Legends of Runeterra in IOS

★★★★★

★★★★★ Easy to build a collection, simple to play but complex strategy and interactions

Easily the best digital card game on the market right now. I came mostly from a less known “tactical card game” “Duelyst” that shut down, and while this game doesn’t have the same kind of positioning, it excels in all the ways a card game should. I’ve never spent a dollar trying to build a collection— I have so many “shards” saved up I could easily buy any new cards that come out if I want, and it should be easy for new players to get the decks they want to try with just a little commitment, the game is very generous with its rewards and in giving “wildcards”which let you craft a copy of any card of that type. The main complaint I have is with how often patches or updates roll out; I would love to see changes to the meta be more frequent, even if it’s just minor nerfs/buffs to over/underplayed archetypes and cards respectively. The new PvE updates have been exciting and are great for those looking for casual gameplay and a challenge alike, nice to have where you don’t have the stress of the timer and fighting a “real” opponent. Honestly amazing for a free game that’s ACTUALLY playable as free, just want to see even more open communication from the devs and faster patches to the game if possible. Still 5/5 stars atm though.

★★★★★ What’s happening?

I apologize if I get this wrong, but I believe around three years ago, you introduced the standard format to the game to help regulate the champions. The next two years flew by, and I continued to enjoy playing. So many excellent and amazing champions were released during that time. However, in the third year, something changed: you decided to create a storyline for the champions, which you called "The Path of the Champions." Don’t get me wrong; I liked it at first and played through a couple of the stories—they were fantastic. Then, midway through the year, the ranked gauntlet disappeared, which made me quite anxious. I reached out to the developers, and they explained that it was seasonal. However, it hadn’t disappeared during the previous two years I had been playing, so I thought, "Okay, that’s fine." (My face was a bit frustrated 😤) Now, as we approach the end of the year, it seems the focus is still on "The Path of the Champions." Nothing else appears to have changed since then. New champions have been released, but that’s about it. Another issue is that the eternal ranked mode goes on hiatus for about three months at a time, and I don’t understand why. If you tell me it’s seasonal, I might just lose it! Also, why do you keep changing the standard champions? I have to adjust my decks every time you alter the standard lineup. I have about eight decks, and I find it frustrating to have to change them all because of your updates to the standard.

★★★★★ It’s not that Noob Friendly

I love League of Legends and find this to be a simpler card game I can possibly grasp, in aim to enjoy a card game with a lover of playing this type of stuff- To add, we’re both lovers of League of Legends too. The thing is- The tutorial isn’t noob friendly, especially for those like me who have a hard time grasping understanding for card mechanics on its own. At first it’s fine, it makes you play the certain cards in order and tells you about them, but then after that it just gives you the cards to read with mechanics you never heard of and leaves you to figure it out. I sat here having to go through ‘try again’ after ‘try again’, slowly feeling more and more like an idiot unable to do it on my own to instead ask my friend to hand hold me what to do. Now this was for certain challenges understanding the hook mechanic and scout and so on so forth. It would have been much better for these tutorial challenges, because they are tutorials for various different cards, to be a bit more hand holding or have an optional setting to turn on for hand holding on what to do. You can say, sit and figure it out- Which I can do, but I need to grasp how things work before I can start thinking on my own. This review mainly applies to those who can relate to me on this, having a hard time in general grasping card games and just want a better tutorial. I shouldn’t have to be spending more than two or five minutes trying to figure out how to play the cards...

★★★★★ In depth

This game is very in-depth. I have a difficulty playing most phone games because they aren’t intellectually stimulating enough. The only other phone game that I’ve enjoyed playing for a prolonged period of time is the elder scrolls card game. As much as I love that game this game far surpasses it. There is a pretty steep learning curve because timing is everything in this game, but they do a good job of rewarding you for investing the time. It isn’t a game where you can really pay to play, even though there are things you can purchase in game. They don’t allow you to buy the best cards for cheap. That being said there are plenty of ways to earn cards through playing the quest in the game. The path of champions feature really adds a lot more longevity to this game because it allows you to try out all the different regions cards and play styles as well as get a taste of what their champions are like. The visuals the gameplay and the champion cards to me or what really sell this game even though it’s completely free to download. I highly recommend it to people who enjoy strategic card games. It will keep you engaged, and there are no annoying ads. I’ve been playing it for about a week now and I’ve been obsessed I confess.

★★★★★ Most F2P Friendly TCG Out There

This is my first review for an app on the IOS App Store here, and that’s because I believe this game deserves that level of praise. I initially started playing when the game came out but took a long break after getting into Magic the Gathering (in real life that is, not arena). However, I had to sell my collection after play groups died down and financial issues set in, but I remembered how free to play friendly this game was. Looking to fill that TCG sized hole in my heart again (and also hearing that some friends started to get into it), I started regularly playing again, and already I have grown my collection substantially after about say 2 weeks with no purchase necessary. The new (to me at least) PvE game mode, Path of champions, is seriously fun, and I wish more TCG games had similar or at least just as as good of quality PvE content for FREE. Ranked and pvp is always there for the competitive players, and it remains pretty diverse from what I’ve seen on meta reports and playing some pvp games here and there. Overall, I would highly recommend this to anyone looking to get into a F2P friendly and quality TCG, and just like watching arcane, you don’t have to like or play league of legends to enjoy legends of runeterra!

★★★★★ Great game

I love the game. In fact, I’m addicted to it. I love constructing decks and testing them. There are no pre-decks on sale which forces players to assemble a deck of their own. The game is also generous in rewards that gives free-to-play players a chance to fight virtually anyone even against players who spends a lot of money on the game. It is a game of luck and a game where you use your brain after all. It is a really good pastime, but it is all over the place and so imbalance in my opinion. There are regions that are too powerful. Some can end the game in less than 5 rounds. Regions that shine late game have no chance of beating them or showing off their special abilities and combos. I do not write reviews often, and I am most certainly not great at giving an objective feedback for I do not know how the developers measure the fairness of the game . In playing the game, I spend most of my time making decks than playing, but when I play, I lose most of the time because of the “imbalances” of the game. It is really discouraging for those players that I lost to have similar decks. There will come a time when all players will just use the winning deck, and they will all end up fighting with that very same deck, disregarding other potential deck combos.

★★★★★ Phenominal

Completely free to play. You can buy cards with real money, but waiting a week or two of gameplay will get you 3 copies of a champion and plenty of lesser cards. I’ve never seen a game more generous with rewards, a deck is 40 cards and you can build one from no cards in about a week, slightly more if you want 6 new champion cards. That’s if you rely only on wildcards, there’s plenty of random rewards alongside them. The card arts and descriptions add so much to the world of Runeterra that started with league, telling stories of their own. Babbling Bjerg, those weird ocean friends, the sumprats gang and the crimsons, they’ve all never been mentioned before, yet they all have 5+ cards that tie together a story. We get to see things only briefly mentioned in the universe tab fleshed out and breathing, Elnuks, Cithria, Elise’s victims, Heimer’s inventions. It’s not just a game, it’s an addition to the lore universe, and a huge one at that. Hardcore Heathstone and Magic fans probably won’t come over, but I truly believe that majority of new card game players who hear of this game should primarily play LoR. It’s incredibly well put together, new player friendly, and the world behind it feels alive and believable.