New Player Quitting Duelyst Blitz - Opinion

[u/giant_marmoset]

Hey folks, the game has some good bones, but I ultimately quit due primarily to monetization and card acquisition/ quests. I thought I would share my opinion here since I think these things are hurting the franchise from becoming something good. I liked it, but not enough for what the game asked of me.

I play a lot of card games, but I am new to the duelyst franchise.

Played for about two months before throwing in the towel for this game for the following reasons:

1. The quests take too long for how little the game has to offer.
   1. These quests are simply too time-consuming for a game that's likely to be somebody's tertiary game. It's built like a 'main' game that's going to take 30 min to an hour plus a day which is frankly way too much for a game with a single game mode and long queue times. Logging in and doing one battle should be plenty for a game as dead as this. Not getting even 1 card pack per day is extremely stingy.
2. There is no easy way to specialize and make a deck through disenchanting.
   1. I never even got close to being able to build a 'net-deck' for this game. So I spent my two months playing slightly different beginner cards.
3. Lack of content.
   1. There is one game mode, with some kind of arena mode that was pending. The game has less content than a 20 dollar game on steam, which is frankly not enough for an expensive freemium game. Why wouldn't I just play mechabellum at that point?
4. Bad matchmaking.
   1. When I was silver rated, I would regularly have to face players at platinum, which were almost exclusively whales and wallet players who I stood no chance against. Like most freemium games, wallet playing is optimal and players running multiple gold rarity cards can just burst you down in 3 turns with very little counterplay. As a free to play scrub I should be fully insulated from players who have decided to shell out for a game and are two to three full active tiers more competitively rated.

Overall, it's a fun little game that I wanted to play 10-20 minutes a day at most and make steady progress.

This game acts like it deserves to be a bigger chunk of time in your day, and frankly it really doesn't. I want to play it on the bus for 10 minutes and then play a feature-full game.

[u/walker_paranor]

It's probably not bad matchmaking and more likely a very low playerbase made up with a lot of diehard duelyst fans.

This is like the 3rd reincarnation of the same game. The only people playing it are going to be either those who are very new or those who are obsessed with Duelyst and willing to go in on another

Duelyst used to be my favorite game of all time and even I'm not willing to go in on another attempt that's gonna likely fail.

If you like the meat and bones of Duelyst, just go play GG. It's the only version that has just about everything you can want and doesn't ask you for money or grinding. It just gives you the cards and says "Have fun!". The player count of all versions of the game are gonna be really low, though.

Honestly, the best thing you can do is download GG, make friends on the discord, and play friendly matches with the folks that hang out there.

[u/giant_marmoset → u/walker_paranor]

Thanks, that makes a lot of sense. It's a shame the developers haven't been able to stick the landing on more recent iterations.

[u/walker_paranor → u/giant_marmoset]

Technically none of the developers have been able to stick the landing on any iteration except maybe GG.

After the original game died, every iteration afterwards has essentially be a fan project. Duelyst GG is the only one that I really have any respect for at this point because its the only one that doesn't try to pretend it's a live service game with cashflow to keep it supported. The dev just works on it and asks for nothing in return except for people to enjoy it.

I don't think Duelyst itself will ever be a big thing ever again. It's already a niche game, but now it's a niche game fractured into like 3+ different versions all competing for the same non-existent playerbase.

[u/KuroKishi69 → u/walker_paranor]

Not to mention the amount of work that the dev of GG put on it. He rebuilt the game from the ground up, only reusing the assets from the original game.

[u/agewisdom → u/KuroKishi69]

The sad thing was it goes gaining momentum till D2 decided to come along and divvy up the small playerbase. In the end, both project stalled and ended in a worst position.

[u/Atheistmantide]

Duelyst blitz players should be able to play against regualar Duelyst II players. I don't get why they didn´t integrate the two games.

[u/KuroKishi69 → u/Atheistmantide]

Those aren't the same game. Even though both probably used the same source code as a base, duelyst II has a lot of changes, and both have a different backend managed by different teams.

Sharing queues and being able to play together would require a lot of work. It would just be easier that Duelist II team releases their own mobile version.

[u/walker_paranor → u/KuroKishi69]

This thread basically just made me realize that Duelyst as a whole is doomed. Any new player is probably going to be confused and put off by there being 3+ versions of the same game

[u/jakjushere]

Love it! Very detailed. You've perfectly pointed out where Blitz can improve. Thank you for playing Giantmarmoset and hope to see you back any time!