Why I Can't Wait For Puzzle Quest To Consume My Phone Again

I absolutely adored the original Puzzle Quest, and I've spent an absurd amount of time playing Marvel Puzzle Quest over the last couple years, so I was excited to learn about D3 Go!'s upcoming Magic: The Gathering – Puzzle Quest. After matching some colored gems during a demo at PAX, I'm convinced this new quest is going to eat up a lot of my phone's battery.

For the initial release of Magic: The Gathering – Puzzle Quest, players will get to pick between one of five different planeswalkers to control. For the Magic uninitiated that just means you get to pick between five different badasses all with their own minions and spells. I played as a rough and tumble gladiator named Gideon who reminded me a little of myself.

In true Puzzle Quest form, anytime you match at least three gems you earn energy, which acts like casting mana for your cards. Matching gems that correspond to your character's color grants you bonus mana, and once you earn enough mana for a card, it's automatically thrown onto the board. Thankfully, you can rearrange the order of the cards in your hand to choose what will get cast first. Once monsters are on the board they will automatically attack at the end of each turn, and all of the familiar Magic rules apply (i.e. some minions have to be attacked before their hero can be attacked).

Your main hero also has an ultimate ability that he/she/it? can use once you've match enough ultimate ability gems. Some ultimate abilities might give boost to your minions while others might let you draw more cards or increase your hero's defenses.

The game's main campaign features a series of missions that all have multiple win conditions, so you can go back to an older mission and try to defeat an opponent while only taking a set amount of damage – for example – and gain an extra reward. As you complete theses challenges you'll unlock new cards (which can also be purchased in packs for real money), and you can edit your deck at any time in order to shape your hero into the ultimate planeswalker.

Magic: The Gathering – Puzzle Quest doesn't have an exact release, but it should be available for both iOS and Android later this fall. If your name is Ben Reeves you'll be playing this game a lot when you should be getting housework done. The rest of you might be a little more responsible.