72hrs.
That is how long the Kickstarter has been live at the time of making this blog. In that short time over 13,000 backers have raised over $10million yet still it doesn’t look like it isn’t slowing down anytime soon. So, how’s there so much excitement and confidence about this project? Well, let's have a deep dive into the Kickstarter, the dystopian world of cyberpunk and the actual TCG itself.
A history of Cyberpunk.
Most people reading this blog will likely be very familiar to the incredible world that is cyberpunk, but maybe not it’s history. From its roots as Mike Pondsmith’s tabletop role-playing game Cyberpunk 2020 made in the late 80’s to the widespread fame it made being released in video game format as Cyberpunk 2077 by CD Projekt Red.
The Cyberpunk universe has been growing and evolving constantly over the years; through many different formats; so, it’s no surprise it’s made its way into a TCG game developed by WeirdCo. The TCG game is heavily inspired by the Cyberpunk 2077 game, so fans of the game will instantly be adjusted to the characters and feel of the TCG game.
The world of Cyberpunk 2077.
Set in the year 2077, 52 years after the end of the 4th Corporate War, and 54 years on from when the one and only Johnny Silverhand detonated a nuke in the Arasaka tower, right in the very heart of Night City. Since then, the city has Rebuilt through outbreaks, natural disasters and continued fighting.
Corporations Rule the “Free” city state, with the biggest influence oppressed by Arasaka, A name known by all for their brutally efficient business practices and the biggest enemy to the protagonist V from the game Cyberpunk2077. V is the player character from the game; they take part in a heist to steal from Arasaka only for it to go wrong and be stuck with Johnny Silverhand in their head and a ticking clock to remove him before Johnny replaces V for good.
Night city is full of incredible characters and a wild variety of gangs from the technophile Maelstrom gangers to the mysterious Voodoo Boys and the ruthless Tyger Claws, all with unique athletics and motivations. Night city is a mega city rich with life and a slice of that is shown on the art and mechanics in the TCG.
Telling a story through game and card design.
With a world as rich and unique as Cyberpunk, for a TCG to feel right it must incorporate all the little quirks and unique characteristics only found in the world of Cyberpunk. I’m extremely happy to say I believe the team at WeirdCo has achieved this brilliantly. The first thing you’ll notice is the incredible artwork that has been created for the cards all capturing in meticulous details and unique aspects of each character from the Cyberpunk world. Especially the extended art versions which in my opinion are some of the best artworks in TCG history.
Then you look at the card design and even more elements from the Cyberpunk worlds shine through. Tags designate a cards faction which tie in with unique gameplay interactions, thus encouraging interesting deck building scenarios whilst staying true to the original universe with having factions feel consistent to how they behave in universe. Then you have the gigs and Eddie mechanics which also help making the game feel so unique to the Cyberpunk aesthetic.
The Deckbuilding of The Cyberpunk TCG.
At the time of writing this, the gameplay guide is part of an alpha product. So, all the content in this section is based on things that might have changed slightly for the official product release. The game is played using a set of six dice (d4, d6, d8, d10, d12, d20) and a deck of Cyberpunk TCG cards, including no less than 40 and no more than 50 cards and 3 legend cards with unique names. With decks using no more than 3 copies of the same card and following a RAM limit mechanic that is set by your Legends.
Each legend has a colour and a RAM limit. The cumulative RAM of your three Legends cards sets the maximum RAM value for colour cards permitted in your deck, so that means If you want to use more powerful cards of a specific colour, you need to use more Legends of the same colour to increase your RAM limit in that colour to be able to include it. Bringing in another level of complexity to deckbuilding as not only your legends but also colour specific powerful cards heavily impact the type of deck you can build. For example, Adam Smasher is a 5x yellow RAM card, so requires 3 yellow legends to include in a deck, however the payoff for this is his ability to defeat all other units when played and bring a whooping 15 power to the board. This however comes at the cost of playing only yellow cards in the deck greatly reducing the card selection available for your deck. This give and take in my opinion is one of the best mechanics in deckbuilding as it adds restrictions that make Deckbuilding more engaging and challenging. Just like mana in mtg, energy in Pokémon or aspects in Star Wars Unlimited, the Cyberpunk TCG has this brilliant mechanic built in perfectly.
The game is designed around 4 main card types: Units, that attack your rival and their Units; Programs are instantaneous effects that happen once; Gear cards equip your Units granting special effects and advantages and Legends that are the leaders and centrepiece of your deck. These concepts should be familiar to most TCG players as they are common archetypes used throughout the TCG landscape and are very well implemented here.
