Verithiathe honest score on any app
Updated July 2026 · real, multi-region App Store reviews
The verdict on

Black Deck

30
User verdict / 100 High confidence In trouble

Black Deck offers engaging card game mechanics and strategic depth, but recent updates have introduced severe loading issues and amplified existing 'pay-to-win' elements, making progression difficult for free players and frustrating for paying users.

4.6★ lifetime (17,416) Free + in-app purchases since 2023 by SayGames LTD updated 1.8 mo ago recent negative 60% 83 reviews across 2 regions
Loading/Crashes Pay-to-Win/Monetization Pop-up Ads Gameplay & Strategy Customer Support
5★11
4★8
3★14
2★11
1★39
recent reviews across 2 regions, vs the 4.6★ lifetime average

Black Deck is a card game praised for its strategic depth and engaging gameplay, particularly for those who enjoy puzzles and systems R1R7. However, recent updates have led to widespread loading errors and crashes, preventing many users from playing R21R42. The game is also heavily criticized for its aggressive monetization, frequent pop-up ads, and a 'pay-to-win' progression model that hinders free players R2R5R10.

What users like

  • Engaging and strategic card game mechanics with depthR1R7R10R33
  • Can be fun and addicting for players willing to grind or payR1R20R33R47

What users complain about

  • Widespread loading errors and crashes, especially after recent updates, prevent many users from playingR21R36R39R42
  • Aggressive 'pay-to-win' model makes progression difficult without spending moneyR2R5R19R27
  • Excessive and intrusive pop-up ads for in-app purchases disrupt gameplayR8R10R48R58
  • Customer support is unresponsive or unhelpful regarding bugs, missing purchases, and account issuesR6R9R11R12
  • Lack of sufficient in-game resources (gold, energy) and high upgrade costs make free progression very slow or impossibleR5R13R20R26
  • Balance changes are perceived as attempts to force spending, and matchmaking can be unfairR3R10R28R56
  • Some users report not receiving purchased items or having gear disappearR9R14R18R24
  • Game is not as advertised in some promotional materials, showing only a mini-gameR52

Latest update · v1.35.17

What the developer says changed (the verdict above weighs this against what reviewers report):

Bug fixes

Recurring themes

Loading/Crashes negative
Many recent reviews report that the game fails to load past a certain point or crashes frequently, especially after the latest update. This issue affects various iPhone models and prevents users from playing, contradicting the developer's 'bug fixes' claim. Some users have been locked out for weeks or months.R6R11R16R21
Pay-to-Win/Monetization negative
A dominant theme is the game's aggressive monetization and 'pay-to-win' structure. Users feel progress is severely capped for free players, requiring hundreds of dollars to advance. Legendary cards and higher-level upgrades are difficult or impossible to obtain without spending money, and prices for in-app purchases are considered unreasonably high.R2R3R5R15
Pop-up Ads negative
Reviewers are highly frustrated by the constant and intrusive pop-up ads for deals and in-app purchases. These ads appear frequently, often after every tap or screen exit, and are sometimes disguised as reward claims, significantly disrupting the gameplay experience.R8R10R48R58
Customer Support negative
Multiple users report poor or non-existent customer support. Issues include unaddressed bug reports, unreceived purchased items, and lack of response to emails, leading to frustration and lost money.R6R9R11R12
Gameplay & Strategy mixed
While many enjoy the game's strategic depth, puzzles, and card-building aspects, some find the progression abrupt or the difficulty unbalanced, especially in later stages. Issues like card point drops and the inability to upgrade artifacts reliably are also mentioned.R1R7R10R13

Who it's for

This game is for players who enjoy strategic card games and puzzles, are willing to invest significant time grinding, or are prepared to spend money on in-app purchases to progress R1R47. It might appeal to those who appreciate detailed game systems and fast-paced gameplay R1R7.

Evidence note: The recent reviews skew heavily negative, particularly regarding loading issues and monetization. While there are positive comments about gameplay, they are fewer and often accompanied by caveats about the aforementioned problems. The lifetime rating of 4.58 suggests a more positive past, but the recent trajectory is clearly negative.

