Hand of Fate 2

I see the promise and it is an interesting combo of cards and fighting. Just too repetitive and combat is very one-dimensional.

Having played Hand of Fate 1 and 2 to completion back to back (over 3 months), I will finally give my proper review of all assets of the game. Note this will judge Hand of Fate 2 in comparison to 1 unlike Hand of Fate 1 to 2, because it should be an improvement. It can't feign ignorance to its history. Summary: 8/10 Hand of Fate 2 is a deck building card-based rogue-lite ARPG like its predecessor. While it lost some of the more interesting features like the character classes from the DLC in Hand of Fate 1, it gained the adventure structure of the narrative and the companion mechanic which upgrades battles and offers a wider variety of strategy. The item depth also expanded and the tedious amount of item slots was reduced. Overall Hand of Fate 2 for the casual player is a major improvement over Hand of Fate 1, especially in the story department. However, the paint comes off when people look closer or want to play skill based like in Hand of Fate 1. Hand of Fate 2 is far less supportive of skill than it first appears and can turn into a grind real fast in Endless Mode. Completionists beware and hardcore players take note, this game is not Hand of Fate 1. Atmosphere: 10/10 Hand of Fate 2 plays a century after Kallas successfully dethroned Valenos as the ruler of fate in the battle of life or death in Hand of Fate 1. Now that Valenos is back from the dead, he plans to remove Kallas from his godly throne as he went the other extreme from Valenos, total extermination of otherkin and mages and brutal subjugation of everyone else that tormented humanity before. Both visions are dystopic for all the guardian of fate doesn't support, as such neither Kallas nor Valenos are in the right. Both are radicals. Yet, now it falls to you if you are remade into a tool for revenge or if you will rise above your puppeteer and become a better guardian of fate once you topple the current ruler of fate. Unlike Kallas which saved humanity from the brink before, you got allies to call you back and support you alongside your journey if you lose your way and your bonds may shape the future of the world; a bond forged so strong along your shared adventures, you may just traverse time and space to save them from their fates. Most of the narrative chapters are in chronological order from the "original timeline", aside of two or three. They also have specific rules beyond basic modifiers like in Hand of Fate 1 and consist of interesting challenges. They are a perfect immersive evolution of the first game. You are however amnesiac to be remade by Valenos and he will show you the world as he imagined it. Be aware that not all is how it seems. Especially for those that knew the cruelty of Hand of Fate 1, the way sympathy is garnered for the otherkin and mages who are very human in Hand of Fate 2, but were absolute monsters when in power in Hand of Fate 1 is an astounding commentary on tribal views and agendas between who controls the machine. The very fact that goblin town and the empire of humanity mostly share a friendly trade relationship despite the war on otherkin also stems from the good relationship of Kallas and the goblins in Hand of Fate 1. Neither side is truly demonic and all have their reasons and all lost their path. Follow them as the world descends into chaos once again. The story takes some interesting turns and if read between the lines will fascinate people for years to come if they are willing to indulge in it. Even the endless mode is build like an ongoing adventure with chained campaigns in a great narrative construct... which sadly suffers later on from enemy spam, bullet sponge fights and many crashes due to the game being unable to handle its own massive overuse of enemy spam. The only downturn of the atmosphere is the character creator. Some additional choices get unlocked only as you do card challenges, at which point you likely settled on a character design. A design that is VERY basic and simple and has little customization. This self-insert protagonist part was mostly pointless and misses its mark entirely. A personality like Kallas in Hand of Fate 1 carried much more weight, even as a silent protagonist. Still the atmosphere is so good, this does not detract from the rating. Gameplay: 6.5/10 Oh dear, where did Hand of Fate 2 go wrong? For most people that come from Hand of Fate 1, this game is a shock to the system. The character is actually animation locked and will be hit if they execute an action that used up their time-window action slot. A lot of hits from unblockable attacks (red) which are very fast, like imperial generals will feel unrewarding. Several executions that get a hit from a random enemy starting after you started will also feel unrewarding. Players are told green attacks can be parried, yet the only combination that can parry a knight lords triple combo is a sword and shield, otherwise the third hit breaks through. Overall Hand of Fate makes a lot of things right. The companion system with their own strength is great. If you prefer to disarm enemy abilities, the Goblin Hubbie will distract them so much, Necromancer forget to bubble shield and shamans forget to frost teleport away and shielded units don't counter-attack. If you prefer damage support, Veles can murder the weak units while you take down the threats. All works well if one can look past the animation lock mechanic. However, with companions there also are new enemies and one was introduced with Ironpeak. The bane of endless runs and the insanity of everyone whoever wanted to played flawless is the "Poisoner of Greed". This thief unit teleports randomly and places a poison container with unlimited range and insta-hit on the player. You will get hit and lose your combo unless you instantly are on their spot to hit the thing in the 0.25 seconds before it begins to tick. It is a horrible design for skill-based players and forces an aggressive playstyle even in giant dangerous enemy swarms that can be unhealthy. Worse, this unit is spammed in lategame endless mode. It is part of every Shadow (vampire) encounter beyond adventurer 15 guaranteed as well and will be in every thief campaign and will torment wild encounters. It is more annoying than thunder AE mages and life-leeching shades or 4 armored knight lords... even worse than 2-3 brimstone ogres. This game does not play fair and has utterly imbalanced combinations. At the same time stunlock is your friend. Unlike Hand of Fate 1 that had upgraded the lizardmen to break stunlocks with counters, you can stunlock ogres in 2-3 groups. Once stunned and out of frame, an ogre will not recover from the stun. So you can stun 1-2 and kill the third in stunlock. Stunlock, stunlock, strength is no dismay; sunlock, stunlock, every fight fairplay. Is it fun? Yes, very much so until endless mode beyond adventure 10-15. Endless mode ruins any love you may have for this gameplay system. I only went to 30k (25k needed for the achievement) and many did the same. This puts me at #21 on the global leader board. Endless mode in Hand of Fate 1 has hundreds of people playing on forever for fun. Hand of Fate 2 endless mode despite the more fun presentation was choked to death this hard by its grindy, bullet sponge, unfair, skill-hating setup. People don't want to play it endlessly... think about it. It is so unfair and hard, while taking 15-20 hours for a 25k attempt, that people tune out the moment they hit the challenge mark. A 30 level run in the skill-rewarding Hand of Fate 1 for the achievement takes you 2-3 hours. It's a huge difference! The team overcompensated HoF 1. Sound and Music: 7.5/10 Much better than its predeccessor, but still repetive, especially due to the longer gameplay in endless mode, the music and sound design takes much of Hand of Fate 1 and adds to it. It doesn't reinvent the wheel, but it improved it. So it is better than Hand of Fate 1. Still, consider Youtube or Spotify on long grind sessions.