I had hoped to dig a little more into Ursula’s Return this week or to have a look at the interesting deck that won the Atlanta Challenge (which I missed because I was at the Grand Canyon with my family), but folks we have bigger Flounder to fry. Because this week Pixelborn, a free online client for playing Lorcana, was shut down by Ravensburger and Disney via a cease and desist sent to the developer. And I’m not sure exactly what this means for Lorcana at this point. According to the message, it goes dark sometime before June 16th.
Several months ago I wanted to do a column on Pixelborn because I felt- and still feel- that it is something that has become integral to the game. In the Bad Old Days when hardly anyone could get cards, it was a way for players to check it out and get interested in what the game has to offer. It was also a way for content creators, tournament runners, and theorycrafters to dig deep into Lorcana. Unlike any other tabletop TCG, Lorcana benefitted from having unlimited access early in its lifespan and I would argue that the game’s success – and indeed its identity – has been founded on Pixelborn.
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But the esteemed editors here at Goonhammer, perhaps quite rightly, argued that exposing Pixelborn to more attention could potentially attract The Mouse. My counter-argument was that Pixelborn was huge and so widely played and acknowledged that it was an open secret covered by many outlets. By the time I wrote my article, which we did publish, there were big money tournaments being played on Pixelborn, content streamers using it, and most players were enjoying games and deckbuilding with the surprisingly full-featured platform.
Through four sets, Pixelborn has thrived and players such as myself have been playing the game exponentially more than possible at the tabletop. It’s gotten to the point where I think many players are playing exclusively on Pixelborn, and its accessibility and availability have been such a tremendous advantage for the game. I wonder how many people are playing the game in shops and in OP events now specifically because of it.
Let’s be clear though. There has never been any doubt that Pixelborn’s days were numbered. It was a bootleg platform skirting IP law despite the developer’s best efforts to frame it as a “TCG client” and hosting the copyright-infringing card images remotely. The actual client had no Lorcana or Disney imagery, instead just a bunch of weird fantasy art that occasionally looked kind of like Mulan or Hercules or whatever. Frankly, I’m surprised it took this long for The Mouse to file a C&D, but I also think that there were almost definitely people on the design team at Ravensburger playing it and understanding how crucial it was to the game. It may even be that someone up there was protecting it to some degree, who knows.
I don’t know if Pavel should have done a Patreon to support it, even if proceeds went to charity- it was making money, and quite possibly a lot of money from donors. Those big, high-profile tournaments run solely on Pixelborn weren’t a great idea to keep The Mouse away. The whole thing, regardless of being free, smelled like money and unlicensed Disney IP was right there the whole time.
What we are about to see is what happens when a game that has been propped up by a bootleg online implementation loses that support and offers no comparable online platform. Ravensburger has not announced a mobile game or client at this time. And when they do, which is also inevitable, it is most likely going to be some free to play bullshit with microtransactions out the ass. Pixelborn was a little rough around the edges but for a one-man show copping some of Hearthstone’s best moves it was quite good but more importantly it was complete. I’m not buying “gems” or “dust” or doing daily “check ins” to grind for booster packs. And I’m sure as hell not buying the $49.99 “most popular” bundle of avatars, card backs, and animated cards or whatever.
Without a complete set of cards, deck testing and exploration is back to the olden days of face to face playtesting and tweaking. Which may, in some ways, be a benefit as it will have the effect of slowing down the development of “solved” meta decks. The singles market may be impacted by the greater degree of trial-and-error, and folks will be less likely to splash out on expensive decks that they haven’t tested to death with Pixelborn. But there again, I lament the passing of the game’s accessibility and how anyone could play with a top-tier deck. I strongly valued being able to play with 4 Sad Beasts in my deck to realize I really only needed 2 as well being able to play with top-ranked decks that I otherwise would not be able to try since I don’t have the $450 worth of cards for them. It’s an immeasurable loss for the game, in my opinion.
Chatter in the Lorcana community is an odd mix of wailing/gnashing of teeth, assumptions that the game is just going to continue on without noticeable change, some “time to go back to Magic” sentiment, somber resignation in the face of inevitability, a few weirdly celebratory posts, and patronizing explanations of Pixelborn’s legality from the “well, actually” set. I’ve seen many posts from people pointing out that they’ll be going from playing 100+ games a week to maybe 6-7. I’m in that boat, and I may not get that 6-7 if priorities keep us away from League for the week. Some have stated that they only play the game with Pixelborn, and others pointed out as I have that it was a fundamental tool supporting tabletop play.
I’ve posted a few times in the r/Lorcana sub about how I think this is a potentially very negative, very damaging blow to the game’s future success and I’ve been downvoted to hell by people who just don’t want to hear anything bad about the game they are invested in. However, I think the folks who aren’t casting a cautious eye on the game’s outlook now are ignoring the impact that Pixelborn has had on the game. Had it been ‘86ed in late 2023 before Floodborn released, I think it’d be a different story. But 9 months beyond that, Pixelborn is ingrained in the fabric of the Lorcana community despite some people saying “but I know X number of people who have never heard of it” or “most games don’t have a free platform like that.” Pixelborn has been part of the game from day 1, and its success has been critical to Lorcana’s success.
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Ravensburger and Disney have made a grave mistake, I think, in not embracing Pixelborn and what it has done for the game. I’m sure the politics and economics of licensure are far too complicated for my layman brain to understand, but the right thing to do would be for it to be allowed to continue until such a time that an official platform is available. Granted, it is definitely going to be monetized to hell and back and it won’t be the same, but at least there wouldn’t be a break in online availability. Many have said that Pavel should have been offered a developer role or that Ravensburger and Disney should have just bought Pixelborn but things just don’t tend to work like that at the scale of business The Mouse expects. Good faith and good will don’t make big bucks.
So yeah, I have a pretty glum outlook on the game right now despite it being apparently more popular and successful than ever, with over 2000 players (excluding me and my kids as we were riding mules at the time) showing up in our hometown Atlanta and a great new set just out. I do believe that there may be some thinning out of players as many will abandon the game completely with no intention (or ability) to play face to face. Content creators and online tournament runners are going to be left in the lurch as virtually all depended on Pixelborn. Which was, honestly, a mistake on their part but who wouldn’t have taken advantage of its availability?
We’ll see where this all goes. I still very much love the game and I’m looking forward to continuing my ultra casual coverage and posting my unpopular opinions of it here at Goonhammer until the last Be Prepared is played.
Next Week: Co-Op and Solo Lorcana???
