As in Monopoly, players in Culdcept Saga roll dice and move around a game board, attempting to claim spaces and assess fees against other Cepters who land there. Unlike Monopoly, squares are claimed by summoning creatures to guard them, and players who land on them can opt to challenge this creature with one of their own rather than pay the toll. If successful, the challenger claims ownership of the square. The winner of the game is the first player to return to the starting location after amassing a sufficient quantity of magic/mana.
Cards
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Creatures are summoned from customized decks ("books") of cards which players design ahead of time from their available pool of cards. Other cards in these decks bestow items to temporarily enhance creature abilities, or represent spells which can influence players or locations on the game board. The standard gameplay options fix the size of each deck at 50 cards, although this is customizable during multiplayer matches.
There are nearly 500 different cards in total, but players must earn the majority of these through skillful play and story mode progression before they can be used. Cards are earned simply for completing a match, regardless of whether one wins or loses, although the winner earns a greater number of cards than the opponent(s).
Strategy
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While the game relies somewhat heavily on luck,[2] strategy and planning play a strong role as well. Players have a choice over what cards make up their decks, as well as when to play those cards. The squares in the game consist of different terrain or elemental types (fire, earth, water, or air), and a creature's defense power is raised when the element of the square is in accordance with the placed color of the creature there. Also the offensive capabilities of creatures can be bolstered by deploying them on an aligned square. Several more powerful creatures can only be summoned when a certain number of squares of a given terrain type are already controlled.
Players must also decide when to upgrade the squares which they currently control. Upgraded squares exact higher magic tolls than non-upgraded squares when landed on.
New features
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As a title in the roughly decade-old Culdcept series, Culdcept Saga expands upon and refines the existing gameplay concept without radically altering it. While more than 300 cards were included from the previous title, some of these were tweaked for balance, and over 100 new cards were added.[3] New features include support for online multiplayer play against up to three other players via Xbox Live, complete with leaderboards and rankings. If desired, custom rules for such online matches can be defined in order to modify the experience. Also new to the series is the ability to unlock various items with which to graphically customize in-game avatars.
Other improvements include high-resolution graphics, now rendered (at least partially) in 3D.