Media Cultures

The game that I will be analyzing is a physical deck-building game called Star Realms. The version I first played is the original version, which is 1-v-1. Each person starts off with the same ten cards, eight of which are “coin” cards that you use to buy cards on the board. The other two are damage cards that each deal one damage point to your opponent. Over the course the game, you collect more cards and build your deck. Each turn, you deal five cards on the table that you play with for that turn. Cards can heal (yourself), attack (your opponent), or buy a card on the board. The game is quite fast- paced, with each player’s turn taking roughly a minute to complete. Each person starts off with the same number of health points, and the point of the game is to “kill” the other person. The game is set in outer space, and all the cards are various types of ships and bases — the aesthetic is space-military. There are four different factions that each have their own specialty; for example, the green faction focuses more on fire-power while the blue faction has more healing and purchasing power. Clearly, the game designers were not holding back from the war theme.

The message of the game is that there can only be one winner, and the way to win is to utterly destroy your opponent. This is not a message I agree with, so I’m honestly a bit conflicted about enjoying this game so much. It’s really fun! However, since the first time I played, I’ve been saying that I wish there could be a version of this game that wasn’t about war and destruction but maintained the same general gameplay and structure. Maybe it could be about fungi and molds competing for habitat or something? I suppose that’s still about “killing” your opponent, but at least it’s not people destroying each other with military spaceships…

There is an expansion pack that allows up to four people to play. The expansion pack includes a coop version where players aren’t competing with each other. Instead, players work together to defeat a mutual opponent. While this eliminates the goal of destroying the other people in the room, the message is ultimately the same: kill or be killed.

Using the terminology of the Quantic Foundry’s gamer motivation model, Star Realms targets the following categories: action, in terms of destruction; social, in terms of competition; mastery, in terms of strategy; and achievement, in terms of power. The game employs a mix of each of these strategies, and therefore it’s not possible to choose one motivation that’s more relevant than the others.

There are also cards that give you the chance to “scrap” (get rid of) any card in your deck each turn. This is another approach that differs from person to person; I find scrapping cards very helpful, because I can get rid of less powerful cards (like the ones we started with), which increases the frequency of getting good cards. Again, this all reinforces the message of gaining power in order to destroy your opponent.

The skills that are required to play the game well are strategy and planning. Through playing this game a lot, I’ve learned that the best way to approach it is to choose a faction (green, blue, red, or yellow) and try to buy as many cards of the same faction as possible. Cards of the same faction work together, and increase the abilities of the individual cards when you deal multiple of them on your turn. The next question is: which faction is the best? This is where the strategies diverge. I personally like the blue faction best, because it heals and gives you lots of purchasing power. I would say that this faction is more defensive in nature. On the other hand, my partner likes to focus on the green faction because when you collect enough greens, you can deal out insane damage. The green faction is definitely the most offensive. My partner and I win and lose games an equal amount, so it doesn’t seem like one faction is better than the other. The red one is decent, and the yellow one is the one we both like the least — it has elements of everything but doesn’t do any of them that well. This actually demonstrates another message in the game: that specialized skills are better than generalized skills.

Overall, Star Realms is a really fun game that (unfortunately, in my opinion) doesn’t hold back from a war and destruction theme. As I mentioned earlier, I wish the game was about something other than ruthless competition. I wonder, however, if that aspect is inherently what makes this game so fun. Competition is an integral part of games, and usually there is only one winner. If Star Realms had a different theme that didn’t promote competition in the same way, maybe the element that makes it so successful as a game would be lost.