Image courtesy of Apple
Apple Arcade, Apple’s very own game subscription service, contains hundreds of games that can be played for the price of a single monthly fee. This storefront has since become a great way for indie developers to offer their games, plus old classics to be released once again to the public.
The subscription plan works on iPhones, iPads, Mac, and even on Apple TV and may be shared between six family members. Due to the Apple ecosystem, these games also use iCloud to back up saves, but may also be played fully offline. Best of all, these games are advertisement and microtransaction-free.
Let’s see which card games have made it to Apple Arcade.
5. Dicey Dungeons
Dicey Dungeons is technically not a card game, but still falls into the category of roguelike deckbuilders, much like other dice-centric games. Here, we assume the role of a contestant, as we participate in a show hosted by Lady Luck herself!
Though seemingly purely luck-based at first, Dicey Dungeons‘ elegance comes in its tableau — our chosen equipment to bring to encounters. These can be used to reroll dice, add values, or even completely flip the result of die rolls! This allows us to mitigate bad luck and still come out with a coherent turn which lets us use all of our dice.
Six classes and various unlocks will keep players coming back for more, while runs take a little under 30 minutes, which makes it a perfect game for short bursts of time. The polish on this one is great!
4. Pocket Card Jockey: Ride On!
The brainchild of Game Freak, best known for Pokémon fame, Pocket Card Jockey: Ride On! is a combination of solitaire, simulation, and horse racing in a weird, yet exciting way.
Using the golf solitaire variant, we’re tasked to clear a tableau of cards which translate to our power and stamina throughout the race. By positioning our horse and managing our resources, we’re able to take the lead and clinch the top spots in the cups. After a four-year run with each horse, they can finally retire and may be used to produce offspring with better stats.
Though offbeat in its execution, Pocket Card Jockey: Ride On! is one of the few non-PVP card games to come out of East Asia, and some may even argue it’s Game Freak’s best game to date.
3. Monster Train
One of the roguelike deckbuilder greats, Monster Train has found its way into Apple Arcade, ready to lure in any unsuspecting gamer for another sleepless evening. In Monster Train, we control several creatures from hell, deployed across three floors of the train, all protetcing The Pyre — the vehicle’s energy source.
In Monster Train, we take on the side of the underworld as we fight angelic beings while unlocking fantastic upgrades on our units and spells, such as additional life, damage, or armor. It’s build-a-bear in a card game, so to speak.
The base game has five factions which we can mix and match, and The Last Divinity DLC brings a sixth clan, the ability to merge units, and the biggest boss the game has ever seen. And did we mention the DLC is also free for Apple Arcade subscribers?
Monster Train 2 is also set to come out at the tail end of May 2025, so be on the lookout for that!
2. Slay the Spire
The deckbuilding roguelike which started it all. Slay the Spire has redefined the genre and put it back on the map as a contender for developers to explore. In this game, we play as one of four characters as we ascend The Spire over three acts. The Ironclad is our archetypal bruiser, The Silent deals with poison and stealth, The Defect channels spells to perform sick combos, and The Watcher switches stances to unleash devastating sequences.
In each act, the game demands from us various deckbuilding tenets: we need burst for Act 1, AoE for Act 2, and scaling for Act 3 — and balancing all three parts in one deck, plus still coming out with a cohesive gameplan is one of the best push-and-pulls the genre still has to offer.
Of course, if we don’t want to chase after the endgame Ascension levels, we’re free to draft decks that just revolve around a central theme. Slay the Spire has a little bit of everything; casual players can focus on specific archetypes for a quick run, while hardcore players can pull up spreadsheets to break down every single card choice as early as the first opportunity.
Slay the Spire 2 is coming to early access this year, but we don’t know much of the specifics yet.
1. Balatro
There’s no denying it, Jimbo lives rent-free in our phones now. Open social media, and there’s that damn clown staring at us like he knows we’re about to mess up our next run already. Balatro, one of the best games in 2024 — not just in the deckbuilder genre, but amongst industry titans such as Elden Ring Shadow of the Erdtree, Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, and Black Myth: Wukong — has taken Poker and reimagined it into a game which ticks all the right boxes and keeps the dopamine flowing.
Balatro is characterized by its colorful cast of Joker cards, which all have various effects. How about Stuntman, a Joker which reduces our hand size, but gives us a massive boost in chips? Or perhaps consider the Baron, a Joker which gives additional bonuses based on how many Kings we have in hand! Maybe one of the funniest is Gros Michel, a literal banana with a one in six chance of being destroyed after every round — but has a fantastic upside!
Each run is a gamble against the odds; can we secure a mult Joker before we meet the blind boss, or can we score enough chips to continue gaining interest? Balatro is a perfectly-concocted game in terms of visuals, audio, and gameplay which makes us itch for just one more run.
Friends of Jimbo are free updates which allows us to cutomize the face cards of our deck. We have options such as The Witcher III: Wild Hunt, Cyberpunk 2077, Among Us, The Binding of Isaac, Critical Role, Slay the Spire, Vampire Survivors, Stardew Valley, Civilization VII and more! Everyone wants to be friends with Jimbo.
If you’ve purchased an Apple device recently, you may be able to claim a three month trial of Apple Arcade for free. An offer goes up for a one month trial from time to time as well.
For more card games, check out our review of Pocket Card Jockey: Ride On! Excited for Slay the Spire 2 and Monster Train 2? We have a recap of what we know so far for these two games, respectively.
