Why Card Copying May Not Ruin Eye of Judgment

Last week it was revealed that the cards used in Sony's interesting new CCG/Videogame hybrid Eye of Judgement can easily be copied and reused. The large symbols on the cards that register with the game also make them prime candidates for counterfeiting. It may sound dire, but weizur writes with a link to a post on the Zen and Games site that theorizes this may not be the end of the world for the game. "Ultimately the rules of the game change. No longer is it a game about collecting and skill begins to play a much larger role in the game in the long run since personal wealth and ability to acquire cards becomes a non-factor. What Magic has taught us though is that this isn't really a bad thing and much fun can still be had when the game becomes a game of skill and less a game of chance, this is of course in theory as Eye of Judgment probably doesn't have the depth and finesse that Magic has and ultimately the game design of Eye of Judgment and it's ability to be a fun game will be the ultimate test."

Good For Players, Bad For Sony

[roadkill_cr]

I used to play Magic a lot, and this is certainly great for players on a budget. With my friends I used to play with proxy decks (i.e. cards with labels instead of the cards themselves) because I couldn't afford the hundreds of dollars I'd have to spend to get the right cards (either through getting rares out of packs and trading them or just buying the specific card I needed). However, this absolutely sucks for Sony, who is now only going to make money through the sale of the Eye and the game itself. Unless it comes up with some extremely clever way to entice people to keep buying the actual cards themselves. (Each box has a unique super card that can only be registered once or something.)

Another reason

[Bieeanda]

The guys at Penny-Arcade noted that there's a limited number of each card you can stack in your deck, anyway-- three for most, and some others are even more limited, so it's not like you're going to run up against a guy with a deck that's full of Fruitfucker Behemoths.

Given that Sony seems to be selling the camera separately (or at least making plans to do so), and retailers don't know what to make of it in the first place, the game is probably already doomed to being an odd little gimmick. If they really wanted to go with a collectible game, they would have been better served by something that was wholly online and digital-- the chance of counterfeits goes down substantially there, and the players are only a step away from the card store whenever they turn the console on.