As with most "sensations" that spring up overnight to become huge money-making machines, the collectible card game market began with a single product: "Magic: The Gathering." This game was to collectible card games what Tomagotchis and Beanie Babies were to the virtual pet and bean-bag toy industries -- i.e., what started it all.

Through the late 1980s, the collectible card industry was relatively small. There were one or two companies that put out cards for different sports leagues (baseball and football being the most popular), and the occasional card series tie-in with a popular movie or television show.

In the early 1990s, however, the card industry exploded, in both the number of companies that put out cards, and the variety of cards that became available. Whereas consumers once had a choice of (maybe) two different brands of football cards, they could now chose from five times as many. Instead of only the biggest moneymaking films getting a set of cards, every film aimed at an audience younger than 30 had card tie-ins. Fantasy and science fiction artists put out card sets of their artwork. Card sets for comic books, television shows, and even upscale "gentlemen's clubs" made the scene.

In 1993, Wizards of the Coast, a then-seven-person company from Renton, Wash., introduced a new concept in collectible cards: a collectible card game. Each card in the "Magic: The Gathering" series represented a different aspect of the game's fantasy world: a character, a creature, an item, a spell, or a land -- and the players were the "Wizards" who controlled them all.

Players started off by buying a "starter deck" of 60 cards, which gave them a broad-enough base of cards to play with. Booster packs of 15 cards could be bought later to supplement a player's deck. Then players squared off against each other in head-to-head or multi-player "combat" to conquer each others' decks.

Part of what made "Magic: The Gathering" so popular was that it was extremely simple, and extremely detailed at the same time. As the official slogan states, to play, "All you need is a brain, a deck, and a friend." Also, since a deck of cards is extremely portable, the game can be played almost anywhere. However, since each player's deck is different, a good player needs to be able to strategize differently each time the game is played, and each game session is different.

What makes "Magic" cards collectible is that some are more rare than others, so players have to "chase" down the better, harder to find cards in the same way baseball card fans chase down cards of the most popular players. Many expansion sets have been added to the "Magic" line, representing creatures places and things in new magical worlds, and there are now more than 1,200 cards available in the game.

As was seen with other "phenomenons" in the toy industry, success is often (and quickly) imitated, and in five short years the collectible card game industry has grown immensely. Although there were a few games based on original concepts (a great example of one is "Jyhad/Vampire: The Eternal Struggle," also by Wizards of the Coast), many of the collectable card games that followed the success of "Magic: The Gathering" were based on pre-existing properties.

Following the sword-and-sorcery lead of "Magic: The Gathering," a card game called "Spellfire" was released, based on the realms of the popular and long-running Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game. (Ironically, Wizards of the Coast eventually bought TSR, the company that owns and produces D&D products). A card game was also produced using J.R.R. Tolkein's Middle Earth mythology, "Middle Earth: The Wizards."

Card games were made based on Japanese cartoons ("Ani-Mayhem" -- notable because it can be played solitaire), Marvel Comics characters ("OverPower"), and a variety of other games (e.g., "BattleTech," "Heavy Gear Fighter," "SimCity," and "Mortal Kombat").

However, the most popular material to base a collectible card game on seems to be sci-fi and fantasy movies and television shows, such as Star Wars, Star Trek, Aliens, Doctor Who, Babylon 5, Hercules: The Legendary Journeys, Highlander, Transformers, Xena: Warrior Princess, and The X-Files. All these properties have card game tie-ins.

With all these products out there, the collectible card game market is getting more crowded, and not every game that is released does as well as hoped. However, the market as a whole seems as healthy as ever, and there is little sign of things letting up any time soon. Collectible card games should be around for a very long time.