Hand Of Fate 2 Review

Hand of Fate 2 Review – Nostalgia and Frustration is in the Cards

GAME INFO

Hand of Fate 2

Nov 7, 2017

Platform PC (Windows, Mac, Linux), Xbox 1, PlayStation 4

Publisher Defiant Development

Developer Defiant Development

Video games long ago freed RPGs from the confines of the kitchen table, but some would argue something vital was lost along the way. The intimacy, unpredictability, and the friendly animosity between Player and Dungeon Master. There's a reason people still break out the graph newspaper and 20-sided dice even when at that place are much more technologically-advanced roleplaying options bachelor.

The Paw of Fate games endeavour to combine that classic RPG entreatment with more modern elements. Your adventures are literally laid out on a tabular array by a shadowy card-dealing DM, but you also appoint in real-fourth dimension hack 'n' slash combat and other distinctly video-gamey things. Is Hand of Fate 2 a successful melding of onetime and new? Or should the game be thrown on the discard pile?

As mentioned, Hand of Fate 2 pits you confronting the Dealer, who builds mildly-randomized quests, called "challenges," using cards. They're bundled on the table in different configurations and each turn you move 1 space, flip the card you lot landed on, and deal with any it throws at you. You lot may have to engage in a little "Choose Your Own Hazard" determination making, accept function in a game of chance, or disharmonism with a pack of baddies. Every bit you lot make your mode through the cards, you'll also need to keep a close eye on your health, money, food enshroud, and level of fame.

Each challenge is partly made up of its own unique cards, but before embarking you also cull your boxing companion and a selection of encounter and equipment cards from your own deck. In theory, this gives you some control over how challenges play out, but, specially at commencement, the effect is rather limited. The cards sectional to each challenge are always the most important, and your deck simply isn't varied plenty alter things in an interesting fashion.

Typically, I'd just choose the nigh manifestly beneficial/powerful cards repeatedly. Why include, say, the Raiders Ambush card that may help or damage me, when I could just stick with the Arm Wrestling card that's piece of cake to win at and pays a ton of aureate every time? It just didn't feel similar there was a lot of strategy to card choice. At least, not at outset. Every fourth dimension yous complete a challenge, you're awarded new cards and eventually your deck swells to the size where choosing cards becomes a flake more interesting. Even then, there still a lot of powerful, purely-benign cards you'd be a fool to exit out.

Challenges are initially fairly straightforward just quickly become more artistic. You lot may accept to search for relics in a vast wilderness, deduce the identity of a would-be assassin, or gather resources to defend a fort from a barbarian horde. Some challenges aren't so much creative, every bit they are sadistic – the less said about the one that starts you off with only 10 health points, the amend. Hand of Fate 2 manages to convey an impressive array of unlike narratives with just a few cards strewn across a virtual table.

While I admired the ingenuity of Paw of Fate ii'south various challenges, I didn't always enjoy playing through them that much. Well-nigh the game'due south events include an element of chance -- a random card selection, ringlet of the dice, or blind decision. The consequences for failure are often nasty. Sometimes there's no way to avoid punishment. Don't like that your dumbass character just ate poison berries and permanently lost 25 percentage of his health? Also bad! One time you larn the correct choices and strategy for each encounter you'll exist able to squeak by, but it may take a while to get there.

Hand of Fate two'south frustration gene is only compounded by its gainsay. Several times per challenge you'll be whisked away to various 3D arenas, where you'll exam your mettle against packs of enemies. The boxing system is unproblematic enough – you can assail, dodge, block, counterattack, shield bash, activate you or your companion'south special move, and take out stunned enemies with a gory finisher. Imagine if Batman: Arkham Asylum looked kind of janky and didn't handle particularly well, and y'all'll have a expert sense of what you're in for. Arkham-manner gainsay requires split-2d timing, and Paw of Fate 2's laggy, unresponsive controls aren't up to the task. Whether or not your block or counterattack registers is pretty much a crap shoot, and enemies beloved to swarm you and attack from behind.

The combination of randomness and uninspired combat means you lot'll be dying a lot in Mitt of Fate 2, and when you do, you'll have to restart your current challenge from scratch. Played almost all the way through and died fighting the dominate? Sorry, that'southward 40 minutes of your life wasted. Worse, with the occasional exception, near cards are just gained by fully finishing a challenge. At that place aren't a lot of options for grinding or improving through defeat. You lot tin attempt to take on a dissimilar challenge, just if all the available options are merely as difficult (as they oft are), you may find yourself banging your head against the wall, hoping for a lucky run and then you lot tin can finally expand your deck. The feeling of growth y'all get from a good RPG is lacking – as I congenital my deck I didn't necessarily feel whatsoever more powerful.

Hand of Fate 2 delivers around a couple dozen challenges, which took me well-nigh 20 hours to play through. Unfortunately, the game started to feel similar a slog well before I reached the stop. The game's uninspired story didn't help matters. Some individual character moments or bits of saucy dialogue are enjoyable, but the overall plot, focused on a loosely-sketched conflict between a powerful Empire, northern raiders, and night magic wielders, is by-the-book fantasy stuff. The meta-story isn't any more compelling – the game is rather vague about why you lot're participating in the Dealer's twisted game until most the end. It's difficult to care nearly a game if you lot don't know what yous stand to win.

This review was based on a PC copy of Hand of Fate two provided by publisher Defiant Evolution.

6.0

Hand of Fate 2 captures some old-school RPG charm, simply deals a few too many bad cards in the process. The game'due south highly-seasoned premise is marred by unsatisfying progression, punishing randomness, and clunky combat. Cornball RPG fans volition find things to appreciate here, only given the popularity and multifariousness of bodily tabletop gaming these days, it's hard to fully recommend the half-stacked Hand of Fate 2.