Now, before I begin to talk to you about Innistrad, let's talk a bit about another set, Zendikar. Zendikar is a set close to my heart for two reasons: firstly, because it was when I first went to a sealed prerelease, and remember enjoying it thoroughly; secondly, because I consider it the last 'pure' MTG set.
Not that I don't think sets after Zendikar weren't good. Some of them were absolutely incredible, Scars Of Mirrodin being the set that I decided that I loved magic. However I consider Zendikar the last set that the truly cared about the FANS, not the money.
You see, although I loved the flavour in Scars, I came the realisation that the money was becoming more important. Now, I understand that everyone will have difficulties, but it was becoming clear that they were running out of ideas. Direct improvements of old cards were coming up, with quite a few ridiculously overpowered rares and mythics there to make a quick buck. I have always prided Wizards Of The Coast on the fact that Magic was not about money, unlike many other TCG's around. Yu-Gi-Oh's slogan was actually 'The More You Have, The Stronger You Get.' Magic was simply about the great game, and people would buy cards regardless. But Wizards was making it all about the powerful cards, 'you just had to keep opening packs till you pulled one of those,' and it really bothered me.
Now, I loved Scars. I should hopefully provide a review at some point, but essentially I thought it was tonnes of fun. However I did realise that this was happening, but it didn't seem to phase me too much.
However when Innistrad came out, I was sad. I felt that they had a chance to redeem themselves, and did the opposite: Innistrad PROVED my theory that this was what was becoming of Magic. Looking over the cards in the set, every other one seems to be a rare or mythic. I just bothers me. What wizards was trying to do was to raise the price of something they realised was equally expensive to print.
But let's put all this behind, and focus on the set.
Now, Lets just say that I consider Innistrad one of the most flavourful sets ever printed. Whe I heard 'Gothic Horror,' I was worried. Magic is high-fantasy in my opinion, but I went on the assumption that if they could make robots fighting brilliant, they could do it with vampires and werewolves. Oh my God they made it work. Every picture, name, flavour text and abilities fitted each card and set perfectly. I really think it was the little tributes that made the set work (invisible stalker-the invisible man, delver of secrets-the fly, civilised scholar/homicidal brute-dr. Jekyll and mr. Hyde). The set was positively fun to play, simply to see this happen to characters that you actually care about. There was simply nothing more satisfying then seeing a zombie deck take-on a human/angel deck. Or ghosts vs. werewolves. It was brilliant. I really felt that while Wizards lost ethical points, I realised that a lot of hard work had gone into making this set work, especially from the artists. I have to be thankful for keeping it simple too, nice, straightforward cards, and they let the combos do the talking.
So, what's my verdict of Innistad? Now, while I'm still angry at Wizards for this set, I do feel like it was a tonne of fun. I do not think that their efforts were quite enough to win me over, but they are boldly noted. I feel like I would have enjoyed this set more if they had cut-the-crap, and just powered-down some of the ridiculous cards. Anyway, I praise Wizards on this incredible set.
Footnote: The card you see above is my favourite card in the entire set, simply for an excellent combination of flavour, simplicity and effectiveness. I would also like to apologise for the particularly long review today, I suppose it was to make up for the slightly under-par one yesterday.
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