Best 2 player card game of it's kind
584557
I have played Magic the Gathering and other collectible/living card games.  This is by far my favorite.  I would give this a try if you like two player competitive play.  The asymmetric game play paired with its rich theme make this a winner and a must try for any gamer.
510469
This is a fun card game for 2 players.  Basically you take turns going back and forth either buying or selling (but never both) each turn until one player amasses enough points to win the round, and the winner of the game is best 2 out of three rounds.  I really like the card art, and I like how the game plays, not too complicated, but with enough strategy to keep it interesting.  The big thing about this game is the decision each round to buy or sell.  At first, its pretty obvious, you want to buy to get some good cards, BUT, the first person to buy into each set of goods gets most of the high point markers, so just waiting one turn could cost you a lot of points.  Each turn you don't buy is another turn your opponent can buy and take a huge lead, but at the same time, each turn you buy means another couple of turns building your hand back up so that you can buy again.  Fun game, I don't think its one you master right off the bat.
2213976
This game was purchased for my 10 year old nephew, he really enjoys card games.  We have found that it is most fun with about four people.  With only two it doesn't offer much of a challenge, but the images on the cards are hard to make out if you have a larger group around the table.  Our family has several other games from the folks who make this one and they are all great.
4479478
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With 2 players this is great. There's some competition for cards and you can easily remember or see the other persons tomb to snatch cards from them, but collecting sets is still very easy and the game flows nicely. Only minus I guess is that there's too much cards for both, so the competition is not that fierce, although I suspect with more players people would specialize even more, since it's more important to get to a high number of the same set than to block someone a bit. In 2 players blocking someone of a card is more beneficial since he/she is your only opponent. All in all, I haven't played 3 or 4, but I would love to try them. I suspect 4 could be pushing it in terms of competition, but maybe 3 would be 'best' here?

Final Thoughts

Ok, I really like deck building in general, but there are so many deck builders out at the moment and not all of them are good. I've also gotten kind of bored to Dominion. My favourites are Legendary Alien, Xenoshyft and Star Realms at the moment, but I have to say Valley of the Kings could really be up there. I love the theme and it will be easier to teach to many people because of the theme, it feels different with the entombing and it's an attractive small package you can play anywhere and easily take with you. One of my favourite things in a deck builder is the ability to thin your deck and here it's built into the rules!(just like Xenoshyft in which I LOVE the ability to turn in Xenosathem and troops for discounts/better cards)The game is also cheap compared to the amount of game in it, so I can't really say anything bad about this so far. Thanks to Tom Cleaver for a unique and very interesting deck builder!
2270708
Really like this game, even when playing the two player version.
3867125
The best card game I've played so far. Simple to learn. Lots of playing possibilities. Very entertaining. The wife and I love playing this at least once a week.
3353770
Family really enjoys playing this, which is not true of most tabletop games. You'll start seeing cards over again when playing with a single deck, but adding a 2nd deck greatly expands the variety and replayability.
4118593
If you like cards, and if you like games, you should check this out. It combines both cards and games flawlessly to make what I am calling a "card game." Legendary Showdown's gameplay is not entirely new. It plays kind "War" with buffs and debuffs thrown into the mix, but the quality of the art and cards themselves is outstanding, and the outlandish elements of the webcomic lend themselves nicely to card game form. It's now my go-to geek game.
1679880
So much fun for a two player table top game. It's definitely a must buy for any card game strategy lover. The best thing about Pixel Tactics is the even playing field. Although I would say that the Heart of the Cards does help as well when drawing your hand (YuGiOh reference :P).
4607613
This is a fun two player, or multi player, deck game.  Each character plays differently, while rules and cards a pretty standard cross deck, it the mix of the cards that make the character.  Two play levels: turn based or Play your cards at will.  Mix of random, strategy and memory/prediction.  Not a deck building game.
2149279
I bought this game last September 2012 for my daughters birthday, and we've played it enough that I have a pretty good feel for its entertainment value. This is easily one of the best card games I have bought for my family. We've played it far and away the most of anything else. Another game we got for Christmas 2012 might catch up to it, but Loot is still the favorite.

The basic goal of the game is to capture the merchant ships of the highest values. Nested into that simple goal is a very complex, yet highly intuitive capture system. While a younger player might need to be coached a bit on bigger strategy, it is easy enough to understand that younger children can learn to play quickly.

In the ship capture system, each player has a chance to fight for the ship by playing pirates of a specific color (there are 4). Once a color is played then no other player can play that color on that ship, but they can play that color on other ships. So a player needs to manage their cards well. If they have a ton of green cards then they might want to hold onto them to fight over a high value ship rather than waste them on lower value ones.

