Pocket Gamer's recommendation-a-day advent calendar: Magic Duels
Cardboard warrior
Every day, as we count down to Christmas, we'll be sharing a brilliant and essential game from 2015 that didn't quite make our game of the year list. We'll reveal the very best iOS and Android games of the last 12 months on Christmas Day
December 13th - Magic Duels
iOS (Free)
The world's most popular collectible card game is an obvious candidate for a digital treatment. So fans got lots, and almost all were dire. Up until we got Magic Duels: Origins this year.
Finally, here was the game we'd been waiting for. There was a vast selection of randomly generated single-player decks to practice against. There was also a bear pit of online play once you knew what you were doing.
But the real Christmas bonus that we got in the summer was a big card selection. In previous versions, the number of cards was severely neutered. It was obviously an attempt to preserve physical sales, and just as obviously misguided.
Publishers Wizards of the Coast realised its error, and now we've got about three quarters of the current line-up in this app. Plus there's a fair free to play model where you can earn new packs while you play.
The result was rich, deep and addictive: a worthy computer clone of the much-loved original. Playing reminded us what a brilliant game it is, and why it kickstarted the current trend for mobile CCGs.
Now the grandfather of them all can compete with the best of its offspring on equal terms.