Tried out the trial game.
It works as you'd expect. You're basically playing with theme decks, so you're not facing super-complex decisions. The game is clearly designed to introduce beginners to the game, which is a little annoying for veterans, but not a big deal. It's easy enough to turn off the hints they give you.
Not having to tap each land wasn't a problem for me, but you only get mono-color decks in the trial. We'll see how it handles when the three-color decks become available. The AI is competent enough, if a bit conservative and easy to bait.
The real issue is that the game moves pretty slowly. At every phase (first main, combat, attack, block, second main), a three or four second timer goes simultaneously for each player. When a timer is active, a player can press X to pause it and think.
The problem is that sometimes, you don't have anything you can do. But a play of "draw card, play land, pass turn" takes ten or fifteen seconds instead of one. I can understand why the timers exist, and why phases can't pass immediately, but I wish there was a way to speed things up a bit.
I can't imagine the customization options are going to be that wide. You have a number of theme decks, and you can unlock 17 additional cards that you can use to customize those decks. It looks like the cards can only be added to the deck they're unlocked for. I can imagine that, in the future, they'll make more cards available, but this isn't anywhere near the customization depth of actual Magic.
This game seems like a much better introduction (or at least, it's a better value) than just buying a single theme deck and trying to play, but I don't think there's a lot here to hook longtime players looking for a cheaper way back to the game. You may as well just stick with the MTGO trial rooms where you duel with tenth-edition theme decks for free.
