Gwent: The Witcher Card Game

Gwent: The Witcher Card Game[lower-alpha 2] is a free-to-play digital collectible card game developed and published by CD Projekt for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 4,[lower-alpha 1] and Xbox One[lower-alpha 1] in 2018, for iOS in 2019, and for Android in 2020. The game is derived from the card game of the same name featured in Andrzej Sapkowski's The Witcher novels and playable in The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt video game.

Gwent: The Witcher Card Game
Developer(s)CD Projekt Red
Publisher(s)CD Projekt
Director(s)Benjamin Lee[1]
Katarzyna Redesiuk[2]
Designer(s)
  • Michał Dobrowolski[3]
  • Damien Monnier[4]
Composer(s)
SeriesThe Witcher
EngineUnity
Platform(s)
Release
  • Microsoft Windows
  • 23 October 2018
  • PlayStation 4, Xbox One
  • 4 December 2018[lower-alpha 1]
  • iOS
  • 29 October 2019
  • Android
  • 24 March 2020
Genre(s)Collectible card game
Mode(s)Single-player, multiplayer

Gameplay
In-game screenshot, prior to the release of the Homecoming Update[6]

Gwent is a turn-based card game between two players, with each game taking three rounds. Each player must play one card each turn from a deck of at least twenty-five cards. Each deck belongs to a faction that offers different play styles. Each faction has different "leaders" who each have individual abilities. As Gwent does not use a mana system like most traditional CCGs, card advantage is often what wins the game.

The Homecoming Update,[6] which was released in conjunction with Thronebreaker: The Witcher Tales, changed the game in a number of ways. The leader is no longer a playable card; it now gives the player an ability, and dictates how many mulligans are available to the player throughout the course of a match. The limits on how many gold and silver cards can be in a deck has been removed. Deckbuilding now uses a Recruit Cost system. Decks have a Recruit Cap of 165, with each card in the game having a Recruit Cost associated with it. The update also removed the siege row from the play area, leaving only the melee row and the ranged row. A new card type, artifacts, was added to the game. These do not contribute points to your side of the board but offer varying abilities.

The goal is to win two of three rounds by playing cards and spells to gain points called "power" on the board. A player wins a round by having more points on board than their opponent. Rounds end when either both players pass to the next round, or when both players run out of cards. The first to win two out of three rounds wins the game.

Round wins go toward daily rewards, awarding players with card packs known as "kegs," scraps, meteorite dust, or ore. Players can gain additional cards by buying kegs with ore or through microtransactions; each keg contains five cards, with the upside that the fifth is rarer than the rest and a choice between three is offered. Cards can also be crafted with scraps. Premium versions of cards can be crafted with meteorite dust. Ore is used to buy kegs.

The game features several modes of gameplay. The standard Casual Play mode allows players to challenge one another, whereas in Rank Play players compete in order to increase in a tier-ladder system. Ranked takes place across a month-long season, where players aim to increase in rank to increase end-of-season rewards. Player ranks do not degrade once earned, and work on a numerical system from 1-21, before entering into the top 1,000. Players are also assigned a matchmaking rating, which respectively increases or decreases as a player wins and loses games. Gwent has also had multiple seasonal events, inviting players to take part in themed events with premade decks. These events functioned like puzzles, where exact moves had to be made to win. Seasonal events normally award a player profile picture, border as well as a title.

It featured cross-platform play between the PC and console versions, although platform play between the console versions was not supported.[7][8]

Arena Mode

Arena Mode functions as a draft mode, where players must build a deck from random cards. The player will pick one of four cards of identical rarity randomly shown. Twenty-six cards are drafted, and then a leader is chosen from 3 randomly shown leaders. The cards shown are from a pool of all cards, meaning decks can contain cards from all factions. There is no limit on how many gold cards or silver cards can be in the deck, and any number of duplicates can be drafted.

Arena Mode is themed around The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt character Gaunter O'Dimm, who offers contracts in the arena in exchange for rewards. A maximum of nine wins will award players with a gold card, as well as other rewards including ore, scraps and/or meteorite dust. The arena will guarantee players at least one keg as a reward, even with no contracts completed. Players have three lives and lose a life when a game is lost. The arena run will end when either a player quits and breaks the contact, when all three lives are lost, or when all nine wins are achieved.

