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Publisher's Note : For the first time ever, Beyond Dominia is publishing something that does not directly deal with Magic -- Urza's review of Chron X. In the future, you may see more reviews of other new CCG's; but for all you Magic purists out there... don't worry, Beyond Dominia will remain a Magic CCG. We will not publish articles discussing stategy, deckbuilding, etc. of other games, but we might publish an occasional review of a different CCG. -- Thanks, Innate Mak, Publisher
REVIEW - Chron X This month, I mark a first for Beyond Dominia. Never before have we strayed from the path of a Magic-only magazine, but this review had to be done for two reasons:
Anyway, let me set this up with an introduction. You probably have seen the advertisement for Chron X on the Beyond Dominia home page (Note : this month, they're advertising on the Sideboard), marked as the world's first internet collectible card game. The picture looked good, and I decided to check it out. When I got to the site, I noticed one downside: This program is pretty big! It's 13.6 megabytes to download, and as I thought "I can't download this! It would take too long and my server would crash!", I noticed that it was also offered in a way that you could download 4 separate files, each 3-4 megabytes, which would hold the same program as the single 13.6 meg download. During the install, it got worse. Once the files were unzipped, the installation directory took up 27.2 megabytes! I was thinking to myself "This had better be good for all the space it's going to use...". Of course, next came a surprise. After the extremely fast and easy installation, the actual program only took up 12.8 megs! "Not too bad..." I thought, "If the game is really worth it.". Well, after this I jumped right into the game. The first problem I ran into was the issue of the screen size. The game requires Windows 95 running at 800x600 pixels (adjustable from the Settings tab in the Display section of the Control Panel). I shrugged, and changed the settings. Luckily, this doesn't make you restart the computer, so it's easy to move back and forth if you aren't normally at 800x600. After this, I opened the program. The tension was unbearable. I had to see this game after everything I've seen of it already! Large files, a special pixel resolution, and that cool advertisement all pointed to the one thing that the game turned out to be: incredible! Once I easily set up my player, named Urza, I entered the game. The excellent graphics grabbed me right away. Along the bottom of the screen were a few buttons, all of which I had no idea how to use yet. The right side had a top-ten list of the highest ranked players, and the middle had some announcements about the game, signaling the time to upgrade for people who had installed before the upgrade was released. I still hadn't seen the actual game, but I was already hooked. I opened up the Readme file that gave the instructions for play, and proceeded with my review. For those of you who didn't care about all that, and just want to hear what the game is like, this is the part for you. For those of you who have no interest in this section, then what are you doing reading this article in the first place?! Anyway, the game is set in a future time, where there are forces battling for control. It's a two- player only game, where the object is to destroy your opponent's Headquarters. Ah, that's not as easy as it sounds, though. Both yours and your opponent's Headquarters are hidden in some city in your playing area. For instance, you may start with your Headquarters in Paris if you choose to play in Europe. With what shall you destroy the base, dear Urza, dear Urza? Well, you've got quite a few people to help you. Called Assets, they are the creatures of Chron X. These Assets have different statistics, which all do something different. The Hit Points number, represented by an H, is like the toughness rating. The only difference is that the damage dealt to it stays throughout the game, until the Asset leaves play! The next two ratings are (F)irepower and (A)rmor. At first, I believed they worked like power and toughness, but in fact, they have a few differences. When the firepower goes to the armor in Asset combat, it brings the firepower down to a number based on how high the armor is. The higher the armor rating, the more firepower goes down. After that, the firepower deals whatever damage it has left to the Hit Points, which determine if the Asset dies. Two other ratings are (P)erception and (S)tealth. These are the ones that really make the game fun! When you deploy an Asset (like casting it), it doesn't automatically appear to the opponent. It won't appear at all unless the opponent has a base (which I'll explain later) or an Asset in the city where you deployed your Asset. Even then, it will only appear automatically if the Asset you deploy has a Stealth rating of 1, the lowest. The perception is the other side of the battle. You may search for hidden Assets with an untapped Asset you control. This finds all hidden Assets with a Stealth rating less than the searchers Perception. Once an asset is found, it will usually remain visible for the rest of the game. The final statistic on an Asset is CyberAffinity (Represented by a C). Many Assets have a high rating in this number because it is the only way to use another set of cards: Programs, which are like instants and interrupts.. Along with the deploy cost, programs can only be run by Assets with a CyberAffinity equal to or less then the CyberAffinity required for use. The last type of card is a Base. These produce resources, like lands, for 15 turns. You can only deploy one of these a turn. To make sure the game stays collectible, there are many bases. All of them separate into three distinct types: Military, Poison (Editor's note : while it looks like a poison bottle, it actually represents the Covert type), and CyberOps. Those represent the three types of resources in the game, which you use to deploy your cards. One important thing to mention here is that, unlike mana in Magic, resources build up each turn to be used whenever you want. The Headquarters, by default, produce one of each resource type a turn, while the other types produce one of the type they represent each turn. This means that you can wait a few turns before deploying anything, and then suddenly deploy five or six Assets or other cards in one motion. Leaving the explanation of gameplay, Chron X has a great feature that would be its death if the company, Genetic Anomalies, hadn't included it. The game has the ability to trade your cards with other registered players, so that you can create a deck just like in Magic. For some reason that players need not understand, you can't play with cards you haven't traded for or paid the company for. All those parts of the game create one great program! Combined with wonderful, futuristic art for every card, the ability to be ranked if registered, the smooth, simple interface and many other positive points, Chron X becomes a wonderful game to play! Chron X can be downloaded from www.ChronX.com or www.GeneticAnomalies.com. The first 60 cards are free, but you are unable to trade, get more cards, or be ranked until you register for $25. That gets you all of those abilities, as well as an extra 60 cards to do whatever you want with. After that, booster packs cost $3 for 10 cards, $10 for 60 cards, and $25 for 180 cards. I must also take this time to mention one last thing that can turn people away if I did not include this. Tournaments DO exist in Chron X. They can either be like a regular Magic tournament, using decks you've made, or sealed deck, by creating a new character which costs nothing. At the end of the tournament, you can delete the character and be on your way as normal. One tournament I've participated in is the one run by Louis Oblin, and you can get information about it at his Chron X homepage, http://members.tripod.com/~chronx. It was a lot of fun, and I hear he's going to be running another one. Who knows, maybe you'll see me there! PROS: Easy-to-use interface; easy to learn; very entertaining; good chat feature; trading; is actually a Collectible Card Game without cards; great graphics CONS: Like Magic, Chron X can be an expensive hobby; kind of a hog of disk space; must be run at 800x600 resolution, which is not commonly used Rating from 1 to 10: 8 1/2
"Chron X" and the name "Genetic Anomalies" are trademarks of Genetic Anomalies, Inc. Visit their web site at http://www.GeneticAnomolies.com, or http://www.ChronX.com. Neither Beyond Dominia or Jonathan Evans are affiliated with Genetic Anomalies. This article, with the names included, was permitted by the President of Genetic Anomalies, Inc.
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