Hidden Dimensions

Play here: Hidden Dimensions

So I came across this browser strategy-card game recently and thought it was pretty cool. It’s very similar to Elements in several ways but has a few unique ideas, and more importantly some flaws I want to note so that future designers might avoid the same mistake.

Overview

HD is a card game played among two players, the human player and a CPU (no multiplayer support sadly) where the goal is to destroy the enemy mothership by eliminating all of its hitpoints. Players are dealt seven cards to their hand. Players may only play a card if they satisfy the energy requirements displayed on the card. Cards are divided into three groups: ships, structures, and actions.

Ships

Ships possess an attack number and a defense (HP) number. When first played, ships may not attack, however on subsequent turns ships will attack at the end of the turn. Players may place a ship into any of the seven lanes if they currently have no ship in that lane, and ships when attacking, will attempt to attack any opposing ships in their lane, and otherwise damage the player’s mothership. Most ships have unique abilities.

Structures

Structures are more or less the backbone of a deck since many generate energy. A player is limited to building up to five structures, but players can also recycle unwanted structures. Structures have many diverse effects (usually in addition to generating energy) such as providing energy when played, increasing mothership hitpoints, or damaging enemy ships.

Actions

Actions are special cards that have an immediate effect when played. These cards have a wide variety of effects.

Energy

Energy is used to play cards and sometimes to activate effects on cards. There are eight types of energy, each a unique color, and most cards require only a single type. Some special cards however require two types, and some special structures will generate multiple types of energy. In addition, players receive one energy each turn just for “majoring” in a certain type of energy.

Thoughts

The cards have a lot of interesting mechanics and many of the energy and the gameplay is pretty decent. I liked that each color had a distinct kind of theme to it. I also like that when building decks I didn’t have to buy cards or anything of the sort- I was able to use as many cards as I wanted to so long as I had unlocked it.

What I think is more interesting however, are the problems that keep it from being great. To some extent, I feel like there weren’t enough cards, that due to the limits of color a lot of synergy was limited, and that frankly, the cards aren’t properly balanced (Or perhaps, the AI just sucks.)

However, I think most important here is that stuff is just locked by achievements and that there is no multiplayer support. Players can’t build any decks with cards outside the three colors they are initially given, and to unlock them requires a lot of grinding with largely static decks and a static and weak AI. At least when playing against players griding is somewhat acceptable since it’s always a new game, but without players to provide unique experiences the game just breaks down. Furthermore, it rather strongly limits the potential of the game since there is no incentive for communities to build up.

Just my two cents.