Nutmeg is a new soccer deckbuilder that's a blast from my past in all the best ways

I walk around at recess like I'm Don Corleone, huge wad of duplicate soccer stickers held together by an old elastic band; the true currency of the playground. I gather a group of hungry collectors. Cries of "Got. Got. Need. Got. NEED!" add fuel to the frenzy as people notice I have not one, but two shiny Jordi Cruyff stickers up for grabs. I am a god. Nutmeg has transported me back to a better time, and maybe it can for you, too.

It's been a long time since then (longer than I'd care to mention, really), but there is still a part of me that craves the thrill of the sticker chase, so to say my face lit up when I saw that there was a deckbuilder based around the niche soccer sticker scene of my youth would be an understatement.

Nutmeg is a management game centered around '80s and '90s soccer, with a deckbuilding twist. The teams and the players within are designed to look like old-school soccer stickers, and your base of operations is the most '90s PC you've ever seen. There's also a demo available right now, which I, of course, played immediately.

I'm given a few different scenarios to play through, the first being Oxford vs KPR. Some official names aren't available, but for anyone who played as Merseyside Blue in Pro Evo for years, this only adds to the retro experience. The players appear to be present and correct, and I'm free to change up my formation and tactics before kickoff by swapping the stickers in my little book. It's all very charming, I'm so in.

The true deckbuilding experience kicks in when the match begins and each team attempts to make its way up the pitch, ultimately, with any luck, scoring a goal. I use some of the many tactics cards at my disposal to influence play, like adding a percentage chance to a shot, for instance.

For a game that boils soccer down to what is essentially text on a screen, Nutmeg manages to capture the back and forth of a real match, the drama of a late goal, and even the nail-biting finish of a penalty shootout. I found myself gobbling up each of the scenarios available in the demo in one go.

The career mode, I feel, is where Nutmeg will shine, and I can't wait to fill up my sticker books with Everton - sorry, Mersey Blue - legends. The demo for Nutmeg is available now over on its Steam page. Annoyingly for me, the full release date is still TBA, but this is one I'll be keeping an eye on for sure.

If you're looking for something to fill your time before Nutmeg is released, we have a guide covering the best soccer games you can play right now, or even the best management games if you're after something with a bit more nuance.

Who was your favorite player in the '90s? Let us know over on the PCGamesN community Discord so we can disagree immediately.