A little history
In April of 1997, MicroProse published the very first digital version of Magic: The Gathering. In addition to the cards sourced from Unlimited, 4th edition, Arabian Nights, Antiquities, Legends, and The Dark, 12 new cards would be also be included.
This “semi-expansion”1 titled Astral would include cards containing random effects. The cards would be split amongst the colors, with each color receiving two cards, with the remaining two cards consisting of an artifact and a land. While novel, the random elements prevent them from being playable in physical form. At least, until now…
An interesting anecdote
In January of 2026, one of the original designers of “Shandalar” wrote in an AMA posted on /r/Shandalar, that prior to Wizards of the Coast involvement, the cards in the Astral expansion were designed to be playable in a normal game of magic.2
The journey
Upon reading this, I was intrigued and set about getting some more information.
I replied to the comment and surprisingly received a list of notes explaining the original abilities of each card. With these notes in hand, I set about reconstructing the set.
I spent a few days going back and forth, trying to fit the original intent of each card into modern mtg templating and upscaling the original source artwork from the video game. Eventually, I had something I felt worthy of sharing.
The Cards
While the cards display in greyscale, each is a full color image suitable for printing as proxies using services such as MPC. They are free for you to use, as I can only accept claim of any mistakes.
