Your first ten minutes in Toybox Champions

Toybox Champions is a card battler set on a bedroom floor. Two heroes, a rug between them, and toys that fight when you play their cards. The web version at toybox.swizzleworks.com is free, with no ads and no purchases. This is what a first session looks like, in order, so you know what to expect before you open it.

Minute one: the home screen. You land on a playroom rug with three doors: Play, Toy Chests, and My Toybox. Press Play. There is no account step first. Email restore exists if you want your toys and progress saved across devices, and it can wait until later.

Minutes two through four: the scripted match. The game hands you the Baby Toys deck and runs a short guided duel. It does three things. It shows the resource, Imagination, which you earn each turn and spend to play cards. It shows a summon, which puts a toy on the floor in front of your hero. And it shows an attack, which sends that toy at an enemy toy or straight at the enemy hero. You win when the enemy hero's health reaches zero. That is the whole loop, and the script does not let you lose it.

Minutes five through eight: the first real duel. The second match is against the AI with the same Baby Toys deck. Now you make the choices. Early turns are about spending Imagination well: two cheap toys usually beat one expensive one you cannot afford yet. Middle turns are about trades, whether to hit the enemy toy blocking you or go past it at the hero. Most new players lose a hero to one big toy they ignored. Block it once and the rest of the match opens up.

Minute nine: your first Toy Chest. Winning moves you along the Apprentice Track and gives you a chest. Open it from the home screen. Chests add toy cards to My Toybox. There is nothing to buy here; chests come from playing. Further along the track the other toy types unlock: Action Figures, Plushies, Transportation Toys, and Building Blocks, with Dolls and Arts at the last station.

Minute ten: your first deck edit. My Toybox is where decks live. Each toy type has a starter deck, and you edit it between matches by swapping cards in and out. The deck you walk into a duel with is the deck you play; nothing is bought from a shared market mid-fight. If you came from Dominion or Slay the Spire, that is the main difference. If you came from a trading card game, the difference is that there are no packs.

After that: another player. Player vs player is on the Play screen. We send new players to the AI first because an empty queue is a bad first game, but once you have a deck you like, queue up. Matches are short enough to fit in a lunch break.

Who this is for. Teens and adults who like short duels and toy nostalgia. The theme is toys, and the game is not directed at children under 13. Do not make an account for a younger kid.

What is next. iOS and Android apps are in progress and are not in the stores yet. The Toybox Champions page on this site has the waitlist, the press kit if you need stills, and the full rules. If you only have ten minutes, spend them in the browser instead.