We’re in love with the new Star Wars deckbuilding game

Star Wars: The Deckbuilding Game—that’s gotta be a cash grab, right? Deckbuilders are immensely popular these days, and Star Wars is…well, Star Wars. Slap the two together, headline the thing with a generic (if accurate) title, and extract money from devoted fans who can’t help but buy anything Star Wars-related from board game publisher Fantasy Flight (I’m categorically not talking about myself here, of course).

As it turns out, no. Star Wars: TDG is not a soulless exercise in marketing. It’s a fantastic little two-player card brawler I feel confident in recommending to anyone who likes both card games and Star Wars. It doesn’t reinvent the genre, but it’s my favorite Star Wars game in years.

Deckbuilding 101

When Rio Grande Games released Donald X. Vaccarino’s Dominion 15 years ago, it introduced a hugely influential new mechanic to tabletop games. “Deckbuilding,” in this context, refers not to building a deck of cards before play, as one might do in, say, Magic: The Gathering. Here, building your deck is the game.