There are also periodic 'special event' arena modes occasionally available. These have unique drafting rules, such as the Gold Rush, where all cards drafted are Gold cards or Law of the Jungle, where all cards drafted are from the Monsters faction. The special events generally last 1 week, and the regular arena mode is also available to play during the event.

Thronebreaker
Main article: Thronebreaker: The Witcher Tales

Gwent serves as the combat mechanic in Thronebreaker: The Witcher Tales video game.

Development and release

The game had an estimated 100 staff members working on it.[9] Following an open beta release in May 2017, it was officially released for Windows in October 2018, and was released for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One on December 4, 2018. A standalone, single-player campaign mode, Thronebreaker: The Witcher Tales, was also released alongside Gwent.[10]

In March 2019, CD Projekt Red announced that Gwent would be launching on mobile devices later that year. Jason Slama, the game's director, said that the team's vision for bringing the game to them combined the best they had to offer both in terms of "graphics and gameplay".[11] It released for iOS on October 29, 2019[12] and Android on March 24, 2020.[13]

Support for the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One versions of the game was ended in June 2020.[5]

Reception
Reception
Aggregate score
AggregatorScore
MetacriticPC: 80/100[14]

Gwent was nominated for "Most Promising New eSports Game" at the 2019 SXSW Gaming Awards[15] and for "Best Polish Game Art" at the 2019 Digital Dragons Awards.[16]

Notes
  1. Support discontinued in June 2020[5]
  2. Gwint: Wiedźmińska Gra Karciana in Polish

References
  1. "GWENT preview refined multiplayer". pcgamer.com. Retrieved 28 October 2016.
  2. "GWENT Homecoming — see what's next for GWENT". playgwent.com. Retrieved 14 April 2018.
  3. "Gwent's cards: testing the limits of crazy". Venture Beat. Retrieved 2 September 2018.
  4. Fenlon, Wes (17 June 2016). "How Gwent became a competitive card game with singleplayer campaigns". PCGamer. Retrieved 18 June 2016.
  5. "[UPDATE] IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT ABOUT THE FUTURE OF GWENT ON CONSOLES". GWENT: The Witcher Card Game. 4 December 2019. Retrieved 28 July 2020.
  6. "GWENT: The Witcher Card Game". Retrieved 25 October 2018.
  7. Sanchez, Miranda; Davis, Justin (13 June 2016). "E3 2016: Gwent: The Witcher Card Game Announced". IGN. Ziff Davis. Retrieved 13 June 2016.
  8. Gwent: The Witcher Card Game - FAQ, playgwent.com, June 6, 2017.
  9. Schreier, Jason (18 June 2018). "Why Cyberpunk 2077 Is Taking So Long". Kotaku. Archived from the original on 19 June 2018. Retrieved 24 June 2018.
  10. Purchese, Robert (18 September 2018). "CD Projekt Red dates full Gwent: The Witcher Card Game release, and standalone Thronebreaker adventure". Eurogamer. Retrieved 18 September 2018.
  11. Broadwell, Joshua (27 March 2019). "GWENT: The Witcher Card Game Coming to Mobile Later This Year". GameSkinny. Retrieved 27 March 2019.
  12. Wald, Heather. "Gwent iOS has officially launched, so you can take the Witcher card game anywhere". GamesRadar+. Retrieved 5 November 2019.
  13. "GWENT is live on Android! Download now on Google Play!". GWENT: The Witcher Card Game. Retrieved 2020-03-27.
  14. "Gwent: The Witcher Card Game for PC Reviews". Metacritic. CBS Interactive. Retrieved 6 March 2020.
  15. Trent, Logan (11 February 2019). "Here Are Your 2019 SXSW Gaming Awards Finalists!". South by Southwest. Retrieved 16 February 2019.
  16. Werner, Adrian (8 April 2019). "Nominacje do Digital Dragons Awards - Frostpunk i Thronebreaker liderami". GRY-Online.pl. Retrieved 14 April 2019.
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