If you’re the sort of person who loves playing Wikipedia tag, or hitting that ‘random’ button for fun facts and knowledge-building, then Wikigacha is a game designed with you in mind.
This recently-released digital TCG game has gone viral for its simple premise: it translates Wikipedia articles into cards, which can be discovered in collectible packs, and then used for battles.
Not only that, but each card has a hyperlink to the Wikipedia article it’s inspired by, allowing you to learn more about the world and your surrounds, while also getting the ‘brain tickle’ of opening new cards.
Wikigacha TCG game goes viral – quick links
How Wikigacha works
Every day, you can visit Wikigacha to open new packs of Wikipedia-inspired collectible cards. Every 10 packs, you’re guaranteed a high-rarity card which may serve you well in battles. You can spend time simply collecting cards, which will be the more appealing aspect to most.
Of course, the more bloodthirsty can head into daily raid battles, random battles, or team battles.
While you might ask how Wikipedia articles can be used to fight, it appears developer Harusugi has accounted for page views and quality assessment ranking as measures of battle stats. The more popular an article is on Wikipedia, the better it will be ranked as a fighter.
It appears there’s minimal curation of the articles listed – which means you do get some cards that deal with ultra-serious matter like wars and religion – but like Wikipedia, Wikigacha aims to be a font of knowledge, with a diverse array of topics available.
It’s essentially a way to gamify learning via Wikipedia, in the guise of a gacha game that delivers the rush of opening new card packs, without the cost or physicality.
The website, so far, is very basic but we expect its popularity will inspire more work.
Wikigacha functions as a simple parody of TCG games, but with plenty of depth
Wikigacha is not meant to be taken seriously, of course. It’s a light-hearted spin on gacha and TCG games, using Wikipedia as a basis. You can pit knowledge like ‘List of diseases spread by arthropods’ against people-focused cards, like that of Tim Birkhead, who, by the way, is a British ornithologist.
I’ve learned a great many things from my time stumbling through Wikigacha. I’ve learned more about professional wrestling and its history, jumping off from a card about GCW’s annual Bloodsport event. I’ve learned about a Roman fort named Manduessedum, and about Addite Malik, who is an Indian television actress and entrepreneur.
I’ve also learned about Charlotte Schreiber, an English-Canadian painter who was a pioneer in the world of women’s art-making, and the Battle at Kruger, which is actually an ‘eight-minute amateur wildlife video that depicts a confrontation between a herd of Cape buffalo, a small group of young lions from a pride, and two crocodiles.’
Isn’t the world magical? Isn’t it so full of wonder? There’s so much to learn out there, and using Wikipedia as a basis, Wikigacha presents new and wonderful chances to learn, every day.
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