What does remove all creatures from the game do in Magic the Gathering?

[kyle]

Hi,

I am new to MTG.

One thing that seems confusing to me looking at the cards and the instructions is about removing creatures from the game. What is the difference between that and between just killing them?

Thanks

[jared]

Where creatures are killed, they go to the graveyard. Discarding a card also sends it to the graveyard.

There are many spells that let you access the graveyard in some way- for example to return a creature from the graveyard to your hand.

When a creature is "removed from the game" however, it is more difficult to access. Not that many cards let you interact with creatures that are removed from the game.

Think of it as 2 different zones in the game: The graveyard, which while is still out of play, can be often accessed by certain spells, and by contrast there is the "removed from game" zone where the cards are harder to access.