Frequently asked

Is Black Deck a 'pay-to-win' game?
Yes, many recent reviews indicate that Black Deck is heavily 'pay-to-win,' with significant progression barriers for free players and high costs for essential upgrades and legendary cards R2R5R19R27.
Are there many ads in Black Deck?
Yes, Black Deck is criticized for having an excessive number of intrusive pop-up ads for in-app purchases that frequently disrupt gameplay R8R10R48R58.
Does Black Deck have loading issues or crashes?
Yes, many recent reviews report widespread loading errors and crashes, especially after the latest update, preventing users from accessing the game on various iPhone models R21R36R39R42.
How is Black Deck's customer support?
Customer support for Black Deck is frequently described as poor or unresponsive, with users reporting unaddressed bug reports, unreceived purchased items, and a lack of communication R6R9R12R16.

What reviewers actually said

Built only from these 83 real reviews (foreign ones translated). Superscripts jump to the quote here. Apple has no per-review links, so [ref] opens that app's reviews on the App Store.

  1. [R1] 5/5 · US Well balanced and a lot of fun: I enjoy puzzles and systems. The status attacks and buffs are designed so that anyone can be a master keeping this game balanced between power players and pay to win noobs. It really is a lot of fun for a card game.
  2. [R7] 5/5 · US Review: Greatness fast paced and enjoyable
  3. [R10] 3/5 · US Pop ups and power climb.: This is a fun game. I was pleasantly surprised at how in depth it was, when I played it for the first time. However after coming back to it a few times now I have noticed two issues. 1) the power climb is very abrupt. Its like there are two sides to the coin. You either have a deck that is 1-2 thousand power. Or you have a deck at 16-20 thousand power. 2)There are so ma
  4. [R33] 5/5 · US Game I’ve needed: Having a lot of fun! Best way to past the time
  5. [R20] 3/5 · US Good, but money hungry: This game is a lot of fun. I enjoy playing it and building decks. However, there are many aspects of the game that are unneeded, and are just there to make the player want to spend money. For example, why make the armor upgrades fail half the time? It is unnecessary and makes the player run out of gold pretty fast. And even if you did spend money, everything is unreasonably
  6. [R47] 5/5 · US Addicting: I love this game and can’t get enough of it. I’m a free player and I play all the time; which is probably why I have higher leveled cards than some. Yes there are ads, but they can get you stuff if you’re lucky. Join a guild to get free stuff for upgrades, artifacts, etc. This game takes persistence and lots of patience. And do all your quests on the daily! Thanks for an incredible game
  7. [R21] 5/5 · US Problems: Game won’t load since upgrade.
  8. [R36] 3/5 · US It stopped loading ((: When launched, it loads halfway and then nothing happens ((( · translated
  9. [R39] 4/5 · US Game down?: Haven’t been able to get on in two days. Missing my rewards. What’s going on?
  10. [R42] 4/5 · US New Update: The game won’t load after the new update
  11. [R2] 1/5 · US Pay to Win: Avoid this game. You’ll get so far for free. Packs are ridiculous. I miss 90s - 2000s games when you pay for the game. Incels pay to win and fuel these this greed
  12. [R5] 1/5 · US Pay to win: This is a complete pay to win type of game, have spent at least 200 Bucks and it won’t get you anywhere further in the game. Players in arena still way out of range and cost of leveling up your units and heroes are ridiculously high. Save your time and HEARTHSTONE will be a way better game to play.
  13. [R19] 3/5 · US There is too much locked behind $$$: I understand the need for games to have in game purchases, but so much of this game’s progress feels like it’s locked behind payment walls, and the offers don’t make a lot of sense. To be clear, you can play this game without paying anything. But you’ll essentially be locked out of legendary level cards, and epic level cards will be quite hard to come by. G
  14. [R27] 1/5 · US PAY TO WIN: I’m about 100 days in and simply put there is barely any progression anymore. Winning battles are far and in between because if you haven’t spent 100’s of dollars you’re capped. It also seem like they didn’t think about the cost of things just put the highest price they could. If you’re a free player(ad watcher) like me it will be frustrating.
  15. [R8] 2/5 · US It’s fun but the pop ups aren’t.: The amount of pop ups is RIDICULES if a computer had this many pop ups and ads you’d assume it was filled to the brim with malware. Why do that with your game?
