The Binding Of Isaac Creator Is Making A Physical Card Game

Edmund McMillen, the creator of the Binding of Isaac and Super Meat Boy is creating a card game based on the Binding of Isaac called, The Binding of Isaac: Four Souls. However, if you think that this is going to be another Hearthstone copy in a market saturated with digital card games, you’re wrong. It’s actually going to be a lovingly made physical card game that he only created because he wanted to.

The game was first revealed on Kickstarter with a goal of $50,000 and the game had exceeded that goal within 1.5 hours, which is pretty crazy. Edmund had already stated that he had something cool to show about three hours prior to the reveal of the game. The Kickstarted page explains more on how the game will work and has multiple different pledge categories that people can use to fund the game. At the time of writing, the game has already raised over $400,000 which is way more than was originally planned.

In the game, four players will play towards the goal of being the first to obtain 4 souls. Souls are obtained by defeating bosses, but these can only be defeated by making your character stronger. You make your character stronger by defeating monsters which will, in turn, grant you resources. However, you will also get to play loot cards during your turn which have varying effects. At the end of the game, you will have to stop other players from gathering the last souls by using any means necessary.

McMillen has said that the first time a physical Binding of Isaac was mentioned was when he was approached by a company called Studio71 that wanted to create a Binding of Isaac themed board game. He said that he “kinda blew them off”, by saying he didn’t have any ideas for such a game and was far too busy. However, the conversation had planted a seed in his brain that would later take over his mind when he was sick at home. Within 5 days he had created the basic structure of the game and over 200 cards. He started playtesting and would later approach Studio71 to handle the production of the game.

It’s great to see a game designer step into the world of physical games. Nowadays physical games don’t get the love that they used to get despite the quality being higher than ever. Recently, Paradox Interactive has also expressed their interesting in creating physical games and in 2016, Riot Games has released the extremely successful Mechs vs Minions. As a fan of both Binding of Isaac and card games, I can’t wait to see how this project will turn out.