A few weeks ago, Wizards of the Coast announced that they were going to have a massive announcement coming on August 24th in their Magic Showcase 2021 stream. Here they will be talking about everything that’s coming up for Magic: the Gathering in 2022.
With this being one of their biggest announcements to date, what can we expect to hear about from the team next week?
New Set and Product Release Schedule
The first thing that I’d expect that Wizards is going to share will be their roadmap for new sets and products that are going to be coming out in 2022. We know now that they will be in fact talking sets, as Mark Rosewater confirmed on his blog earlier today. Some sets that we think might be coming out next year include Kamigawa: Neon Dynasties, Dominaria United, and potentially Streets of New Celesta. The websites for these 3 names were registered on the same day that “Innistrad Double Feature” was as well, and we’re about to kick off preview season for the first of that double header Innistrad: Midnight Hunt on August 30th. It stands to reason that Kamigawa may be the first set of the year, since we do have some focus group artwork and story that has been leaked. We have very little information around Dominaria and New Celesta.
We also know that they’ll be talking about Multiverses Beyond (Which was previously called Universes Beyond), where we know that Magic will be heading to different universes, such as Warhammer 40,000, Lord of the Rings, and Stranger Things.
Magic Arena Updates
The next major announcement that we expect is updates for Magic Arena. We know that also on the 24th, Magic Arena is going to be undergoing a major back end up date which “will help with the long term support of the game”. That being said, I hope that we learn more about what those updates can help the team accomplish in the coming months. Some things that I hope to see come in the next few months include Spectator Mode, possibly In-Client Tournament support, and an Economy Revamp. The Economy has been a massive topic in the community for months, so it’d be nice to see that come into play.
State of Organized Play
One of the biggest things that I know that myself and the community will be looking at is the State of Organized Play for Magic: the Gathering. With the abolishing of the Magic Pro League and Rivals League, we have been left with a bit of a hole in what’s coming up for competitive Magic events. It would appear that they’re doing a full restructure of the system, and considering that Worlds is in October, I’d hope that they have a plan in place for the upcoming year. I definitely would love to see plans for both paper and digital play to include a clear path to the Players Tour.
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What kinds of things are you excited for in Magic: the Gathering next year? What sets do you hope that will be announced? Let us know in the comments!
