A long time ago, in an era called the nineties, times were very different. The internet was only in its infancy and not filled with the mountains of information that you could find now. Even if it was, you’d be waiting at least a minute for a web page to load up after spending two minutes listening to your dial up connection sounding like it was grounding something mechanical into the dust (and lord help you if someone rang on the landline phone – it would cut your connection in a second!). The Star Wars Encyclopedia by Steve Sansweet was still a couple of years away and finding information on characters, items and locations for Star Wars was not the easiest. It was during this time that Decipher Inc. released the Star Wars Customizable Card Game (CCG).
I first came across this game when I went into a shop in Walsall called Jabba’s Hut (at least I think that was the name) and they had loose cards of this game for sale. Images from the trilogy, stills I had never seen, all with a little bit of text explaining who the character or item was. I was hypnotised by the wealth of information on offer. I ended up going in every week, getting a booster pack or two and some loose cards, thirsty for more and more information on my favourite trilogy. The game itself I never played. Still at primary school the rulebook went a bit over my head and to be completely honest, it wasn’t why I was buying the game. As the years passed, the cards were given away as I found myself needing the information on the cards less and less as the internet continued to grow and grow.
Fast forward to 2022 and I was missing a good Star Wars game to play. Fantasy Flight Games’ Outer Rim was superb but long, Star Wars Destiny had become frustrating with its overwhelming release schedule and everything else had too long of a set up time for when you have a five-year-old running around. Going to Tritex Games in Staffordshire every week, I had been playing on a table that was next to a poster from the Star Wars CCG, still up even now. When some of the cards came up on my social media, my mind drifted back to those old cards. Now older (wiser?), could this game hold something that I had missed them first-time round.
Researching, I found that the game was still very high regarded and was one of the most popular card games ever made (losing out only to Magic, which is quite an achievement). I also found that the game had been kept alive by www.starwarsccg.org, who are keeping the game alive as well as creating new cards for players everywhere to play with. This was looking rather intriguing. After a little searching, I found a sealed Premier introductory set. Looking, I had been warned that this did not contain some key components, but I wanted to see if this was a rabbit hole I wanted to fall down before I got carried away.
The set did not stay sealed for long as I opened the two decks: one light, one dark. Persuading my son into playing, we sat down and began to play. As the game was almost thirty years old, I wasn’t too sure what to expect, but after one play through I was completely surprised. I played as the light side and my son, Charlie, as the dark. The aim, to deplete your opponent’s force before they deplete yours. Through the course of the first game, we travelled from Tatooine to the Death Star, had Darth Vader chasing Luke and had Jawa’s seeking their revenge against the stormtroopers. Unfortunately for the Rebellion, my son won but both of us had massive grins on our faces. What on earth had we just played?
This game did not feel old or vintage. This felt refreshing, very refreshing. The first thing that really struck me was the fact that there were no tokens. No carrying around lots of extra things, we literally just needed our card deck (okay and a tiny rulebook), which everything, from force management to destiny draws, comes from. It was very refreshing as almost every other card game we play must have some sort of token system. It means that the game is extremely portable. Taking this just about anywhere will literally require you to take a deck that can fit into your pocket.
But the thing that really made this feel special was the adventure of it all and the sense of Star Wars. Through the game you reveal locations from your deck that create the areas you can go visit. The characters, vehicles and starships can move between these locations either by going on vehicles or using the docking bay. Where most games it’s one sides’ character attacking another, there is a whole different dimension here. The locations help to tell an almost narrative story, of characters trying to outpace the opponent to different locations to force drain them or just run away from Darth Vader for fear of his power. This mechanic makes this game feel more like Star Wars than others (like Destiny), the franchise far more than just characters attacking one another.
Although easy to pick up, the management of the force is very clever. Your ‘force’ is your deck of cards, and you draw a certain amount of those cards each round depending on the number of locations on the table. You then have to decide how many of these cards you are going to use to pay to play cards and how many you are going to draw into your hand to give you actual cards to play. It might be great having lots of force but only if you have cards to play that use them. It’s a very fine balance and one that I’m still trying to master.
We very quickly played another game where we switched sides and still had a huge amount of fun. Within seconds, I was opening the sealed booster pack that came with the set, excited to see what other cards we could add. From there I quickly started getting cards, lots of cards, as well as The Empire Strikes Back introductory set. This had more vehicles and just one set of locations all on Hoth. When Charlie and I played it was like acting out the start of the film and yes, Charlie stopped the Rebellion in their tracks – again! But we were having lots and lots of fun. We’re at the stage where we are starting to build our own decks, looking at what cards suit our play style. With some of the later releases of the game and being such a fan of the old Expanded Universe, it’s incredible to be able to play with Mara Jade and Talon Karrde.
I would never have thought that such an old game would hold up so well to modern games, but that’s exactly what Star Wars CCG does. This is a game that’s extremely thematic, simple to play and, most importantly, a huge amount of fun to play. I’ve already brought a deck for my gaming buddy Gavin, as I’m sure he will love it too, but I’m very aware that I’ve only begun to scratch the surface of this fantastic game. Although some cards can be very expensive, to get enough cards to play and do some deck building has been relative cheap. Not only that, but the fans of this game are incredibly generous. I had one send me a whole host of cards from America for the cost of postage and the game itself can be printed and played for free at SWCCG website. They even hold tournaments every year! What’s even better is that Charlie is just as fascinated by all the information on the cards as I was when I was his age. I guess even with such freely accessible information, it’s always a little different when it’s printed out as opposed to on a screen. If you’ve ever wanted to try one of the many Star Wars games out there, this has certainly climbed to the top of my recommendations. Now I just need to find a way of beating my son and his Empire.
