Organization: Cartoon Network

On the list of animated shows I'm glad my daughter likes so I have a plausible reason to watch more of them myself, Adventure Time is right at the top (Littlest Pet Shop, in contrast, is last). So it's with great delight that I report that Card Wars - Adventure Time does right by the show and is better than most mobile card battle games, held back only a bit by its unnecessary two-pronged monetization.Fans of the series probably already know that Card Wars is a real thing in Finn and Jake's universe, kind of their own version of games like Magic: The Gathering. What you play in the mobile game is pretty darn faithful to what we've seen on screen, right down to some of the creatures and buildings, as well as "flooping the pig" — flooping being this game's version of tapping to activate a card's special ability."The biggest difference is that Card Wars - Adventure Time doesn't take that long to figure out, despite Jake's warning that there are lots of rules. Each battle has a setup phase that has each player lay out four landscapes on his or her side of the board. Creatures can only be played into their corresponding landscape, except for rainbow cards that can be played anywhere.Only one creature can be played at a time into each of the four lanes. All of them have varying mana costs to play, plus values for attack and defense. The other types of cards are buildings, which buff the creatures in their lanes, and spells, which have a variety of effects. The Volcano, for instance, wipes out everything in its lane on both sides of the board.