11 February 2025
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Fantasy Flight Games has used its Fireside Chat format to make some major announcements about the future of their living card games. These changes are set to redefine the company’s design strategy, as well as limiting the release of classic products.
Written by George Chysostomou
What are the changes to Living Card Games?
Fantasy Flight Games is well-known for collaborating with major intellectual properties, and has partially been defined by its work in the living card game space. Their most significant titles are Arkham Horror: The Card Game, The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game, and Marvel Champions: The Card Game, and with that kind of track record it wouldn’t be shocking to see the brand take on some other major names in the future.
But, changes are coming to these cooperative, scenario-based titles, which will alter the definition of their gaming environments. Plans are being put in place to begin retiring some expansion sets from this trio of titles, to make room for new opportunities. Fantasy Flight Games has thus confirmed that there will be a Current Environment and a Legacy Environment for players to interact with.
The Current Environment includes any of those core sets and evergreen expansions that are still in circulation and are consistently being produced. The Current Environment will be added to and supported, with at least 2 to 3 years worth of material. The Legacy Environment, meanwhile, will consist of every set that has ever existed, including those that are now no longer supported under the Current Environment and have been retired. Players can make the choice as to whether they want to play in the Current, Legacy or a combination of Environments whenever they pick up a game. This is essentially an easy way to separate old and new cards, which will still remain compatible with one another.
Benefits to changing the Living Card Game format
Fantasy Flight Games has argued that this change brings some notable benefits, and assures fans that they will soon see a positive shift. For starters, they argue that the design process will be far easier. Not only are they no longer limited by the framework set by older cards, but they also have more time on their hands to really focus in on the Current Environment. They suggest that when they playtest cards, they can now dial in on a smaller section of the game, rather than looking through the long history of a title and comparing and contrasting with every card available.
They also make the case that these alterations will make these titles more accessible to a wider range of players. Retailers can sell the most relevant products in the Current Environment, and there won’t be such a daunting array of sets available for new fans to navigate. We’ve seen a number of titles across the tabletop space attempting to streamline their systems as they head towards a more mainstream market and Fantasy Flight Games is keen to follow that trajectory.
2025 Marks A Major Year For The Company
Despite this potentially disappointing news for some LCG players, there are lots of products that will launch in 2025 which will instantly enter the Current Environment and therefore expand those gameplay options. Fantasy Flight Games will debut both The Drowned City Investigator Expansion and The Drowned City Campaign Expansion for Arkham Horror: The Card Game in February and April respectively. Meanwhile, February also brings the Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. expansion to Marvel Champions: The Card Game, while April debuts a Black Panther add-on.
Continue to keep up with both Fantasy Flight Games and Tabletop Gaming Magazine for all the latest updates on these living card games, and be sure to get sorting through your own collection to work out which expansions fit into which environments!