Marvel Snap is a deck-builder that fashions together fan-favorite Marvel characters and leans on the fascinating abilities they possess to make interesting card features. It’s certainly competitive in its traditional, casual ladder if fans want it to be, thanks in large part to the Cosmic Cube mechanic. Otherwise, Marvel Snap is a great pick-up-and-go mobile game that prides itself on matches that are created and completed in under a few minutes, wasting absolutely none of the player’s time.
Of course, there is always the chance that some players take a long time to end their turns anyway. But in Marvel Snap’s new PvP Conquest mode, the entire thesis of what makes the game authentic seems to be thrown out the window. This mode is phenomenal for fans who are purely competitive and don’t mind grinding through tedious back-to-back matches with the same opponents and decks, but it's in that tedium where a lot of gripes can be found that the default game mode avoids.
Marvel Snap’s Conquest is a War of Attrition, Not a Rapid Set of Matches
Conquest is purely optional and fans never have to touch it if they don’t prefer its lengthy and competitive angle, though it still seems like a steep curve to climb if they intend on gaining any of its associable rewards. Indeed, there is an entry barrier that requires resources earned from matches won at lower ranks, which then allows players to earn subsequent rank resources, more rewards, and so on.
Conquest gives each player 10 points of available health that can be auctioned with the Cube’s titular Snap function, making each round more perilous or painstaking than the one before. This premise can be daunting since players are tasked with defeating three opponents per rank—Proving Grounds, Silver, Gold, and Infinity—and the same player in multiple rounds, with losing even a single time erasing the progress made on that rank’s ladder. This would be fine if not for how long and grueling each matchup can be, especially considering the RNG of which locations will appear each round and how poorly one player’s singular deck might compare to another player’s chosen deck.
Matches suddenly go from taking around two minutes total to taking around 10 minutes depending on how many times players wager more on a Snap, which can lead to an unrecoverable loss of Cube points and create a war of attrition where the losing player must gradually work their way back from their final two points of health. Therefore, progressing through entire ranks can take upwards of 30 minutes altogether.
That’s only truly rewarding if players get satisfaction from completing ranks because by the time they’ve conquered the Infinity rank they’ll likely have earned enough medals to purchase the available shop rewards they wanted anyhow. Of course, fans might be happy to have a new game mode that puts a bit more high stakes to their gameplay, and particularly skilled players will surely find it rewarding to try out optimal deck builds on higher ranks.
It seems this is where players tend to go once they’ve progressed through Marvel Snap’s traditional ranked rewards, too, seeing as how many opponents will be proudly donning this Season’s Infinite Spider-Man 2099 card back at a max rank of 100, which is an incredibly impressive feat on its own. Still, it is not a mode for the faint of heart, and certainly not for fans who prefer how rapid and inconsequential Marvel Snap’s regular gameplay can be.
Marvel Snap is available for PC and mobile devices.