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Easily the best card battling strategy game that you've never played!

Mix the strategic trading card battling of games like Magic: The Gathering and gameplay style of the classic Monopoly boardgame and what you get is a gem of a game entitled Culdcept. Culdcept is based on a popular Japanese trading card game which has been translated into console games previously on the import Saturn and Dreamcast. NEC International has become the first game publisher to release a Culdcept game in the USA. The PS2 incarnation of Culdcept is not only easy for anyone to comprehend, but also highly addictive. This addiction may be even more intense for those experienced with playing trading card games like Magic: The Gathering, Yu-Gi-Oh, etc. Even those who are fans of the old Monopoly board game will find it hard to resist Culdcept's ingenious concept.

The story of the Culdcept game begins with the absolute goddess Culdra who created the Culdcept, the book of creation and destruction. Cepters are those special individuals who can utilize cards to summon creatures and magic from the Culdcept. Those same Cepters fight for total control of the Culdcept's power in hopes of becoming gods. Culdra foresees the future of an evil Cepter, Geminigh, who will actually take control of the power and use it to create and destroy many worlds. She sends her entrusted assistant, Goligan who happens to be a living wooden cane, to seek out the one good Cepter who will save the universe from this evil Cepter's ambition. The fate of the universe lies in the hands and cards of one of these two Cepters. While the backstory is okay by strategy game standards, the gameplay is what truly shines through in Culdcept.

Culdcept's gameplay is good enough to addict strategy gamers within the first battle alone and it just gets better from that point on. For starters, each Cepter will start out with a 50 card deck (called Books in Culdcept) that consist of creature, item, and spell cards. Creature cards contain various monsters that can be summoned to fight or hold spaces on the game board (similar to buying a property on Monopoly). Item cards contain scrolls, weapons, and armor that can be used to aid creatures in combat. Spell cards are similar to Item cards, but are used to directly aid the Cepter. Battles in Culdcept take place on 3D isometric boards with spaces that the Cepters will move across until the goal is reached. Culdcept's battle goals involve gaining a set amount of magic points before the opponent and returning to the start point with them. Bonus magic points are awarded to a Cepter every time they pass the starting checkpoint (i.e., passing GO) and this bonus is multiplied by the amount of land a Cepter owns. The battles start with a draw from the Cepter's 50 card deck and then a roll of the die (this continues every round). Cepters must roll a 7-sided die and then move the number of spaces that the roll specifies. However, some boards have crossroads that once reached will present Cepter's with a decision of which way to go to finish movement. Also, each space on the board represents an element that is either water, air, fire, or earth. This is where the cards come into play.

When a Cepter lands on a space that they wish to take control of they must summon a creature from a Creature card to hold that space. The strategy there is that once a land space is owned by one Cepter any other Cepter that lands on the space will be charged a toll according to the level of the land. Magic points can be used to increase the level of a land space which will in turn increase the toll and increase a creature's bonus. However, that toll can be avoided should the Cepter who owes a toll initiate and win a creature card battle against the creature holding the land in question. Creature card battles are another dynamic that aids the addictive nature of Culdcept. For instance, creatures are based on the elements of air, earth, fire, and water, yet some are also neutral. What this means to creature placement strategy is that a creature placed in the same elemental land space as their element will get a bonus to their stats. Creature stats are based on Strength (ST) and Hit Points (HP), but can also include special abilities as well. For example, the Giant Hornet is air based and if placed on air element will gain maybe 10 more points of HP and also has the ability to poison an opponent for additional damage over time. There will be many times when the cards will have players believe winning a battle is impossible, but fear not because Item cards can help. Let's say Cepter #1 lands on Cepter #2's Level 1 fire element space which is being held by Creature #2, who is based in fire element. Creature #2 has 20 ST, 30 HP, and the ability to neutralize the attack of any creature with 40+ HP which also includes immunity to elemental abilities and also to Item cards containing magic scroll attacks. Obviously, Creature #2 gets a 10+ ST boost for being on its Level 1 base elemental land. The solution would be to use would be using a creature of the same element (or not) who has an HP lower than 40 and then boost that creature with an item card like a mace (which gives 20+ ST). Say goodbye to the enemy creature. If the battle ends in a draw then Cepter #1 must still pay the toll. Should Cepter #1 win the battle their creature will take over the land and Cepter #2 will be forced to pay the toll to Cepter #1. That is just a very small example of the battles within Culdcept.

It would also be important to note that some cards how limitations of how and when they can be used. Some creatures cannot utilize certain Item cards during battle. There are even some creatures that will benefit from attack of ability bonuses if no Item cards are used at all to aid them in battle. Also worth noting is that Spell cards play a major factor in helping or hindering the progress of Cepters. Spell cards can only be used before a die roll takes place. Players will utilize Spell cards like "Fly" which will allow the target Cepter to roll a 6 on the die for one round. Some other Spell cards can be used to hurt enemy Cepter's creatures from across the board or even give Cepter's a magic point boost. There are even Spell cards that can lower a Cepter's die roll number or even silence them so that they can summon no Creature cards for a set of rounds.

Another element of Culdcept's gameplay are the various other structures on the board, such as Forts and Altars. Forts, if landed on, provide the Cepter an opportunity to use the Territory command. The Territory command allows a Cepter to manage their owned land by leveling up a land, changing its element, moving a creature, or exchanging a creature for one in their current hand of cards. Other than landing on a Fort or the starting checkpoint, the only other time a Cepter is allowed to manipulate their territory is after passing over them during that same round of movement. The other structure that players will come across are Altars. Altars, once landed on, will either bless or curse the Cepter or Cepter's with some random occurrence ranging from creature stat boosts to damaging the HP/ST of certain creatures to even taking magic points away. Landing on a Altar is a crapshoot, plain and simple.

All in all, Culdcept is a great game that should be in the possession of anyone who loves cardgames, boardgames or strategy games. There is so much depth and strategy involved in this game, yet it is so easy to get into from the jump. Not only that, but take into consideration that there are close to 500 different cards to collect that can be used to upgrade and customize multiple decks for battle. All of those hundreds of cards feature beautifully detailed artwork from some of Japan's best fantasy artists. Boards are interesting in design as they go in multiple directions, crossover, provide jumps to higher or lower levels, and form outlandish shapes. Add to the fact that there are about 42 of those boards in Culdcept to play on, some which as unlockable by collecting special medals from successful battles. For those who find the gameplay of Culdcept overwhelming, a built in game manual and tutorial is also present. Culdcept even sports a multiplayer Versus mode that allows 2 players to go head to head with their own custom decks. Unfortunately, this versus mode is not online at all. With every time that Culdcept has going for it, it is a shame that so many overlooked its release this past December. In a day when Yu-Gi-Oh and Magic: The Gathering games are either lackluster, not faithfully translated to consoles, or just don't hit the mark, Culdcept stands out as this reviewer's consolized champion of the card battle strategy games. Should anyone come across this now rare PS2 game, I would highly recommend purchasing it.

Last Updated on Wednesday, 22 January 2014 14:21