Magic: The Gathering‘s latest set takes players to a solar system on the edge of the multiverse, but for the beloved trading card game’s next big adventure, fans will be transported to… New York City. MTG’s September release is a crossover with your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man, the latest in the game’s popular (if controversial) Universes Beyond series, but a new promotional video may have revealed the company’s larger plans for an even bigger Marvel tie-in that’s still to come: the Avengers.
A promotional video for the new Magic set shared by Marvel on Instagram and Facebook this Friday offers a fresh look at some of the upcoming cards, along with interviews with head designer Mark Rosewater and others. Hidden near the end of the video, however, is a surprising reveal: the Soul Stone has officially entered the world of MTG.
The card itself is a black legendary artifact that can tap for mana and also has a powerful reanimator ability denoted by an infinity symbol that’s new to Magic: The Gathering. If you’re playing with a deck that likes to fill up the graveyard with lots of creatures, the Soul Stone just became a must-have card. However, the bigger news here is what the Soul Stone represents.
The video seemingly confirms two important things: 1) Magic publisher Wizards of the Coast is already working with Marvel on additional crossover sets, and 2) those sets will slowly introduce more Infinity Stones into the game. This all seems to be leading to a very obvious endgame (pun intended). Just like Marvel Studios did with the first three phases of its cinematic universe, MTG can slowly introduce all six Infinity Stones in various Universes Beyond sets, eventually leading up to a massive Avengers set that ties it all together.
“We know it doesn’t make sense to do just one Infinity Stone,” says Max McCall, executive producer of the Spider-Man set. “People have certain expectations to be able to get them all and doing something cool with them. We will certainly pay off everybody’s expectations in that vein.”
It’s fascinating to see Magic’s plan for Marvel start to coalesce, even if that confirms the future holds even more Universes Beyond sets (likely at the expense of new cards designed to explore the game’s own expansive lore and universe). Still, with the actual Marvel Cinematic Universe seemingly running on fumes, the promise of being able to reexperience the relive Avengers: Infinity War and Endgame in Magic: The Gathering form is pretty damn exciting.