  16. [R48] 1/5 · US Gross game in general, genuinely: First of all the monetization is bad even for a mobile game. The amount of pop ups for battle passes and subscriptions and transactions is already annoying enough getting into the game, but they overload you with even more as soon as you hit rank 5. A lot of the pop ups are mixed in with “claim this reward!” Buttons and ads that just look like rewards, but are act
  17. [R58] 3/5 · AU It’s Ok: It’s an ok game to pass the time, has a bunch of irritations but if you can look past them, it’s, well, just “ok”. The sheer amount of ad spam to buy their product every time you click anything is one such example. I don’t need to be spammed on every. Single. Tap. To buy more gems or more energy or more cards. Stop it. There’s an in game shop, if I want something, I’ll go look. Energy i
  18. [R6] 1/5 · US Support not good: I used to play this game a while back and really enjoyed it but when I redownloaded the game to play it says there’s a loading error and to contact support. But I have sent emails to support and never received a response and I still am not able to play game
  19. [R9] 1/5 · US Fraud: Made two back to back purchases and only got one
  20. [R11] 1/5 · US Can’t play on iPhone: Loading error pls contact support that’s all I get. Deleted.
  21. [R12] 1/5 · US Awful Customer Support: Played for a couple weeks. I had a paid top-tier (“Diamond”) subscription, which I just cancelled. A glitch/bug cheated me out of rewards during a limited-time event, I submitted a ticket to Support, they took forever to respond, didn’t actually address my problem, then after a bit of back and forth, basically said everything was fine on their personal account so it wasn’t
  22. [R13] 1/5 · US Artifact upgrades: If you have to spend coins to upgrade the artifacts to begin with it should not be a “chance” of getting the upgrade. I should not have to spend half my coins to move up one level.
  23. [R26] 3/5 · US Fun at the beginning: Very slow progress after the first few hours.
  24. [R3] 1/5 · US Stay away!: The devs are ruining the game with “balance” changes that are just a poorly concealed attempt at fleecing players out of more money. Stay away from this game!
  25. [R28] 2/5 · US Very Money Hungry: In the tournaments you’ll see a dude at 501 and as soon as you use your summon tokens passed 501 to get 1st place. I’m now in 14th place behind a dude that has an impossible amount of points. They force you to spend money which is very dishonest. The highest ranked players are people who put thousands of dollars into the game, and I’m not even kidding.
  26. [R56] 5/5 · AU Good game: The game is really good, I think that there should be a thing where it only lets you fight other people’s cards that are around your decks power level
  27. [R14] 2/5 · US Gear disappeared: The games pretty good but it’s hard capped big time unless you blow money on it and it took gear out of my inventory that I didn’t sell so that’s also kinda bogus
  28. [R18] 1/5 · US Do not play this scam.: Used one of the purchase to get gems through their offer wall. Showed them proof of the purchase and only response I get is “provide more proof” here’s your proof. I will take my numerous dollars I spend on gaming elsewhere. DO NOt waste time on this scam.
  29. [R24] 1/5 · US It has its issues: I really enjoy playing this game , its fun and I love the creativity in it. What I don’t like however is that a few days ago I paid for in app purchase. And never received it and when I messsaged them on support they said they get back to me with in 24-48 hours well it’s been over 72 hours and now support will not respond and I lost my money and never got what I paid for
  30. [R52] 2/5 · AU Game not as advertised: I saw an ad for the game and downloaded it, only to find the actual game isn’t what was advertised, what the ad showed was just a small minigame, I guess included so they can claim it’s not misleading advertising… I wasn’t interested in the game and deleted it because it wasn’t as advertised. The game graphics are nice so it still gets 2/5 stars because I can appreciate it
  31. [R16] 1/5 · US The game is always broken or down: I haven’t been able to load my game for atleast a month if not more. Tried to hit the support button in the loading screen DOESNT WORK or do anything
  32. [R15] 1/5 · US Pay, Just Pay: Why do you ssaholes start paying and when a player likes the game then invest time; developers/apps think f them we are not standing by our commitment to pay. Ssajacks

Synthesized from 83 recent App Store reviews · updated July 2026 · View on the App Store