because they won’t want to play here.

The Sacred Timeline: First to fill this one gets a copy of their opening hand. When played with MODOK (more below), this opens the game for all sorts of ridiculous combos.

Featured Card (MODOK)

Image from Marvel.com

On Reveal: Discard your hand.

Oh great, more disco decks to deal with on the ladder. I now have a dumb trigger every time I see Apocalypse discarded from a hand. I don’t have a reliable way to play around that stupid card. Oh well, time to research control options. I already have Cosmo and Armor in my deck. Might as well go full lock down and find a card that prevents discards.

Other Cards

On Reveal: See your opponent's turn and replay the turn (without Kang)

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I doubt I will ever play Ghost, but who knows? At least in my most played deck, my Ongoing, I need to flip first especially with Cosmo and Armor. Armor made more than one destro deck retreat by himself. Kang seems like an autoinclude in almost every deck. Who doesn’t want a late game do over? Speaking of disco tech, I like Stature. 1 cost, 7 power? Quite versatile, for sure.

The Verdict

In addition, Marvel SNAP in Quantumania give us variants (no more pixels, please, most of those are just bad), bundles (I saw some one person saying the price points in this game are off and based on the first bundle, it seems way overcosted), and some ideas of how to utilize the “Battle Mode” against your friends with weird rules. I love this game and I love what I see from this update. See you out there, SNAPers.

Digital Playground

2022 Mobile GOTY: Marvel SNAP

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Introduction

We debuted Game of the Year articles two years ago. I only wrote Console/PC, Tabletop, and Mobile articles last year and the year before. This year, I plan to add two new categories; card and a separate articles for console and PC. To be honest, I played less on consoles and especially PC than any other format, but I know what to do when I get to those categories later in the week. Today, I celebrate our 2022 mobile GOTY: Marvel SNAP.

As often happens lately, Chris texted me about the game to say that he tried it. I saw advertisements for it, but heard little about the game. So, he got a chance to play it before me. He told me a little about the game and said he mostly enjoyed it. That’s when I downloaded and gave it a try.

Marvel SNAP Humble Beginnings

Chris explained the game as “War” with additional features. Okay, I thought, how does that work? Exactly as I should have known. You build a deck of 10 cards with Marvel heroes and there are three “locations” in the middle of the board that sometimes have special abilities like modifying your cards or moving them to other spots on the board.

See? War with additional features.

I still only played part of the tutorial. The game seemed a bit too basic for me. What can this game offer in the face of other card games like Magic the Gathering and Hearthstone? As usual, I looked at it the wrong way. It wasn’t until a couple of students in my first block class at Conant mentioned the game again that I gave it another chance. I started playing it again shortly after that. I earned some new cards, tried some of them in new decks, and the game finally worked its way into my regular rotation.

Missions, Rewards Track, and All That

After playing through the introduction rewards, I opened the actual rewards track. I searched for the price a couple of times before realizing that I needed to unlock it and then pay. $9.99 seemed a bit high, but mostly worth it for daily play, so I paid the amount and regularly check the game to see if my missions refreshed (it happens about every 8 hours instead of daily, which is nice) in between other games.

The game still seems basic and almost too easy. I don’t have any actual statistical analysis, but it feels like I win 9 out of 10 matches. Until today, I couldn’t remember the last time I actually lost a match. I mean, as I play, I see strategy and misplays by my opponents, so maybe it is just in that weird space where everyone is learning the game and how to play. Maybe my opponents just don’t care all that much about winning. Honestly, the game offers little in the way of incentive to win. Most of the rewards simply come from playing the game.

The Verdict

In spite of that minor drawback, I enjoy the game and look forward to seeing the new upgrades to cards that I unlock periodically. Several of the cards made me say, “Oh wow!” But, we saw with the most recent Hearthstone set that isn’t always an indication that cards are memorable.

Is SNAP my favorite mobile game? No. Did I play it the most often during 2022? Not even close. I only started actually playing a month ago. Plus, seeing as how my play sessions are only about 5-10 minutes each, I don’t even anticipate playing it the most next year. Still, I like the game and have no problem naming it our 2022 Mobile GOTY. If you want to learn more about the game and give it a try, click the link.