Why I like pre-release events.
I do not enjoy Commander. I know that's the way everyone likes to play these days and what most of the events are. The whole reason it's played so readily is because you can use your older cards from a much wider pool than standard. I know about Pioneer, Pai Gow, Modern, Pauper, etc. I don't have any friends that play them. Everyone plays Commander.
Now, I do have Commander decks. I have an enhanced Mrs Bumbleflower, Tidus, and Tatyova, Benthic Druid landfall deck. In a perfect world I would have Standard decks with these cards and mechanics I like so much. But Standard has a narrow window of sets that are allowed in it. The cards are also just as expensive as they are in Commander, and have to be replaced more often unless a new set reprints them.
Right now I only play Standard in Arena. For a while I had one of those evil Red/White aggro decks where you threw Monsterous Rage on Heartfire Hero every few minutes because there were four of each in your deck. But because this is all virtual I could make them out of the free rare/uncommon tokens they give you in the game. I don't pay to play arena but it's the one I play the most because the format is the most accessible.
During covid Magic switched all the pre-release events to Arena. You could pay how ever many in game coins to sign up and do a pre-release kit just like you do now at the shop but instead of a card shop it's in my living room on the iPad. I miss that they don't do that anymore. But we do go to most prerelease events at the shop in town.
We just got back from the Marvel pre-release. There was a descent turn out. Some people were there early opening $600 collector booster boxes. Some people were there who had been there since they opened playing commander and opening $200 play boxes. A pre release kit used to be $35, but now they are $48 or more depending on the set. These new UB sets end up with a lower turn out so it's easier to play.
One of the reasons I like it is because 1. It's sealed so it doesn't take 2 hours for all 30 of us to draft it, and 2. The cards are new enough that even the veterans have to stop and analyze what they are doing. If the cards are well known then the veteran players will know exactly what to pick to win. Having new stuff and a limited pool to use makes it a more even playing field.
If it were a constructed standard event I would need to go buy $500 more in staple cards to finish putting together one of the meta decks online that everyone uses in tournaments in order to even compete. That's not cool. In college we played from a pool of random Onslaught and older cards that were kept in a shoe box. We went to Walmart and bought like 3 Core Set booster packs and every card was an amazing thing to be cherished. Now I rip open a case of play boosters and toss the commons/uncommons in a giant cardboard box that will never leave it.
Playing a pre-release feels as close to what that those old games of Magic felt like.
I can deal with Wanda and Thor cards if I can have fun.
Spiderman not so much. If they made a kids version of Magic with Marvel characters I'd be way cooler with that.