Mindbug

In December 2021, I backed a small card game on Kickstarter called Mindbug. It was from an upstart publisher, but I backed it because:

I really liked the concept of a fast-playing, 1-on-1 card battle game that evoked the feel of a lightweight “Magic the Gathering” but built around a single deck of cards.
The card art looked absolutely fantastic.
Richard Garfield was one of the game designers.

In October 2022, Mindbug arrived at my house. It has been sitting on my game shelf since then.

On Sunday, April 2nd, I finally played it. One word sums up my initial impression: Wow.

On the afternoon of April 2nd, my friend Wally Wenklar and I sat down, watched a YouTube video to learn how to play it, and then proceeded to play 5 games of Mindbug in a row. It took a couple of plays to really grok the system, but wow, Richard Garfield strikes again!

The level of complexity & strategy, short game length, and variety of cards achieve a perfect harmony here. It’s a rules-light game, but still very satisfying to play. And the artwork on the cards is fantastic and funny; they were highly creative with the hybrid creatures they devised.

For a game that takes 15-25 minutes to play and that’s based around a small box of cards, it’s amazing how much engaging gameplay is packed into this. We didn’t even play with the Expansion Deck that came with the crowdfunded version. I can’t wait to try that.

Overall, Mindbug is a truly elegant game design and a real surprise gem for me. I was not expecting to like it that much.