The concept of risk and reward lies at the very core of Hand of Fate, as the impact of your minimal decisions take their toll on every step of progress you make. Do you give some of your food to villagers and risk your own starvation? Is it worth helping an injured civilian retrieve his belongings from a group of vicious bandits? Every small decision could cost you health, gold or resources, but you will ultimately dig deeper and deeper regardless of the abundant risks because of the gameplay’s addictive nature. This dangling carrot is what makes Hand of Fate such a lovably old school role playing adventure, combining mechanics both old and new into accessible yet deceivingly in-depth experience.
Hand of Fate is an unorthodox combination of tried and true tabletop gaming fused with third person combat that feels like it was ripped straight from an Arkham title, albeit with significantly less depth. Before you begin playing you are tasked with assembling a deck with cards consisting of monsters, towns and all kinds of unpredictable scenarios that make every session feel varied and tense, even if some repetitious patterns begin to surface over time. At any moment a trap could be sprung on you, hindering you with a curse that will have you desperately praying for a nearby priest or merchant. Vendors such as this can heal you of these ailments, for a price. Occasionally you have the opportunity to purchase equipment and spells from merchants you encounter. But be careful when allocating your gold as you never know when you may need to splurge in an attempt to restore your health or remove a deadly curse. The sheer number of card combinations available to you is overwhelming at times. I spent several minutes before certain games assembling a suitable deck, but often I went with the recommended setting that provided enough variety and challenge to keep me truly invested.
A mysterious and oftentimes cryptic card dealer lies at the centre of this ordeal, sitting across from you as he guides you through your adventure, but he is powerless in influencing what exactly you encounter. His enigmatic composure as he lays out your cards whilst spitting ambiguous lyrical verses that loosely narrate your actions are almost hypnotizing in their execution. He will even make a playful joke if your decisions take too long, giving his foreboding demeanour a much needed bit of personality. He has the power to bless you with resources or take them away at a moment’s notice. This solidifies his identity as a maniacally twisted dungeon master, despite what little power he truly has over where each card will take or inflict upon you. His dialogue does begin to loop quite quickly however; along the environments combat takes place in. This somewhat ruins the illusion that your character is adventuring through a vast land, when you fight three identical goblins in the same cave several times in a row.
Moving across the playing field is simple; you select a card and head in that particular direction. Each move means you lose a piece of food, deterring you from deviating away from the expectant path. Although risking vital resources could result in some fantastical rewards. You could always stumble upon a particular weapon that can so easily sway the tide of a difficult battle, but there is an equal chance of walking into an ambush that you have no hope of escaping from. Such an aura of unpredictability kept me coming back again and again, even after several bitter defeats at the hands of relentless lizard men. At times the sequence of cards you turn over can feel unfair, almost as if you had little chance of succeeding with failure being nothing but an inevitable conclusion. It is easy to become overwhelmed by a large number of enemies. More formidable foes such as lumbering mutant lizards and poison wielding rats are likely to ambush you with attacks that are both impossible to counter and deal fatal damage. These annoyances fade away as you obtain better equipment and in some ways attribute to the palpable tension to accompany every overturned card you hesitantly come across.
Combat is unexpectedly simplistic and requires little skill to succeed once you master its limited mechanics. Your main attack is mapped to the X button, whilst your counter is reached by using Y, and beyond that there is very little you need to utilise in order to come out on top. Certain weapons and armour sets come equipped with specialised abilities that can be activated, but these are helpful additions rather than a necessity for taking down enemies. Battles take place in confined areas that are determined by the cards that describe both your location and the veritable beasties you are up against. Some stages may be lined with deadly traps that are a danger to both you and your enemies, meaning you can easily lure them to their death if you happen to be low on health. This environmental interaction is a godsend due to the generic combat that would easily grow stale if it weren’t for the constantly changing scenarios. I understand that a more complex combat system would have clashed with the intricacy of the role playing mechanics, but I can’t help but feel it could have been something more. Perhaps multiple classes would have alleviated the monotony, as character customisation is almost non-existent here.
The story mode is split in between dozens of scenarios that task with you with defeating a single opponent. You could be up against a barbaric bandit clan leader or a cleaver wielding lizard monster, the variety of encounters here is impressive to say the least. On the other side of the coin is Endless Mode, which is exactly what it sounds like. You build up a score the longer you manage to survive, but unlike the previous mode the dealer throws out handicaps at the end of each turn. This forces you to adapt to a slowly increasing challenge, making your decisions more important than ever. The wider variety of cards you have obtained the more fun this mode ends up being, as you won’t find yourself repeating the same cards as often as you would in the campaign-based scenarios. The modes on offer here do leave a little to be desired, but I consistently found myself coming back for another round. Instilling that “just one more go” feeling I absolutely adore.
Hand of Fate is an excellent role playing adventure that comes packed with enough variety and challenge to keep you entertained for hours, but cracks begin to show once you wear out its uninspired combat mechanics and somewhat limited scope in terms of its execution. Although that didn’t stop this card based adventure for being an absolute joy to play. It provides abundance in classical role playing tropes and replayability that are bound to bring out the inner nostalgic nerd in any gamer. Or at least it did in me, echoing memories of fighting imaginary dragons in my back garden as a child. Anything that can replicate something so precious is easily worth a draw. (CARD PUN!)