Hearthstone’s latest expansion Kobolds and Catacombs launched today, featuring 135 new cards. One of them is called Violet Wurm, and as some players have noticed, it’s almost exactly like a Magic: The Gathering card that came out 17 years ago.
Here’s the tale of the tape:
- Violet Wurm is a new Hearthstone card, a minion with eight mana cost, seven power, and seven toughness. When it dies, it spawns seven 1/1 grubs.
- Symbiotic Wurm is an old Magic card with eight mana cost, seven power, and seven defence. When it dies, it spawns seven 1/1 insects.
At least the artwork is somewhat different: Violet Wurm looks more like a bug and Symbiotic Wurm looks more lizardy – which makes sense, as “wurm” is a medieval term for dragon employed in a lot of fantasy games, and not an earthworm.
In an even more intriguing twist, both cards were at least partly designed by the same person. Mike Donais, Principal Game Designer on Hearthstone and a frequent Reddit poster, actually commented on the original thread discussing the two twin cards: “Is it still copying if I designed Symbiotic Wurm for Onslaught 17 years ago and then designed it again for Hearthstone?” he wrote. “That isn’t exactly how it happened,” he added, “but I helped design both expansions and it makes a much better story.”
Donais said that he didn’t even remember the old card when working on Violet Wurm as part of the Kobolds and Catacombs expansion. That’s not necessarily surprising either. As others pointed out, cryptomnesia, in which a person recalls something they saw or heard before while thinking it’s original, isn’t unheard of. Writers and musicians occasionally suffer from it, plagiarizing their past work or others’ without even realising it.
Of course, just because it wasn’t intentional doesn’t mean it still doesn’t pose issues. The weirdest part is the spelling of “Wurm”. While Hearthstone has a number of cards with “Worm” or “Wyrm” in the title, this is the first to use the “ur” spelling. World of Warcraft‘s lore, which Hearthstone’s is based on, doesn’t really mention wurms either.
On the other hand they’re quite common in Magic such that they constitute an entire creature type, while Hearthstone‘s worms are all included alongside wild boars and other animals in the “beasts” bucket.
Donais declined to elaborate further when reached for comment by Kotaku, referring us to Blizzard PR, which has not yet responded.
Comments
10 responses to “New Hearthstone Card Looks Suspiciously Familiar To Magic Players”
I don’t see it being THAT close, but even if it was who could be surprised, MtG has 24 years worth of art hoarded up, overlap was always going to occur.
Has a similar effect though…
Yeah 7 1/1 creatures after death, that was a pure coincidence *cough*
Yeah. I thought that it was bound to be a coincidence but they’re both worms spelled wurm that spawn grubs and revolve around the number 7. They aren’t just the same concept or the same picture, they’re the same card. The guy must have had the same inspiration twice.
To quote South park
MTG has been around for ages. It does not own every single fantasy trope.
And when did Dune come out? 1965?
This is one of the most retarded things I’ve read in a while.
Who cares.
The entire expansion is a call back to old school 70s/80s fantasy media. From the D&D font to the Dark Crystal inspired poster and the Labrynth style trailer. I’m actually surprised it’s not intentional.
And they both look like Purple Worms from D&D. Call the copy police.
http://www.gf9.com/Portals/0/all_images/GF9/Miniatures/71007a.jpg
It’s a giant worm. I can’t remember seeing any interpretations through the years that didn’t look like this.