The desire for entertainment has never been quenched by the appetite of Man, whose boredom has transgressed the invisible boundaries of time. Modern classic games such as Chess & checkers have evolved over centuries and millenniums. They captured the limited imagination of battling kings and empires through the simplicity of symbolic pieces and well-defined rules of war.
The dawn of the new century stretched imagination with increased technological capability. Attaching artwork to the independent imagination brought about enhanced role-playing attributes for the game player. The intricacies of board games took on new rules and complex interactions that reflected a culture they tended to mimic. Games such as Monopoly, Risk, and Clue demonstrated an improvement over the games of old through advanced socially regulated rules. Yet as technology continued to improve, games began to take on new appearances. The introduction of the video game and the computer game has brought about new faces and possibilities for the future of gaming. Bringing the static game to life has fed off the sinful God-complex of every man, uniting creative ability with desire's whim. Enter the present day where technology has offered new possibilities yet stumbles to preserve the simplicity of a classic game.
Sanctum is an online collectible card game (CCG) that offers the simplicity of a board game, the functionality of a video game, and the role-playing attributes of the imagination, and the social network of devoted game players. When the original game host decided to part from the venture, it handed the game over to the players who subsequently formed NIOGA to keep the game alive. As a result, Sanctum has survived as an online entity for over 10 years with many of the original players returning time and time again.
Designed in a turn-based, chess-like atmosphere, the objective of the game is to capture the “sanctum” of the opponent with the accumulating soldiers based on the control of various towns spread throughout the map. Calling upon monsters and powerful spells through the use of accumulated mana, the player has the ability to directly influence the workings of his opponent and enhance his own capabilities in the struggle to reach the objective.
Sanctum's artwork was designed by Lee Moyer, and its operating system has been perfected over the course of the game's decade-long experience. Since its inception, there have been three card set expansions that have increased capabilities while maintaining balance. There are few to no card set expansions foreseen for the future, which allows sustainability for the new game player to be introduced into the world without being overwhelmed. With 12 houses (races) to choose from, the game allows for deck-building that entails the creativity of the individual while calling upon the strengths of a particular house. Visit Sanctum & play for free by searching “sanctum nioga” on your nearest internet browser.
