Design Decisions and Concepts in Licensed Collectible Card Games
Eric Lang (with Pat Harrigan) explains the advantages writers have in crafting adaptations of literary franchises into collectible card games. Lang maintains that, while attempting to remain true to the original, when turning narratives into games, one must "respect the medium."
The source is the essay-review on www.electronicbookreview.com written by Eric Lang
"There are a fair number of games in the hobby industry based on literary licenses. I've played most of them, and designed a certain number myself. For almost every license, there is a divergent theory about just how a design can capture the essence of the literary property while maintaining its integrity as a game."
"Mythos, the resolution of any individual tale is often reliant on whether the forces of humanity or the abyss get the upper hand (and there are plenty of examples of both in Lovecraftian fiction and Chaosium's RPG). Therefore the resolution of AGOT's plots is only a step on the road to victory, while the successful resolution of COC stories is an end in itself - in fact, it is the very way victory is achieved."
All quotes were directly rewritten from the essay.
