The reveal of a new Secret Lair drop is always a double whammy for news. Obviously, each new drop can be admired and analyzed, but there’s always a bonus card waiting in the wings too. Thankfully, these are now being revealed sooner rather than later following the shift to the limited-run printing model.
While this change has been fraught with controversy and complaints, shipping speed has undeniably improved. It has now gotten to the point that many bonus cards are being revealed long before the drop sells out. This is great news for any MTG player looking to know exactly what they’re getting for their hard-earned money.
This aspect is all the more important when a Secret Lair drop is slightly more expensive than usual. Starting at $39.99, this is certainly the case for the new Pixel Perfect drop. While it does support the Extra Life charity,
Pixel Perfect Bonus Card
While it is slightly more expensive, the Pixel Perfect Secret Lair has been a good deal from the moment it was announced. Offering $53 worth of reprints, this drop is a rare value win for players to enjoy. Mercifully, this drop isn’t even completely limited-run, so players can get their fill of these well-priced cards.
Offering a rather unique, and highly popular, pixel-art theme, this drop seemed like a slam dunk in every aspect. Given the strong theming, there was also a high chance of a guaranteed bonus card in the drop’s style. As you can see, this has been confirmed now that Solve the Equation has been revealed.
Continuing the drop’s already stellar video-game-inspired flavor this bonus card is a very welcome and fitting addition. As if the flavor wasn’t fun enough, this card is also pretty great from a playability perspective. Allowing you to tutor any instant or sorcery to your hand, Solve the Equation is understandably pretty popular!
Being a three mana tutor, Solve the Equation is only really played in Commander, but it’s seriously popular there. Offering extra redundancy, or whatever’s needed really, for any blue-aligned combo deck, tutors, like Solve the Equation, are simply effective. Currently, this card sees play in 100,000 Commander decks, according to EDHREC.
Various Values
In terms of value, Solve the Equation is sadly not the most expensive MTG card ever printed. Originally found as an uncommon from Strixhaven: School of Mages, there are plenty of copies of this card floating around. As a result of this, you can easily pick up a near-mint copy on TCGplayer for just shy of $2.
While Solve the Equation isn’t a bad value bump to Pixel Perfect already, there is the Secret Lair tax to consider. Even under the hybrid print-to-demand model, this version is bound to be a lot rarer than original Strixhaven copies. As a result of this, the prices for this new variant of Solve the Equation are bound to be a good deal higher.
Thankfully, we don’t just have to speculate about a potential price increase, since Solve the Equation already has a Secret Lair printing. Released as part of the Kamigawa Manga drop, this Kaito and Manga-themed variant currently sells for around $5. In theory, we should be able to expect this new Pixel Perfect variant to sell for a similar amount.
Notably, while the final resting price may settle around the $5 mark, this variant may be significantly more expensive initially. To hopefully offer the best of both worlds, Pixel Perfect is both limited-run and print-to-demand. This means some players will quickly get the pre-printed supply, while others have to wait for back-orders to be fulfilled.
The long and short of this means that supply for this variant is going to be very limited at first. Depending on how many copies Wizards pre-printed, we may see the new Solve the Equation selling for surprisingly high amounts. As more orders are eventually fulfilled over time, however, you should expect this price to drop.
An Art Oddity
All in all, Solve the Equation is a great bonus card and a welcome addition to the Pixel Perfect drop. There’s only one real problem with this card that MTG players were quick to point out online. Thanks to the rare use of extra text, and its placement, it looks like this card is called “Extra Life.”
Given that Pixel Perfect supports the Extra Life charity, this extra text is technically a nice flavorful touch on the bonus card. It even plays into the video-game-inspired theme of the drop for added tonal harmony. That being said, if this was the flavor Wizards was going for, they could have made things a touch cleaner.
As RestlessCreator suggests on Reddit, Wizards could have reskinned Solve the Equation with the new name “Extra Life.” While cleaner, RestlessCreator joked they might be saving that for a Super Mario Universes Beyond drop, which honestly isn’t unlikely. As flavorful as a card named Extra Life would be for an Extra Life-supporting Secret Lair, Solve the Equation isn’t the best fit.
As a result, we’ve been left with this half-name that’s just a bit confusing really. That being said, it’s hardly the end of the world, especially since it follows the Pixel Perfect drop’s art style. At worst, this drop is going to make a few players double-take at first glance, but it shouldn’t do any more harm than that.
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