Howdy guys! I'm posting the genealogical tree of some families (It was done months ago? Yes, and I did not post? Yes2, why? I think it's bothering someone :"3), and sorry if you're confused, of thing :"3

~See Ya

Got another offer from GameStop to try a game for a $3 coupon. Today's subject is the mobile collectable card game BloodRealm (made by Kongregate, apparently).

Playing for just over an hour got me through the tutorial and the first campaign the game has to offer. It has the elements you'd expect of a TCG or CCG--you have a champion with attack power and hit points, and the enemy has the same. You can play allies who have their own attack power and health (health is much lower than your champions), and you can use spells to get rid of their allies or buff your own. You end your turn by having your champion and allies attack, and each one attacks the opponent's ally across from them if there is one, or the opponent's champion if their isn't. You and your opponent continue taking turns until someone wins.

You have a very small deck of cards compared to other games--my starting deck had 12 cards, and I think 20 is the maximum. You can have 5 cards in your hand at a time, and you draw one at the beginning of each turn. Unlike other games, you don't automatically lose for running out of cards.

Your champion has a mana pool that starts with a small amount and increases each turn. Stronger allies and spells take more mana to use. In the hour I played, I didn't catch any obvious pattern to how this works.

As far as the gameplay itself goes, this looks like a fantastic way to kill a few minutes here and there. It's simple enough to be a mobile game and gives you some interesting choices to make, even is it isn't as deep as other games in the genre get.

There's an online multiplayer mode which I didn't try in the hour I played. From a few comments I've read, it sounds like a lot of online players will pay to get the strongest cards they can, meaning you may need to do the same to compete.

That brings us back around to the fact that it's a freemium game. The good news is the game does give you ways to earn premium currency without paying, it just takes time. I got just one "special offer" flashed in my face in the first hour of play, and the app store says it's one of the most common purchases. I can't say at this early point how plausible or implausible it is to progress through the single player mode without spending anything, but I would guess it's closer to "will fail because players will try to figure out everything they can do without paying" than "will fail because it stops players to shake them down".