Things were looking up for Kelly Reid, founder of Quiet Speculation, in 2007. His post-college years had been “a total catastrophe,” but he’d finally found a job at a startup he liked and felt like he was getting his act together. He was making decent money — almost enough to live in New York City — and he was learning new tech skills. His employers gave him more responsibility and he began to really thrive. Yeah, all in all, things were starting to look up.

And then the crash of 2008 happened.

“One day I woke up with no job,” Kelly tells Startups.co. “The whole world caught on fire and my entire life was kindling.”

But there was one thing that Kelly Reid still had going for him.

Magic: The Gathering.

Making a game very, very real.

So ther...