‘Inscryption’ is a D-D-Duel to the Death

In the Cards Looking from a video game developer’s perspective, one can see the appeal of cards. Taking a game concept from prototype to finished product is easier when working with something familiar. It’s why, even outside of the crowded digital deck-building market, most titles feel like they’re referencing each other.  So it’s completely understandable that, on its face, Daniel Mullins Games’ Inscryption is yet another ‘deck-builder with roguelike elements.’ What isn’t as understandable, however, is everything that happens after the player continues the game.

Note the word ‘continue’, which is very deliberately not ‘start.’

At the beginning of Inscryption, your controls are limited as you take in your surroundings. The first-person POV reveals a darkened cabin with your most immediate concern staring out of the darkness, opposite your seat at a wooden table marked with a grid. Your shadowy opponent begins to explain the deck of cards you have at hand. Welcome to Die All of the cards are themed after various real or imaginary beasts. Playing these cards on the table’s grid deal damage to the mysterious cabin dweller. To put most cards into play, however, will require blood. Inscryption’s ‘blood’ is one of its types of currency, only obtainable by ‘sacrificing’ cards that are in play. Winning the match via your blood-summoned cards reveals that the eyes in the shadows are not only your opponent, but the game master running this bizarre tabletop session. A map is unf…