Square Enix has a long history of including a myriad of different mini-games throughout its franchises. Final Fantasy games almost always include some kind of mini-games for players to engage in, like Fort Condor in FF7, Blitzball in FF10, and a host of card games in several entries. A recently discovered trademark and subsequent image leak have uncovered Voice of Cards: Isle Dragon Roars. While next to nothing is known about the game, the title Voice of Cards makes the idea that it will be a deckbuilder TCG-style game in the vein of Hearthstone or MTG Arena a fairly safe assumption.
Voice of Cards' first image was leaked recently, and despite being a miniscule piece of information, it can be used to draw a fair amount of inferences. The image shows three card-styled characters. The art is in the distinct blend of anime and traditional fantasy art that has long defined Square Enix. While that isn't much information to go on, Square Enix's legacy with card-based mini-games means that the game could end up being pretty engaging. The two most famous examples of the publishers penchant for card games are the Tetra Master game from Final Fantasy 9 and Triple Triad from FF8.
Voice of Cards Could Mix Up the Genre with Triple Triad Mechanics
Both of the collectible card games from FF8 and FF9 work on similar concepts that are familiar to even casual TCG players. Squall and Zidane respectively are able to collect various cards throughout their journey across their game worlds. Cards represent the menagerie of monsters encountered throughout the two Final Fantasy games and are assigned individual statistics. Final Fantasy 8's Triple Triad game heavily influenced FF9's Tetra Master and later card games, even appearing in the popular FF14 MMO. That will likely also be true for Voice of Cards.
Updating the mechanics of Triple Triad worked well for FF14, and many of its core concepts will likely appear in Voice of Cards, albeit with some changes. While not much is known about Voice of Cards, it's probable that the game will focus on various creature and hero/villain cards with some kind of system for "spells" similar to the instant/sorcery/artifact cards from Magic: The Gathering. Also in line with Magic, the game will probably feature some kind of mana system that gauges how many cards can be played in a turn. One of Triple Triads main concepts could shake that formula up in a big way.
Triple Triad features many iconic Final Fantasy creatures, but even the most powerful cards can be defeated if played incorrectly. The game adds another layer of strategy by way of exactly where the cards are played. Each Triple Triad card has four attack/defense scores that are placed individually on one side of the cards. When a creature card is placed above another, the former's bottom score is played against the latter's top score. A 9x9 grid is used for the placement of cards, so managing the various angles of attack and defense are critical to the game's strategy.
If a system like this is introduced into Voice of Cards, it would be a big shakeup of the more common format that emulates MTG. It's likely that Voice of Cards will adopt many of the conventions that are commonplace in MTG, Hearthstone, and Elder Scrolls: Legends. That being said, incorporating more elements from Triple Triad could create a unique experience in a market that's full of very similar titles. FF8's Triple Triad is considered the best in-game card game by many, so if Square Enix is creating a new card game, it will likely dig into its history for inspiration with Voice of Cards.
Voice of Cards: Isle Dragon Roars is rumored to be in development.