u/CharizardPerson

So, after doing a lot of new-player research, I ordered the Foundations Beginner Box a couple of days ago, which was supposed to be delivered yesterday but wasn't. Being the impatient person I am and fully expecting to play* that* night, my girlfriend and I eventually drove to a local game shop to see what they had and while they didn't have the Foundations Beginner Box (the guy actually told me he's pretty sure it's out-of-print), he offered me the Final Fantasy Starter Kit, which I saw in stores in-person while driving to stores like Target, Best Buy, etc. but reallyyy didn't want a gimmicky non-MtG themed deck (like Marvel, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, etc.) so I never bought them but kept them in the back of my mind as a backup.

Well, fast-forward back to being in the game shop, I said, "screw it" and bought the FF box as well as two dice. We got home, unpacked it all, and started shuffling the decks. I will say, we started around 7PM and did not stop until like 1:45AM, lol (wayyy past our bed times since we both wake up super early for work every day). So between 7PM-1:45AM, we played a total of 3 games. I have no idea what the typical average time per game is, but man oh man did we have QUESTIONS every single turn of what exactly X card means by its effect, how it's supposed to be used, etc. The 45min video we watched in the morning made it look so much easier than it was and the starter kit itself really didn't explain any of the questions we had....but, honestly, I wouldn't have it any other way.

This allowed me to truly bond with my girlfriend because she's always been super into board games and things like that while I really don't care for them and prefer to play games on my PC, make videos for YouTube, or watch content on my home media server on my projector. We debated about playing Yu-Gi-Oh or MtG, since I loved Yu-Gi-Oh growing up, and she was down for either at this point, but I decided to go with MtG due to both of us have never touching it once and so there wouldn't be any competitive edge or previously-known knowledge for me to have an upper-hand or something.

We had a blast. Despite our turns taking foreverrrr, we really bonded over the game and genuinely were having fun with it. Can't wait for the Beginner Box to arrive today now to add even more cards for us to take hours to learn (haha) and whatnot. I am super glad to have found a game that is a happy-medium for her love of board/tabletop games and my love for Yu-Gi-Oh in the past and getting back into this kind of stuff. Apologies for the long paragraphs. Just wanted to share. Have a good day, everyone!

Photos of us playing: https://i.imgur.com/wKyzKbS.jpeg | https://i.imgur.com/hICL96T.png

If anyone has any helpful tips, recommendations, or anything, that would be cool as well!