Hand of Fate: Hordes recently arrived in Early Access, bringing deck-building, story elements, and games of chance to the crowded bullet heaven genre. GamingOnLinux published an early look at the PC release, detailing how the title diverges from traditional survivor-like video games.
Quick Facts
- Platform: PC (native Linux version reported running smoothly on SteamOS Steam Machine)
- Release Date: July 22, 2026 (Early Access)
- Genre: Bullet heaven / survivor-like with deck-building and games of chance
Gameplay and Pacing Findings
While basic combat follows standard survivor-like mechanics—running around while abilities auto-fire and collecting experience orbs to pick power-up cards—the overall pacing differs significantly from genre peers. According to the reported impressions, Hand of Fate: Hordes is considerably slower due to constant interruptions from quests, encounters, and interactive objects like Shrines, Wells, and Chests.
Players must stand in designated circles to trigger events, which then utilize dice rolls or card shuffling to determine rewards or failures. Food can be spent to retry failed chances, while food and gold collected during runs are used for camping, healing, and purchasing upgrades between excursions.
Player Fit and Performance Caveats
Review findings indicate that the game suits players who enjoy the concept of bullet heavens but find typical entries too chaotic. The inclusion of a chatty narrator, quality enemy animations—such as bomb skeletons cowering before explosions—and a well-scaled UI that remains clear on handheld or living-room hardware earned praise.
However, critics of the current Early Access build point out that the meta-upgrade system feels overly safe and straightforward, relying on standard increases to max health, speed, and health regeneration rather than more exciting unlocks. Developers have outlined plans to expand the game during Early Access with additional heroes, cards, enemies, encounters, progression systems, game modes, and narrative content.