Much like the Dragon Ball series and its multiple iterations, fans have burned through more card games than Vegeta has gone through Scouters. With the latest series, Dragon Ball Super, reignighting the fandom in ways that hasn’t been seen in nearly two decades, it was only a matter of time before the show got a card game of its own. But right off the bat, it’s clear that the game is aiming to be more than just another anime card game. By combining eras spanning the entire Dragon Ball saga, featuring some unique mechanics and highlighting them with some of the finest artwork I’ve seen at this side of the world, and we have the beginnings of what can be the next big hit.
Naturally, the first DBS card game heavily features the new characters from the ongoing sequel series. Highlighting Super Saiyan Blue versions of Goku and Vegeta, newer fighters such as Beerus, Champa and Hit fill out the roster alongside old favorites like Gohan, Piccolo and Frieza. Cards are divided into different types, including support and energy cards used for summoning, new characters, many of which serve to power up your leader.
These Leader Cards are the centerpiece of your 52 card deck, cleverly designed as double sided cards that act as transformations. Each time a player’s leader is overpowered and defeated by an opposing leader with more attack power, you pull one of eight cards that are set aside at the start of a match. Serving as your Life Points, being defeated eight times results in a loss, but each point lost gives you an extra card to possibly mount a comeback. Once you take enough damage, your leader will awaken their true power, flipping to their ultimate form highlighted by some eye popping artwork. In fact, the gorgeous designs are a trait that most of the rare cards share.
Standard card designs aren’t anything special for the most part, primarily featuring images from the show. With this in mind, it helps the Super Rare cards stand out so much more. Leaders look especially great, but in a sea of card games with increasingly impressive artwork, the rest of the rare cards help provide that extra layer of excitement when drawing one of your ace cards.
But more importantly than cosmetics, playing the Dragon Ball Super card game is lots of fun, with the novelty of creating your own super team and fighting it out with the universe’s strongest offering plenty of appeal. I’m excited to see how the game grows from here, but if the pre-release is any indication, then it’s off to a promising start.
Check out the trailer below to get caught up with all the specifics ahead of release! The Dragon Ball Super card game will be officially releasing on July 28.