Planeswalkers and (Neo)Planeswalkers

So who is a Planeswalker? Where did they come from? How many of them are there in the Multiverse?

Planeswalkers of the past

Ages ago (when I was little) I learned about the term Planeswalker. I got this from a series of books (starting with the artifacts cycle) and not the actual game - Magic: The Gathering

I learned about a planeswalker spark and about a few planeswalkers that had their spark ignited - that's how they became a Planeswalker. Planeswalker as the word suggest is someone with the ability to go from one plane to another in the Multiverse. There is one being with a planeswalker spark out of a million and out of those with the spark they still need to ascend (usually by going through a really stressfull situation - mostly dying).
Planeswalkers are almost immortal, they cannot be killed in a normal way. They have immense magical power and can regenerate and shapeshift at will.

During Time Spiral Block the multiverse 'fabric' started to get ripped apart. Rifts appeared and caused destruction and change in time. The current planeswalkers wanted to mend this and sacrificed their planeswalker spark for this (this means being stripped of their powers becoming mortal or dying in the process).

This meant the end of the planeswalkers as I knew them. The very first new planeswalkers were Venser and Radha.

Planeswalkers nowadays

With Lorwyn being released we have a new card type - Planeswalker. The card represents a character of great magical power but being still mortal.
The old planeswalkers were really scarce and had immense powers, nowadays ones are hardly that powerful and are mortal and the number of new 'walkers is much higher.

There is for example Ajani, Elspeth Tirel, Gideon Jura, Jace Beleren, Nissa Revane, Sorin Markow, Karn, Sarkhan Vol, Kiora, Koth, Tezzeret, Nicol Bolas, Venser, Liliana Vess etc...and maybe some more.

When you read a book about one of them or comics you have the feeling that they have to be idiots and not really being able to control their power fully. At least I have the feeling when reading a new book from the Magic world.

Since Lorwyn WotC uses Planeswalkers as 'the image' of Magic: The Gathering. You see them everywhere and the whole Here I Rule campaign is about 'Becoming a planeswalker'. When you register for a free deck, you'll get it in a box with a Planeswalker. The site is full of them as well and the first promo cards were ..well.. of Planeswalkers.

There are kids coming to our store and ask: 'Do you have some planeswalkers?'. The answer is 'yes'. 'And do you have some [insert color] planeswalkers?'. The answer is once again 'yes' sometimes followed by the list of the names. 'And how much costs [insert planeswalker name]?'. After the kid hears the answer he usually leaves because it costs too much money. And imagine that some of those kids were asking for Jace TMS!!

And then when you ask them if they know what the planeswalkers do, they have NO IDEA about it. They don't even know how the planeswalker card actually works.

So players are planeswalkers, everyone sees planeswalkers everywhere (we also have Gideon, Jace and Chandra - next to Kamahl, Scion of Darkness and Eight-and-a-half-tails) and sees them in the game as well. You know after quite a long time playing UWx with like 12 planeswalkers in a deck by the end of the day I was usually fed up with those cards! Especially with Jace TMS whom I saw like at least 10 times per game (counting both my and opponents' Jace)!

And now we have Planeswalker points! I know it's logical. Players are Planeswalkers so they should gather Planeswalker points.

So nowadays in the 'everyone can become a planeswalker 'world'' the old planeswalkers are forgotten. No one knows who Urza is or who are the Nine Titans. It's a bit sad but that's how it goes.