Magic: The Gathering Arena is adding new features and cards in the November update. However, the feature that's sure to catch your attention is the Friends List functionality. It looks as if MTG Arena is going the way of social media.
Friends List
According to Wizards of the Coast, they're calling this update "social features 1.0" for now, mainly because it's the first feature in a planned social suite. As of now, Wizards is still working on the different functionalities that the Friends List is going to offer.
With MTG Arena, players should be able to add other players to their Friends List. That said, they can remove and/or block other players as well. What's good about having this Friends List is that players are going to be able to see if their friends are online and then issue Direct Challenge matches using the Friends List interface.
Upcoming features with the Friends List include being able to directly send a message to friends and being able to share decks when playing Direct Challenge matches.
Priority
Friends List aside, MTG Arena revealed that its highest priority remains to be performance. For November, the update should allow for numerous improvements, especially during matches. These include:
- Gameplay Hitches, FPS Drops, Unresponsiveness (In Progress)
- MTG Arena said that they've started the code refractor of its asset system, the first batch of which is set to arrive with the update. The main focus was on lowering the frequency and severity of times the game appears to "stutter" or "hang" during matches. Players should also experience better performance whenever they're viewing a lot of cards like during deck building.
- Memory Allocation and Management (In Progress)
- This is also known as memory leaks. MTG Arena said it made improvement on how asset cleanup is handled. This should result in less memory usage, especially during longer gameplay sessions. In addition, it should also lower spikes in memory allocation as well as CPU utilization, especially during matches.
WotC said that most game crash reports it received were mainly related to the issues mentioned. Hopefully these types of crashes should decrease as WotC works to improve CPU utilization, memory usage, and overall game optimization.
The Friends List will release alongside some quality-of-life changes, bug fixes, and continued work on performance improvements this November 21.
