PsyCard
© 2016 Ludosity AB
Remember the classic game Minesweeper? This easy to learn, difficult to master competitive card game can be played alone or with a friend. In story mode you pick one of four characters and proceed to play through several PsyCard tournaments large and small to place your rank among the best competitors. The game's pacing is relaxed, and win or lose, the story mode will progress uninterrupted, meant to be a casual, comfortable tour through the enjoyable psychic sport. Minesweeper veterans will find the basic mechanics to be familiar, except with matches broken into quick, two-player rounds, first to the score limit wins. The game's tutorial is a bit sparse, so newcomers will likely need some time to figure things out. Each card you flip reveals information about its surrounding cards. Plus signs indicate apple cards, collect three of the five scattered around the board and you win the round. A skull will end the round in a loss for whoever flipped it, meaning the opponent gains vital points towards their victory. Lastly, stars provide extra points if you win the round, but more importantly they charge your character's star meter, which allows the use of unique psychic abilities such as revealing unknown cards to reduce risky plays, or to control an opponent's next move. New characters encountered in the story mode are unlocked in multiplayer mode, which provides custom rulesets and game variants to tailor the game experience how you like, such as turning off star abilities if you find them unfair. A mode simply titled Friend's Quest stars the cyborg heroine Friend in her own dungeon crawler, providing a bonus retro adventure to explore and practice your card-flipping prowess. Even for those who couldn't wrap their head around the numeric nightmare of a tough Minesweeper game, PsyCard may be a good contemporary middle ground to enjoy its classic risk/reward strategy.
$1, iPhone, Android, iPad
Teaches: strategy, luck, risk/reward, reading, puzzle-solving, minesweeper,
CTR Rating: 82%