in 1993, Wizards of the Coast combined card game and trading cards in a ritual intended to summon all the world's nerd-money. in the wake of their success, every game company hastily grabbed their biggest license and designed a collectible card game - a CCG - around it. a thread.

using an existing franchise did two things for a publisher: it created collector appeal (they hoped) for an existing fanbase, and it meant they had a ready supply of images to use on cards. ccgs include so many cards, most publishers didn't want to commission that much art.

most of these games are designed firstly to be flavorful - to tell the stories fans associate with the franchise - and only secondly to be mechanically functional, playable games. tons of these games were made and discontinued within the span of a few years. here are some of them

let's kick it off with SIMCITY: THE CARD GAME. wouldn't you want to build a city out of stock photography with your friends? some locations were connected by roads, some by trains. just like Sim City: The Video Game! shout out to skokie

you can see simcity: the card game actually hews pretty close to the magic model, with no less than two returning Land cards. that Low-Income Housing card is unbelievably yikes

"You will have Fun playing SimCity: The Card Game (TM)."

SimCity is far from the only video game series to get its own ccg, but it is probably the boringest. others include Mortal Kombat and Killer Instinct

here's the X-Files ccg. i said these games are mostly flavor - 75% of the text on these cards is quotes from the show. instead of using original art, this game used stills from the TV show, of which there were countless

def make sure to view the full images if you want to check out the card text

the force ... is with you. the Star Wars ccg (i think the basis of a current fantasy flight card game) splits its cards into Light side and Dark side, who play against each other? i like how tarkin and leia are mechanically basically the same card

luke's ship can 'bullseye' a 'womp rat.' is that a thing the empire is likely to deploy against you? who knows, he says in the movie he could do it so we have to make sure the game rules allow it

here's a gross sibling kiss and a jizz musician. this game involved building a track out of planet cards which both players moved their characters along. how did it work? no one alive remembers

Star Trek: TNG: CCG. ccgs need different rarities of cards - not every card can be a Leia Organa - which explains why there are cards based on background characters like JIZZ MUSICIAN and GORTA. who doesn't remember lovable gorta!

Legend of the 5 Rings. white nerds really love Glorious Nippon i guess. tons of rpg publishers created ccgs of their existing franchises. there were D&D and World of Darkness ccgs as well

horny on main

best for last! Steve Jackson's Battlecards actually came out a few months before magic, and was immediately overshadowed by it. these are SCRATCH-OFF cards. in order to defeat the sinister BAALTHAZAC, you must scratch off his weak points. make sure to find his loot space!

cw: gore, amputation

STARRING: the cover of every fantasy novel you've ever read. some of the cards include rules for different ways to play the game with others

there was actually an arg hidden on the cards? to get the final card, you needed to collect the cards that teach you in in-game alphabet, then translate a message. artists also got their own cards (lower right). the trading post card allowed you to mail away for other cards??

these games are all beautiful disasters - flavor-first game designs paired with the the super exploratory, chaotic graphic design of the late 90s. (the original Netrunner ccg still has my favorite visual design of any ccg, look it up)

shout out to my mom for mailing me all my terrible old ccg cards.

i should dig through the magic cards and see if any of them are worth anything

oh, i forgot i host complete scans of the original Netrunner cards on my archive site, @annarchive

(disclaimer: please don't ask me about annarchive, please don't ask me what's going on with annarchive, please don't tell me what files are missing)

https://annarchive.com/archive.html 

not going to do a whole other thread of these, but i don't think any ccg encapsulates as perfectly what i love about that amazing, hideous moment in graphic design

(Netrunner was famously designed by richard garfield, the designer of magic: the gathering, and became the basis for the much more boring-looking and much more successful Android Netrunner from fantasy flight)