Pokémon Trading Card Game Pocket launches today

There’s a new Pokémon game on iOS and Android today, and it’s geared towards people who like mobile card games and collecting Pokémon cards.

The traditional Pokémon Trading Card Game launched in 1996 and follows closely in the footsteps of Magic: the Gathering, which means that the games are long and require lots of cards in a deck. While this game is a ton of fun, it never quite clicked on mobile because the matches would take a long time.

The new version, Pokémon Trading Card Game Pocket, is inspired by other mobile card games like Marvel Snap. This means it focuses on smaller decks, shorter rounds, and a faster game overall. I’ve only played for an hour on my lunch break, but so far, it has been a ton of fun, and the app has a lot more polish than the existing mobile Pokémon Trading Card Game.

There is also an expanded focus on collecting in the new game since it gives you a few free packs of five cards per day to unlock, so you can collect lots of cards in a few days to start upgrading and expanding your decks for battle. In the brief time I played, I was able to unlock 62 cards, but it does seem like you’ll unlock more cards in the first few days since the introductory missions are geared toward giving you lots of ‘Pack hourglasses,’ which is the currency used to unlock the packs.

If you don’t know how to play the regular Pokémon Trading Card Game, don’t worry because the new game is a bit less complex and the app does a really great job of running you through a few tutorials to make sure that you know what you’re doing before you start taking on other human opponents.

You can download the game for free on iOS or Android. It’s free to play, but in-app purchases and a subscription allow you to unlock a few extra packs per day. I haven’t been playing long enough to see if it’s worth it, but there is a two-week free trial so you can try it out.