So I finally got to try the DC deckbuilding game. Man, I'm so glad it wasn’t me who spent money on this game. Oh, it was fun and surprisingly thematic, but I don't see me playing this a whole lot.
Basically, it's an Ascension clone. You have five cards in the middle you can buy. On a bright note, where Ascension has two currencies to track, DC only has one currency, Power. The super-villain is a nice touch. It's a sixth card worth extra VPs and costs a lot. When one is defeated, another one arrives, and it immediately does something to screw with the players. You don't know what's coming so you can't really plan for it.
I trounced the others. For one, I was given Aquaman, who has the ability to top-deck any card gained or bought that costs 5 or less. With amazing shuffle luck, I had 5 in my opening hand and could afford to defeat (buy) Scarecrow. I went for him because he is the Witch of DC. Imagine a Dominion game where the first player on his first turn top-decks a Witch. That's worth a rage-quit right there.
To make matters worse, even when other players got 5 Power, it's not like they could get back at me by buying their own Scarecrow. Another Scarecrow eventually did show up in the middle, and I would have loved to buy that one to hold a monopoly, but someone did manage to get it—after I played mine several times. So I wasn't in danger of getting swamped in Weaknesses (Curses).
One player got Bizarro, which allowed her to change Curses into Estates when scoring. That's a nice feature.
I've only played it once, so if someone loves this game, feel free to correct my initial and only impression. I think it's worth playing a few times, but I wouldn't be interested in owning this and taking up valuable shelf space in my small home. Much like Marvel's Legendary, I'm glad that I know someone else who owns it so I can get my fix in if I ever get a hankering while saving my money and shelf space for other games.
