Stranger Things Announces Collaborations With Magic: The Gathering and Smite

Netflix has announced that Stranger Things will have crossovers with both Magic: The Gathering and the online battle arena game Smite. Netflix announced the news as part of their Netflix Geeked week. Magic: The Gathering will publish a Stranger Things Secret Lair drop, while Smite will have a Stranger Things battlepass. Both crossovers will be released later this year for their respective games.

The Stranger Things crossover with Magic: The Gathering builds on an existing relationship between Stranger Things and Wizards of the Coast. Dungeons & Dragons, which is published by Wizards of the Coast, has a prominent role in Stranger Things, with the two primary monsters of the series (the Demogorgon and Mind Flayer) both named after D&D monsters. Wizards of the Coast previously collaborated with Stranger Things to release a D&D boxed set written from the perspective of Will that featured several references to the show.

The Stranger Things Secret Lair cards will be released as part of their "Universes Beyond" line that exists outside of the Magic: The Gathering multiverse. The cards will also be "mechanically unique" with themes and abilities based on the TV show instead of traditional Magic: The Gathering mechanics. Wizards of the Coast is also using the cards to change how they release their Secret Lairs cards. Magic: The Gathering confirmed that they would release "in-universe" versions of the cards with the same mechanics, and that both the Stranger Things versions and the "in-universe" versions would count towards the limit of 4 cards of the same type per deck. The "in-universe" cards will also be released in various set boosters and other products to make sure that players didn't feel they had to buy the one-time collectible Stranger Things versions if they wanted to make a deck using those cards. Magic: The Gathering also noted that the Stranger Things cards are specifically geared for Commander play and are not geared for constructed competitive play.

No release dates for the Stranger Things Secret Lair or Smash battlepass were announced, but more details for both will be announced later this year.