ThePokemonCompany is well on its way to makingPokemon TCGLive the flagship digital Pokemon TCG game. The intent to do so was made clear after the final Expansion for Pokemon TCG Online was announced, indicating a complete overhaul into Pokemon TCG Live moving forward.
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Now, let’s be honest; every new game has its fair share of hiccups. The same goes for TCG Live. While it’s showcased incredible potential as the successor to TCG Online, certain elements have been lacking. Significant improvements in particular aspects of the game would help make it truly the best digital TCG game we’ve seen to date.
9Improve The Visual Design
The bland background is the first thing you’ll notice about the game client. It appears that The Pokemon Company has been following the ‘less is more’ principle while designing the UI for TCG Live.
While that makes it so that it’s a lot easier to navigate through the menus and the different layouts, the game also loses a lot of its visual appeal. You can make the game run as smoothly as possible, but if people don’t like what they see on their screen, they won’t want to play as much.
8Bring Back Trading
Removing trading from thePokemon Trading Card Gamehas been one of the most controversial steps The Pokemon Company has made. Maybe it’s just the boomer in me weeping over the removal of a key, nostalgic feature, but trading had plenty of benefits to it.
While it’s true that the old system made it difficult for players to collect those rarer VMax, and VStar cards, the trading system also made it so that you could collect slightly lower-tier cards much more easily. Besides, the removal of trading has dampened the exciting collection aspect of the game since the new system revolves around a completely revamped card-collecting and deck-building system. All in all, trading could’ve also stayed in the updated version; it had more pros than cons and we’d love it to return.
7Adjust In-Game Card Animations
One of the more significant criticisms of the TCG Live beta version was that the card animations needed to be faster. While the developers didfix that by speeding up the animations, it ended up being a bittoo fast,and you hardly have any time to see what effect a particular Item or Stadium card has. There must be a sweet spot for card animation time, we just haven’t hit it quite yet.
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While we’re still on the topic of card animation, there’s also a need to point out the nuance of the animation design and mechanism. Drawing and using cards just feels somewhat unnatural in TCG Live when you compare it to its predecessors. Maybe I’m being a bit too picky with the design here, but the animation can make for a dizzying experience at times and some minor adjustments could really turn this around.
6Reduce Queue Times
TCG Live is still in its early days, so inconsistent queue times can be expected. However, the queue times can test your patience occasionally. The problem gets more pronounced as you move up the ranks, where you can begin observing queue times of around 20-30 minutes. This is made even more frustrating because it’s so easy to accidentally pull out from the queue (at least if you’re using the mobile version).
Therefore, to make sure that people can find a game as quickly as possible, it could help to be a little more lenient on the queue restrictions for the time being to help negate this frustration.
5Improve Holo Card Design
A good card design is integral to producing that oh-so-joyous feeling of excitement we’re all familiar with when we peel open a brand-new pack of cards. Trust me, many of the card designs in the TCG Live version are levels beyond what we had in TCG Online. Still, there are a few disappointing features within the card design that, unfortunately, reduce the aesthetic appeal of cards.
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The most prominent example comes from the holo texture cards. While the regular cards have a bright, solid texture, the holo versions have slightly grainy, streaking textures that give them a sour look instead of a ‘novel’ one. Reverting the changes to the holo cards and making them look a lot more like what they do in person will be something everyone would appreciate.
4Offer Incentives For Long-Term Players
The Pokemon TCGL has done a fantastic job introducing the newer generation of Pokemon players to TCG. If you’re just starting out, you’ll quickly learn the ropes through TCGL tutorials. However, a significant portion of the previous player base - the ones coming from TCGO - isn’t that eager to transition to the newer client.
TCGO has been around for ten years, so it obviously has a nostalgic flair to it. If the developers really want to retain the TCGO player base across TCGL, they’ll have to provide the older players with incentives that make them want to shift to the newer client. And no, a free Lugia isn’t enough of an incentive.
3Card Collection And Deck Building Changes
TCG Live sought to transition from a trading system to a crafting system, where, if you opened enough packs, you’d be certain to farm enough credits for a specific card you wanted. Now, the good thing about this is that you’ll always know in the back of your head that if you put in enough time and resources, you’lleventuallyget that coveted VMax card you really like.
However, the bad thing is that getting a specific card takes far more time than before. Each pack has a farlower value than it did in the previous client. Realistically, you end up opening more packs and cashing in more codes than you would have, which leads to the issue of expensive decks being far more difficult to build in the long run.
2Allow Us To Stock Up Packs
Here’s another feature that should’ve survived as we transition to the new digital TCG client. In TCG online, you could keep your hands on any card pack you acquired until you wanted to open it. Now, you immediately have to open every pack you get.
This change really hurt many TCG content creators who liked to hold on to multiple packs, so they could open them in one grand pack-opening video and other players who choose to spend a little more conservatively, as they lose the opportunity to have mass card-opening sessions.
1Offer More Daily Challenges
The Daily challenges in TCG have been a fantastic way to incentivize players to log in daily, as the challenges would offer pretty generous rewards for the amount of time you’d have to invest in them. That said, with the new overhaul, the number of daily challenges has reduced to just one compared to three in TCG Online.
Considering how the game’s economic changes have made it much more difficult to rack up credits, introducing more Daily Challenges or even Weekly Challenges would give players more reason to log in daily and play a few games.
