I want Culdcept Begins to be the start of the series to be appreciated worldwide. It’s such a fun sugoroku style board game along the lines of Fortune Street / Itadaki Street. And with deck-building being so popular in roguelikes now, it feels like a perfect opportunity to find its moment. Especially since this entry in particular provides such good opportunities to build decks and enjoy matches online. Perhaps appropriately enough, Culdcept Begins starts with an academy setting and a young hero with everything to prove. You know, the sort of thing Shonen Jump series and classic JRPGs are made of. Kamru is a student at Royal Cept Academy training to become a Cepter who uses Culd tablets to summon creatures and perform magic. However, classmates talk about how he’s descended from Origin, who revolutionized the magic. As his natural skill and aptitude becomes obvious, he’s picked to join the Royal Cepter Guard Regiment and uncover the truth behind unsettling goings on around Bavrashka. Okay, the story isn’t great. It follows familiar tropes as we watch a gifted youngster, his friend, and his rival get to the heart of goings on around a country and eventually save the day. It’s not the worst, but it’s not terribly exciting. If you do find yourself connecting to Kamru and supporting cast members like Ishara and Tarhunt, there are side story quests with additional maps and cards. The good news is, if you’re not captivated, these segments can be sped up or skipped entirely. I feel it mainly serves as an extended tutorial to prepare you for certain maps, situations, and decks and introduce you to elements. Because once you do get past that to the actual deck-building and map-traversal, Culdcept Begins is incredibly strong and enjoyable. It follows the same sort of principals as games like Monopoly, Itadaki Street / Fortune Street, and Billion Road. You want to hit a certain magic total (G) defined by the board, which can tend to be around 8,000 for campaign stages. (This can be adjusted in multiplayer.) You use your magical reservoirs to summon Culds with monsters on them to claim empty territories (spaces) you stop at on the board. Monsters can be tied to elements (or have none at all), which can affect their performance when placed or keep them from even occupying certain spots. Said magic can also be used for buffs, debuffs, and spells before you even roll the dice. It’s also possible to invest in certain elemental lands at Sanctuaries, or stop at special spaces to get blessings or get cards. Your goal is to stop at the forts around the map to get symbols, then return to the castle for a full loop, getting more G each time you do. When you hit the goal for the map, you must reach the castle to win.Go Ad-Free With Siliconera+View the site with no ads, be able to provide direct feedback about what we cover, and be automatically entered into our monthly PC game giveaway.Join Siliconera+ Now, like a game like Monopoly or Fortune Street, landing on another person’s occupied territory is when things get interesting. You can either pay a toll or challenge them to try and take the spot. Since it’s possible to develop your lands, investing money to increase their level for higher tolls or changing elements to create chains that increase the tolls and value, it’s in your best interest to defend your lands or try and challenge others to avoid fees. This means going into a fight with one of the monster cards in your hand or that is placed, while also using additional spell, weapon, armor, or item cards to trigger attack, HP, or abilities in the fight. If you defeat the foe and you landed on a spot, your monster now occupies that land and it becomes yours. Lose, and you pay the toll and lose your cards. Images via Neos Building a deck in Culdcept Begins feels incredible. And easy, honestly. After a few campaign maps, a Card Shop opens up, and continuing opens up new packs. (It also sells single cards, but boosters are more cost-effective.) You can set maps to auto-play, netting you more experience and money for building. Focusing on one or two elements feels ideal, rather than trying to diversify and do too much at once. And since you are limited to 40 cards in a deck, you will start to need to make smart choices after you’re about 10 maps into the campaign. I think where Culdcept Begins really will hopefully find an audience is in multiplayer. This does feel like the best times will come from setting custom requirements for games, including team functions or possible NPC opponents to bulk up rounds, choosing the more interesting maps you unlock in the campaign, and showing what the deck you’ve put together can do. From our testing here at Siliconera, competitive play worked quite well on the Switch 2. Not that lag would really be an issue here. But things moved swiftly and were fun, and the rudimentary emoji reaction system is also quite handy. Culdcept Begins turned out to be a solid entry in the series and really feels great once you build a good deck and go online. The campaign is a bit bland and, for the most part, easy. However, if you look at that more as a tutorial to start to build up decks and prepare for actual human opponents online, it makes more sense. Especially since the multiplayer is so solid. Culdcept Begins is available on the Switch, Switch 2, and PC.