SPIDER-MAN comic book art looks AMAZING on MAGIC cards

Magic: The Gathering | Marvel's Spider-Man is the latest cross over set that has your favourite web slinging heroes and villains crossing the planes to do battle. They'll bring with them a few new mechanics, fantastic art and fun story elements for both die hard Spidey fans and seasoned planeswalkers looking to add some new cards to their decks.

I sat down at my local game store with a friend to crack open the bundles and booster packs Wizards of the Coast sent us. After sorting everything we found we had enough cards to create a red x black deck and a green x white deck.

The decks were pretty easy to throw together and play. We ended up with a sort of heroes vs villains match up due to the heavy presence of Venom in this set which was very fun (seriously it's almost like he's the main character). 

The game was pretty fast paced on the hero side, with spiderlings dropping in and out of the battlefield to get hits in much as they would on the comic page or silver screen. On the Venom dominated villain side there are many gooey spells to choose from and the ability to “Venomise” the cards that aren't. I found the combination of Shriek, Treblemaker and Swarm, Being of Bees to be a pretty devastating combo in our short game. Although it wasn’t quite enough to secure the win as I was beaten in the end by the hero deck in true comic book fashion.

The standout feature of this set has to be the art. In this regard I can find no fault. There are new spins on classic characters as well as homages to iconic comic book covers and splash pages. Some of my favourite works are by John Romita Sr, Vicentini/Sanchez and Veronica Fish.

Fans of gameplay narratives have a lot to sink their teeth into with this set, with cards such as Maximum Carnage that have powerful effects playing out over following turns. My favourite narrative card sequence by a long shot is City Pigeon and Hot Dog Cart by David Szabo & David Alvarez. It's a fun mechanic that helps you get life points back, something I need often, also I like birds a lot.

I was fortunate enough to be cracking open my packs at a local weekly gaming event and there was a noticeable interest about what I was doing. People were genuinely hyped about the set. Showing me what they've pulled and what I might open in my own packs.

I was very lucky to get The Soul Stone in one of the standard boosters which is a very sought after drop, however I'm starting to wonder whether I’ll need to declare this on my next tax return.

In summary I think this set has much more to offer Spiderman fans than Magic players. While the mechanics are fun I don’t think the set will do much to bring that many planeswalkers over to the Spiderman franchise. The cross pollination is maybe a very one way road on this one. That being said, fans of the wider web slinging universe will be very excited to know that your favourite character will most certainly be in the set. Even absurd creatures like Spider-Ham, Peter Porker and Spider-Rex, Daring Dino make an appearance.

I found the whole set much more compelling than I thought I would and I'm looking forward to crafting a commander deck with these cards and slamming my Soul Stone in there!

If you're a spidey fan who's never played Magic before this is you're best chance to swing into the game. Just drop by your friendly neighbourhood local game store and they'll be able to help with deck building and supply you with worthy opponents.

MAGIC THE GATHERING | MARVEL'S SPIDERMAN cards were provided to SIFTER for the purposes of this review.