RE: Over-Simplicity: Is it an issue?
You've just agreed with me that the game almost solely focusses on kids now, right?
I know this can seem like a good thing. Teaching kids the game was kind of hard during the ex era, I speak from experience. But reducing overall complexity is not the way to solve this. What that essentially does is make the beginning the end point, meaning kids have no real way of growing with the game and there's no real point in trying to dig deeper. A far better way of dealing with initial complexity is something explained in another Magic article (the fun thing about Magic is that the developers are really open about the design process, and I sort of read Magic articles as a hobby): New World Order. To very quickly summarise, what the article explains is the strategy MtG came up with to keep the game complexity high enough for the more experienced players, while at the same time making the game as easy to learn as possible for new players. The solution was to scale complexity with rarity. Rare cards are allowed to do very weird and complex things, while common cards have to be as simple as possible. This is why I referred to fully-evolved e-cards in my original post, because the NFE basics in e-series are fairy simple, as they should be. That way, if kids buy boosters and/or a starter deck, they won't be overwhelmed by complexity, but once they do learn the game there is a very rich and complex world for them to explore. Pokémon doesn't have that world anymore.
Another fun way to add eventual complexity without adding initial complexity is lenticular design (yes, another Magic article, try and stop me), where you essentially add fairy simple and easy to understand effects which can have very large competitive implications both in terms of synergy and strategy, but only if you understand the game well enough. For example, to a novice player, Crobat SP seems like a pretty nifty Pokémon, with the added fun bonus that when it enters play it does 10 damage to an opponent's Pokémon. Competitive players know the true power of this beast, though, and will rarely play it as a Pokémon but almost solely for this effect. An effect which adds a lot of potential decision making and allows you to build entire decks or engines around it.
A complex game can be easy to learn, but it does require that the designers aren't as lazy or single-minded as the current ones seem to be.
You've just agreed with me that the game almost solely focusses on kids now, right?
I know this can seem like a good thing. Teaching kids the game was kind of hard during the ex era, I speak from experience. But reducing overall complexity is not the way to solve this. What that essentially does is make the beginning the end point, meaning kids have no real way of growing with the game and there's no real point in trying to dig deeper. A far better way of dealing with initial complexity is something explained in another Magic article (the fun thing about Magic is that the developers are really open about the design process, and I sort of read Magic articles as a hobby): New World Order. To very quickly summarise, what the article explains is the strategy MtG came up with to keep the game complexity high enough for the more experienced players, while at the same time making the game as easy to learn as possible for new players. The solution was to scale complexity with rarity. Rare cards are allowed to do very weird and complex things, while common cards have to be as simple as possible. This is why I referred to fully-evolved e-cards in my original post, because the NFE basics in e-series are fairy simple, as they should be. That way, if kids buy boosters and/or a starter deck, they won't be overwhelmed by complexity, but once they do learn the game there is a very rich and complex world for them to explore. Pokémon doesn't have that world anymore.
Another fun way to add eventual complexity without adding initial complexity is lenticular design (yes, another Magic article, try and stop me), where you essentially add fairy simple and easy to understand effects which can have very large competitive implications both in terms of synergy and strategy, but only if you understand the game well enough. For example, to a novice player, Crobat SP seems like a pretty nifty Pokémon, with the added fun bonus that when it enters play it does 10 damage to an opponent's Pokémon. Competitive players know the true power of this beast, though, and will rarely play it as a Pokémon but almost solely for this effect. An effect which adds a lot of potential decision making and allows you to build entire decks or engines around it.
A complex game can be easy to learn, but it does require that the designers aren't as lazy or single-minded as the current ones seem to be.