On the other hand, I've seen games where the player who consistently fights over lower value ships wins because the sheer number of ships they capture, even at low values, adds up to a lot of points over the whole game. You have to watch what other players are doing and act accordingly.

Trump cards are also in available in the form of Pirate Captains (one of each four colors) for offense, and a single Admiral for defense. All cards are drawn randomly from the deck, so it is possible for a player to never get a trump card or for a player to get most of them. While the overall game needs strategy to win, the acquisition of the pirate captains/admiral is very much luck.

We play it a lot, and it's been quite fun. After six months the cards are still in great shape.
3810420
My husband and I are almost obsessed with the Settlers of Catan card game!  We play a few times a week.

Start off with the basic game and then add the expansions once you get the hang of it.  Our favorite expansion is definitely Barbarians and Traders.  Once you're hooked on the card game, it's really hard to transition to the board game.  I find the card game to be much more intricate and dynamic.

If you're looking for a 2-player game, then LOOK NO FURTHER.  Catan is simply the best game we've ever played.  Nothing else comes close.
521988
This has usurped Dominion as my favorite deckbuilder.  And - it's cheap!  (Don't buy it for less than $15, max.  Amazon regularly carries it for around $11).

For those that don't know what a deckbuilder is - it means both players start with the same cards in their (very small) starting deck, and have to purchase cards (with in-game money as part of their game turn, not real money) from a communal "pot" of cards that will constantly refresh.  Those cards will go into the player's deck, making their deck bigger and more powerful.

Star Realms has a sci-fi theme at its core, which I do enjoy.  It has two resources at its core - money and "authority" (health).  Unlike in a lot of deckbuilders, you are actually attacking your opponent in this one.  If your health is reduced to zero, you lose.  All cards cost money, and there's two varieties of cards you can purchase.  You can purchase ships or stations.  Ships are played once to get their effect, then they go into your discard pile to be shuffled back into your cards.  Stations, however, stay in play until they are destroyed.  They have their own health points, and you get their effects every single turn that they stay in play.  Some stations even act as walls, forcing your opponent to destroy the station before they can hurt you again.  Once destroyed, they go in your discard pile to come back out again later that game.

Another mechanic that I greatly enjoyed were the various "fleets".  Every ship belongs to one of four factions - Blobs, Machines, Federation, and the Empire.  Really, the four factions are Red, Yellow, Blue, and Green.  Each ship and station has a certain colored symbol on their card, and most of them have an additional, extra-powerful effect if they are played with another ship or station of the same faction.  It encourages players to put some strategy into their decks and focus on a couple factions (I find two is the sweet spot, but every player has their own take on it) instead of just buying whatever.

The game itself will take about 20 minutes once you're familiar with the rules and the various effects - probably 40 or so for your first couple of games.  Very easy to set up and clean up.

This deck works for two players ONLY - but there are a ton of multiplayer rules.  Just pick up a second set and you can do four players, or a third set and you can do six.

Ultimately, this is a very easy deckbuilding game to teach, fantastic for two player, and is well worth the money.
2861457
This is one of my favorite card games right now.  It is easy to introduce to anyone that has played games like rook, spades, or hearts.  It is one of my go to games when  choosing a game to play with nongamers.

The jewels in the game give it a nice feel, and step up in quality.  The card quality is also above standard and provides you with something that can take many plays.

I feel confident in recommending this game to most anyone.
2327087
This is a quick and easy "filler" game for 2-10 players (it says 3 on the box, but that's a misprint; the instructions say 2-10). My wife and I quite enjoy playing this in the evenings when I get home from work. This and Skip-Bo are her favorite card games, followed by Phase 10. "6 nimmt!" is German for "6 takes!" literally. Each player is dealt 10 cards at setup, and then 4 cards are laid out on the table, each starting their own row. During play, each player will choose a card from their hand, laying it face down on the table. When everyone has laid out a card, they'll simultaneously turn it over. The player with the lowest card will play their card first, placing it next to the card on the table whose value most closely matches and is less than the card played. If the player's card is the sixth card to be played on one of the rows, they must take the first 5 cards that were placed, and leave their own as the start of a new row. Hence: 6 takes it! If the card being played, however, is lower, than the last card of any row, the player takes all the cards from the row of their choice, and places their card as the start of a new row.
1147707
Great game for four players (no good if you don't have four). Relatively easy to learn, lots of game time before you master, though. Easy to recommend to card game lovers.
3014423
A great two player staple in my game closet. Simple to learn and play.