Robot Viking

About a year ago, Robot Viking’s Pillager-In-Chief wrote an article for io9 brainstorming ways for making Magic: the Gathering into an RPG. Unaware of this, the west coast Vikings decided we would try to make a Magic RPG work. We later discovered Ed’s article and we shamelessly stole some things from it, but with some [...]

The first expansion for the 2013 edition of Duels of the Planeswalkers came out this week. It adds five new decks and a ton of cards from the original Ravnica block to the casual video game version of Magic: the Gathering.

While I was at PAX I had the chance to talk to Magic Brand Manager Paul Levy about Return to Ravnica. Due to technical difficulties associated with a loud expo floor I can’t give a transcript, but I can pass on the highlights of the talk.

With the World Magic Cup going on at Gen Con, Magic Organized Play Programs Manager Scott Larabee must have been insanely busy. He still found time to sit down with me and talk about Commander, Grand Prix events and Planeswalker Points.

WotC announced at San Diego Comic Con that they would be releasing Commander products every year now, and that we’d have a November release this year. They’ve lifted the lid on that November product, called Commander’s Arsenal.

Some time ago, Wizards of the Coast abandoned their old Player Rewards Program, eventually replacing it with Planeswalker Points, a system by which you “level up” when you compete in tournaments and win matches, and which is utterly meaningless unless you’re one of the 0.5 percent of all Magic players saving up seasonal points for [...]

If you’re heading to Gen Con this year, you might want to head over to the artist’s area and check out some of your favorite Magic artists. Not only will they be selling cool art prints, but they’ll sign cards featuring their art for you, which makes for a pretty cool souvenir. Which artists will [...]

Sure, it’s Magic Week here at Robot Viking, but sometimes Magic is a little too complicated for the younger gamers in your life. You need a gateway game to teach them the fundamentals of card advantage, hand-quality, and creature combat. How about Kaijudo? The upcoming Dojo Edition will feature this creepy squid creature, Vikorakas.

Wizards of the Coast has been working on a new user interface/client for Magic Online for 180 years*, and this week they finally opened it to a public beta test. It vastly improves some aspects of the old client, but needs work in some key areas. Which sounds about right for a beta. *actual time [...]

I haven’t been playing much constructed Magic lately, so I won’t fake my way through an analysis of M13 for competitive play. Instead, here are ten cards from the set, both new ones and reprints, that I think are particularly interesting. It might be because they’re a sleeper draft pick, a surprising reprint, a fun [...]

It’s Magic Week at Robot VIking! What does that mean? That I’m going to talk about nothing but Magic all week. Duh. Hope you like Magic! Anyway, let’s get things started by roping up all of the wild bits of Return to Ravnica info that Wizards let loose at San Diego Comic Con (SDCC to [...]

Duels of the Planeswalkers lets you play Magic: the Gathering on your computer or gaming console, against the computer or online friends. It’s a standalone game — no card collecting — and it gets updated every year. It’s sort of the Madden of strategy/puzzle games, and this year’s edition is fantastic.

The release of Magic 2013 is just about a month away. Over at io9 today there’s a gallery of new images from the set, including five new characters being introduced to Magic mythology. The Robot Viking faithful get a special bonus — M13 wallpapers.

I haven’t been specifically trying to design Magic cards lately, but now and zen an idea pops into my head. This card started out as a solution to an annoying Commander problem, then got a little more interesting.