Does Flavour Matter in Digital Card Games?

Published by Ryan May on 21 May 202021 May 2020

I’ve been playing a fair amount of Riot’s new digital card game, Legends of Runeterra (LoR). Being an avid fan of the League of Legends lore, a large part of what initially drew me to LoR was the flavour text. I saw the release of this game as a huge lore dump and couldn’t wait to dig my teeth into all the little tidbits of information that were about to surface. But it got me thinking — just how important is flavour in a card game like this? Certainly I care, but I know that not everybody shares my passion for story. Or do they? So, I did some digging. Here’s what I learnt.

Nobody Enjoys a Tasteless Meal

People like stories. It’s an unavoidable fact — story fills nearly every aspect of our lives. We use stories to communicate with one another all the time, such as when we tell our loved ones the story of ‘our day’, our struggle with the mundane. We read news stories, we read books, we watch movies. We even use stories to advertise, and this is where flavour enters the mix. That’s right, flavour is advertising. Well, at least in part. But it makes sense. Flavour tells a story, and those who are interested in that story will then be interested in the game that the flavour belongs to. Flavour connects to people, draws them in, then says, “You know, this game tastes pretty good. Why don’t you try a bite?”

You Are What You Eat

Give a neutral game a flavour and it takes on a theme. It also stops being neutral. This speaks to one of the most powerful aspects of flavour in digital card games.

Flavour pushes an agenda.

Nothing is neutral, whether you like it or not, and games are no different. This is a particularly important point to note for digital card games, as they are often free to play and as a result extremely accessible. Ideally, all games would push positive moral agendas through their flavour, but the reality is that this is not always the case. Depending on your values, you may find a games agenda delicious or distasteful.

For example, a card recently added to LoR, ‘Prowling Cutthroat’, depicts an attractive young woman, scantily clad, poised in the shadows with blades in hand. I remember when I first viewed this card I groaned inwardly. Oversexualisation of female characters has been an issue that video games have been grappling with for a long time now. ‘Prowling Cutthroat’ seemed like yet another unnecessarily oversexualised character, until I read the card’s flavour text.

*Prowling Cutthroat* *– Legends of Runeterra*

“…and the idiot said I had hips that ‘rolled like the waves’. I told him to cut the flattery, or I’d cut out his tongue.”

Immediately I saw what was being conveyed. The message, “I should be able to appear how I like without suffering harassment,” came across loud and clear. The sexualisation of the character was being used in an attempt to drive home the card’s message, its theme. Of course, it can also be argued that the character could be far less sexualised and still get the same point across — the rain-soaked translucent white shirt probably wasn’t necessary. Ultimately this speaks to the responsibility of game developers to keep in mind the influence that flavour in their games has on the real world, and to do their best to get it right.

You’re the Chef; Here Are Your Ingredients

Once the game entices the player into the kitchen, it offers them ingredients. In this case, those ingredients are the cards players use to build their decks. Every player has to build a deck in order to be able to play the game, and this deck will inevitably follow a theme of its own. This then introduces the next positive of flavour — player expression. It’s through flavour that players have the ability to express themselves with their deck. Just as a player may choose to play as a mage in an RPG because they relate to a ‘brains over brawn’ attitude, players may also build a deck around flavour that relates to an aspect of their character, such as building a deck with a ‘knight’ theme because it appeals to their value of honour. By adding a personal element to the game the appeal increases.

A Meal You Won’t Forget

While a game with strong functionality and no flavour might struggle to get off the ground, a game with strong flavour and poor functionality won’t even make it out of the garage. Keep in mind, flavour is meaningless if it’s never seen, and the best way for a card to be seen is for it to be played. The best way for a digital card game to succeed is to seamlessly combine both flavour and function. A game with cards that not only function well but function in accordance with what their flavour depicts will not only be easier to understand, it will be remembered for longer by those who play it.

Digital Flavours

When it comes to flavour, digital card games have it good. While physical cards suffer from real-world formatting constraints, digital cards do not. As a result, digital card games are afforded a lot more freedom. It’s common for digital card faces to predominantly feature art and symbols, with flavour text and sometimes even ability descriptions being hidden altogether. Gwent cards, for example, only display art and symbols until they are selected or hovered over, whereupon the card’s text will appear.

In addition to this, digital card games often incorporate animations and voice acting to emphasise important moments in gameplay, as well as to flesh out the game world and its characters. Gwent, Hearthstone and Legends of Runeterra all have voice acting and sound effects for when cards are summoned and they all utilise animations when spells are cast, abilities are triggered, or powerful cards are played.

All of these extras add up to create a stronger flavour that, if used correctly, can serve to enhance the synergy between flavour and function in digital cards beyond anything that’s possible with physical cards.

I Hope You’re Hungry

There you have it. Flavour matters, for a whole host of reasons. Flavour generates financial benefits through its ability to attract players and to make games understandable and memorable. It provides the freedom for players to express themselves and in doing so builds stronger connections between players and the game. Perhaps flavour’s greatest power, however, is its ability to push agenda. Inevitably, flavour will serve to promote certain values — that’s just how stories work — and because most digital card games run under free to play models, that’s a big deal. The accessibility of digital card games grants them a large degree of influence among gamers, and this power should not be taken lightly. Far from a bit of fun text at the bottom of a card, flavour has the power to change how we think about pivotal topics such as global warming, treatment of minorities, and treatment of women, to name a few. Flavour matters because it has the power to make a world a better place, or a worse one.