Resources in this game Eddies are created by selling certain cards with Eddie symbols on them similar to mechanics found in Lorcana and Star Wars unlimited, but with the added mechanic that only certain cards can be sold, compounding even more to the incredible experience I believe the deckbuilding in this game will be.
The gameplay of The Cyberpunk TCG.
The goal is to collect more Gig Dice then your opponent. You achieve this through protecting your own Gig Dice and attacking your rival to steal theirs, until you have at least six Gigs dice at the start their turn and win the game or if the game goes to overtime, the moment you have the majority of Gig Dice, you win.
You start the game with your 3 legends face down and randomised and all gig dice in the fixer area. Then each player draws 6 with one free mulligan.
At the start of each turn, you begin with the ready phase. you draw a card, choose one Gig die from the fixer are and roll it to set its value and add it to the Gig area, then ready all your cards. The values on the die are used for Street Cred. Street Cred is the total value of the dice in your Gig area and certain cards have unique abilities once certain thresholds of Street Cred are met.
Next is the play phase where you sell cards to spend them each turn for one Eddie. You can spend 2 Eddies to flip a legend face-up and you can spend eddies to play cards from your hand or deploy certain legends as units.
Finally, the attack phase. This is where each unit attacks individually a spent rival unit, or your rival directly. Spend your attacking unit and resolve any ATTACK trigger. Then your rival can Call a Legend or redirect the attack to a ready BLOCKER unit. Then finally if your unit successfully attacked a rival, you could choose any die from your rival’s Gig area and move it to your own additionally for every 10 power a Unit has, they steal an additional Gig making stronger units more disruptive. Likewise, stronger units are also great for attacking spent rival units as if you chose a unit as the target, you compare the total power of your Unit to the total power of your rival’s defending card. The one with more power defeats the other. With a tie resulting in both defeated. Then once all attacks you want to make are made, it’s your opponent's turn. This continues till a player wins or if you have 0 cards left in your deck, your rival automatically wins. The Full rules can be found here: https://cyberpunktcg.com/gameplay-guide
The Kickstarter campaign:
As you’ve hopefully seen the Cyberpunk TCG has been carefully constructed with deckbuilding and gameplay in mind, whilst making sure to stay true to the world of Cyberpunk. However, these aren't the only factors in the success of the Kickstarter campaign.
Firstly, the marketing. They have reached out to multiple influencers for videos on the game allowing for an easy way to look at how the game plays and the types of mechanics included. I Myself having watched several of them to gain insight into the rhythm of the game, whilst for many others it could be what persuaded them to back the campaign. This campaign has also appeared in mine and friend's social media feeds, so it’s been targeted well at possible backers.
Next is how the campaign was managed pre-launch. Most marketing I saw was months before the launch with a sign up for the newsletter offering exclusive rewards and with the influencer videos as well a lot of hype was built well before the actual launch. Likewise, the tiers were all announced before launch as well, giving people extra time to decide. All the partnerships where announced before launch as well, including titans like Dragon Shield bringing extra prestige to the project. This all built up to the greatest TCG Kickstarter launch in history.
72hrs have passed since launch and I have seen stretch goals constantly reached and surpassed. Most of the goals relate to the beta box, a unique add-on to Netrunner tier and above. This box originally contained an additional booster pack and a legend pack containing a legend from a card pool of increasing size as stretch goals unlocked. Then a playmat, a metal legends card and card sleeves were added via goals too. Likewise, a second hit slot for packs and box toppers were added to boxes.
These would normally be the highlights of most campaigns, but incredibly they are all easily surpassed by the $10million goal. This removed the legend pack and instead just included all cards from the pool in the beta box. By doing this they created a massive wave of appreciation from backers and created a moment that acted as a triumph for the entire campaign so far.
The future of the Cyberpunk TCG
At the time of writing there is still plenty of time to join the Kickstarter and get all the exclusives if you desire. The Kickstarter ends on the 18th of April 2026, with express fulfilment beginning Q3 2026 for (Starter Decks, Beta Displays, Add-On Starter Decks, and Add-On Beta Displays from the Netrunner Starter Kit pledge tier and above). Then in Q4 2026 - Wave #2 Standard Fulfilment begins (Starter Decks and Beta Displays from the Common Cyberdecks and Quickhacks pledge tiers, Accessories, Add-Ons, and Non-Foil and Foil Lucy Cards).
All the information on the campaign can be found here: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/cyberpunktcg/the-official-cyberpunk-trading-card-game?ref=discovery&term=cyberpunk&total_hits=1120&category_id=34
The Cyberpunk TCG website: https://cyberpunktcg.com/
I am not associated with WeirdCo / Cyberpunk TCG, and this blog is of my own opinions, it is not any sort of official blog post by WeirdCo.
