New Card Button

You might have seen this new button on Kongregate.


This button links to a new page with more information on the Kongregate Collectible Card Game. It contains essentially 5 important things. The first, is a nifty new screenshot.
In addition there are is a little "about the game" section with a brief overview of how the game plays, a link to learn the rules of the game, the weekly card, and a place for PAX attendees to redeem a special edition PAX card.


This one! :)

Challenge #24: Deflector Protector

COCAK has posted up another guide to getting the most recent card. However I found another potential path to getting the card while playing. I had been saving my money and putting all bonus points into interest. I would save the game after every round, but eventually died from not having any upgrades. I then found out that after reloading the score is reset to zero. :( This was a minor issue Ihowever, as it becomes incredibly easy to gain points in later levels. After continuing on I easily managed to defeat the challenge even though I had been spending almost no money and died another time. Eventually due to high interest and frugal spending I was able to generate huge amounts of money and easily clear levels in seconds. Anyway the important lesson is that if you do die, you do not necessarily have to start over on a new game. Merely load up from where you died and try the level again.

Tiki Villagers

The world is an old place, and it is within the deep island jungles that the oldest and darkest of its secrets are tended. A tribe of hunters and lorekeepers has protected the wisdom of the earth since its creation, fighting tirelessly against the modern world that claws at their sanctuary. But progress, like water, wears on even the most powerful of structures. It is a battle the tribe is losing. With a solemn decree and a savage war cry, the tribe decided to leave the shelter of their island and take the fight to the bright, plastic world encroaching on their solitude.

Before leaving, the wisest of them, knowing that the strength that was theirs inside the forest would fade as they left its borders, fashioned totems and weapons from the spirit of the jungle. Even the youngest of them knew what a sacrifice the island had made in giving these objects of power to the villagers. It would be defenseless until their return.

The old world had declared war on the new.

Characters:


Items:

Amazons

Amazon women were a force to be feared in ancient Greece, female warriors who stood toe to toe with their male enemies and slaughtered them without mercy. Though their kingdom has greatly diminished as civilization bred the savagery from their culture, the land of Amazonia still burns with the unrealized ambitions of their ancient grandmothers. A new generation has come to power, one not content to rule what land has been left them by years of polite wars and table politics. These women armed themselves in their ancient armor and brutally killed the first foreign ambassador who came to their court.

They plundered the old treasuries and museums, searching for weapons that would strengthen them for battle. Only five of the True Relics their ancestors had used still held power, but they were more than enough to push the warrior women toward victory.

The Amazons once again went to war.

Characters:

Items:

Vampires

Vampires have roamed the world for ages, a steady line of ancient demons passing their bloodthirst on to their successors - most losing their precious immortality at the hands of those very same successors. One vampire, however, has put an end to this self-destructive cycle. Ancient beyond measure, he has hand-picked his children from among the centuries and bound them to a common cause. For now a hunter with their blood stalks their daylight resting places and their rule over the night is in danger of being broken. Once loners and rebels, the vampires joined together to face this unprecedented threat.

The ancient one hoarded many dark, powerful items over the years, talismans that would lend his children vast and ancient power. The younger vampires took them, drinking in their strength like blood, less human with every breath.

The vampires stalked out into the night, bringing death to meet their enemies.

Characters:

Items:

Martial Artists

For centuries a lost clan of warriors took refuge in the hidden mountains of Japan, honing their skills and biding their time until once again the Daimyo would call them to battle. As the years passed their numbers may have faltered, but never their resolve, their drive towards the perfection of bushido. When against all tradition a son of the village turned his back on his teachings and left the mountain, the last surviving master and his three remaining students were forced to follow, to try to stop whatever harm their wayward brother might do.

With them they took the most sacred relics of their arts, the tools and charms that had been passed down through the centuries from master to student, some once used by the most valiant warriors of samurai legend, others by the darkest of ninja assassins.

Items:

PAX

I missed PAX and as a result didn't get a chance to see the card game in action. However, some screenshots of the event have been posted up. Let's take a more detailed look at the photos that caught my attention.


Lets take a closer look at the cards.



We can see that there are four different groups of 4 characters (16 characters) and each group has a corresponding group of 4 items (16) so we have 32 cards total. The groups appear to be Ninjas, Amazons, Tiki Villagers, and Vampires.

If anyone that attended PAX and played the card game would like to talk about their experience or add any input just drop me a line. I am very interested in how it played.

Challenge #23: Bouncy Ball of Souls

COCAK has posted up another fairly basic guide to completing this week's challenge here. The card you receive is the Gem of Souls. Enjoy!

I am Back!

I just returned home from vacation last night, and will be posting up several updates today. PAX has generated tons of info to look at, and I will be posting it here. It's good to be back!

Metagame rulesheet, updated screenshot, and full Rumiko details

Greg has posted up a Metagame rulesheet, updated screenshot, and full Rumiko details from PAX. You can go check everything out here. I am currently in Hawaii with very limited access, but I will try and get a post with a detailed look at all of the information up as soon as I can.

Challenge #22: Rock Attack

COCAK has posted up another guide for the most recent card challenge here.

In addition to the strategy listed in the guide, I found that getting a speed of five and putting the rest into armor is another way to not only beat the challenge, but the badge as well. In fact, I reached almost 9000 points with this method. Anyway the most important thing is to put your upgrades into speed or armor, the other upgrades simply do not cut it. Enjoy your new card. :)

Various News

I have several different things to talk about today, and first up is a response from Jim Greer to my previous post speculating about certain areas of the card game. Jim replied to my question on the different dot layouts saying:

Hey guys -

The dots are to choose close or long range. The two dots close together means "go close", the two far apart means "go far". The blank one means "pass" - you do that because trying to change range takes energy.

Both people choose a range. If they choose the opposite from each other, nothing happens (but both lose energy). If one chooses to change range, and the other doesn't, or if they choose the same, the range changes.

Some attacks only work at one range, so this is pretty important.

Both players declare range at the same time, so there's a guessing game about it, like Rock, Paper Scissors, kind of. A lot of the game is psychological.

It's fun, too.

Thanks for the response Jim, we appreciate it. It sounds like Sirlin has done a good job of implementing his thoughts on good RPS Strategy.

Moving on, the Kongregate Card Game will be demoed on the floor of PAX. I was going to be going to PAX this year, but will be on a trip to Hawaii (poor me) instead. Since I won't be able to attend, if anyone could stop by the demo and share with us a rundown on the game and their experiences with it at PAX I would really appreciate it.

Finally, rumor has it that the Kongregate Card Game will be named "Kongai". Any chance we could get an official word on this?

Card Game Screenshot

Greg from the Kongregate forums posted up a screen shot of the card game in it's early stages. You can see the screenshot that was posted below.

Finally we are able to see some of the "hidden" information that the cards have, and can gain some insight into how the game will work. In particular I would like to speculate on a couple particular aspects of the screenshot. The following is purely wild speculation and could be entirely wrong, and as such I would like to hear what you think these aspects of the game are.


Use the above image to reference the particular spots I am referring to. For number One (1) I have very little idea as to what the three different "dot layouts" are. This is the one I am most interested in as it appears each attack uses the second two dot layouts.

Number Two (2) shows what I believe is either the speed or energy cost of the attack Number Three (3) is the most obvious in that it looks to be the damage that the attack inflicts.

Anyway, what are your thoughts on the screenshot? Let's see just how wrong we can all be by the time the game releases. :)