Hordes of Fate : A Hand of Fate Adventure Interview: Cade Franklin Talks Genre Shift, Fan Community, and More

A new adventure from the original creative team (and much loved around here!) Hand of Fate series, deckbuilding meets auto-shooter with Spitfire Interactive and Defiant Development’s Hordes of Fate : A Hand of Fate Adventure.

Gamers Heroes recently sat down with Spitfire Interactive Creative Director Cade Franklin to discuss Hordes of Fate : A Hand of Fate Adventure, touching upon this truly unique genre shift, the fan community, and more – learn more with our interview.

Hordes of Fate : A Hand of Fate Adventure Interview: Cade Franklin Talks Genre Shift, Fan Community, and More

Gamers Heroes

Before we begin, I wanted to say I got a chance to check out the demo!

Absolutely love it – we’re huge fans of both Hand of Fate titles. 

I presented the idea of Hordes of Fate to our Editor-in-Chief, and he said that’s an interesting direction to take. I told him I’m going to give it a shot, I did, and I loved it!

Cade Franklin

It’s funny, because it was actually the idea of the game was actually suggested by one of our programmers. 

He had been playing heaps of Vampire Survivors and Deep Rock Galactic, and was like “Hand of Fate would be great for this!”

I was like, “I’m not sure, I’m skeptical.”

I think that going in with that skepticism was good for us, because it had us make sure this is going to work.

I actually really enjoy playing the game! I spend most of my afternoons just playing and getting a sense of it all. 

Gamers Heroes

Leaving it to fate, if you will! 

(Sorry, I love dad jokes.)

It sounds like you’re a fan too, which is fantastic. And I know you mentioned Vampire Survivors. Was there anything else that kind of sparked it? 

The Hand of Fate games were revolutionary deckbuilders – and fairly new at the time. 

Was there something that said, “I have to do this,” or a title that inspired you? Was there maybe an element you wanted to pull that you really wanted to implement? 

Cade Franklin

I’ve played a heap of games – I think it wasn’t that one thing, like I want to do what those guys are doing. 

What I saw was that there’s a huge space for something new – for us coming from the Hand of Fate angle, it was an opportunity to do something with the encounters and the text adventure side of things.

The fact that we’ve got this Dealer who you ask: 

“Is he on your side? Is he not? He’s talking to you and kind of taunting you, but also encouraging you?”

I thought that there was kind of this angle that we could have that hadn’t really been explored in this genre and in the space, there definitely have been titles that have elements of these things. 

It was really cool to see!

One example that comes to mind was Death Must Die has little text encounters that you can interact with along the way – that gave me confidence!

At the very least we could do what they’re doing, which is more or less presenting me with a couple of options and an outcome. 

From there we said: “Maybe we can do something with this.”

We’ve been nervous about how far we can push that, because obviously the emphasis is making a survival-like autoshooter roguelike game. How long can you take the players time away from that? 

There’s a balance to be had for sure, but I think that was the thing that excited me. 

I was like, “I think we can do something new and fresh!”

Hopefully people who are into this genre will still really like this game, and the people who love Hand of Fate will also get a kick out of it as well.

Gamers Heores

On that same note, I’m sure you’ve had a lot of great runs throughout development. 

You said you played the game quite a bit. I can tell you right now that Lightning Crash was my savior during my time.

Were there any types of strategies that kind of rose to the top, or moments where you were like:

“You know what? Those Hordes of Skulls, I have to find a way to get around those right away!”

Cade Frankin

It’s funny for me – I always try to pick the least powerful stuff!

As a developer, I know those things are good, but then I ask myself: 

“Can I do it with the blades, or this, or that?”

For me, I get a kick out of that! 

I guess I’m playing this for the Nth time; I’ve played a lot, so I’m trying to push it to the limit, and scraping through when you know all the ins and outs.

I think you know: The thing that I really like – and I think that is somewhat unique to what we do – is our Enchantment system. 

At the moment with what’s in the demo, it really leans into the Trickster – the character you’re playing – load out kit. They kind of have two branches in their tech; there’s effectively a tech tree in a way. 

Do you go fully defensive with this defensive stuff, or do you go the garlic kind of approach from  Vampire Survivors? Which side of that do you want to play it on? 

And similarly, with the missiles, do you want to go absolute destruction, or just raining missiles? 

I think the thing for me is you never know necessarily what you’re going to get when the cards come out. That’s what’s kind of fun for me; each run can feel a bit different.

You can push or change things, depending on which one of those you’ve chosen. Maybe, if I’ve gone missiles, maybe going projectile and taking the Cardinal Blade (which is about projectiles) becomes more enticing than just raining down lightning.

Gamers Heroes

Fair! I’m looking forward to spending more time with the title, so I’m sure I’ll figure out a good strategy.

On that same note, about, I saw that you have a Discord channel as well!

What’s it been like working with the community? You’ve certainly got fans with Hand of Fate 1 and 2!

Cade Frankin

It’s really cool, because it is actually the same Discord that we’ve had since Hand of Fate 2 when it started.

Obviously there were a lot of people that joined us back then, and then we had a modding community on Hand of Fate 2 that kept things alive.

It’s always awesome! 

We celebrated 10 years of Hand of Fate since the original launch this year, and have people pop in from time to time. They say they’re playing Hand of Fate 2 and sharing their stories – its so cool. 

That that’s part of what inspired us to go “people still dig how to fight – let’s do this!”

We’ve been running some playtests behind the scenes with members of our of the Discord community. It’s been really fun – someone asked me the other day if I was going to have a certain element in the game.

I was like “Well, what would you like to see, like things that you know from Hand of Fate that you liked?” 

And it really sprung this awesome conversation about the things that they remembered from the game – and everyone was contributing to that.

That sort of stuff is really fun and inspiring for us, especially when there’s overlap.

That’s kind of what we were hoping with releasing this demo, that we can kind of widen that!

We’ve had kind of a closed group for now, just to get the ball rolling. 

Now we get to really open that up to everyone, see what’s resonating, see what people want to see more of – we’re excited for that!

Gamers Heroes

I also saw you released Capes, which is a turn-based superhero tactics game! 

Were there any learnings from that that that you’re looking to put into Hordes of Fate?

Cade Franklin

That’s a game that we were hugely proud of putting so much of our life into!

The takeaway is that we really want to play and make something that is easy to jump into.

There’s a huge audience for turn-based tactic stuff. But with Hordes of Fate, we want to make something that’s anyone can kind of pick-up-and-play, and then hopefully say “this is interesting; let me play a little bit more and get into it.” 

So I think that was a big part of it. 

We also saw Hordes of Fate as a way to get a game we could start sharing with people a lot sooner – which is what we’re doing with this demo. That’s exciting too! 

Capes was narratively kind of fixed, like it was a linear game. There was a story that Morgan was telling with that he’d put together, and we were bringing to life. 

I think with this one – if you played Hand of Fate, you can understand how there’s lots of surprises and things that can happen. They’ll happen at the pace that you kind of tackle in that as well, which I think is really exciting! 

I think Capes is great, and there’s and the people who love that genre really have enjoyed it.

It’s fun to branch out from that and be a lot more free with the narrative and what we can do with it.

Gamers Heroes

I know we’ve talked about Hordes of Fate, Capes, Hand of Fate (one and two) – were there any elements you’ve seen in those titles that you’ve seen adopted in others? 

You’re pioneering each genre!

Cade Franklin

There’s a bit of a backstory here!

I’m based in Brisbane and those guys were based in Brisbane.

I remember they had this Kickstarter, I’ll support that! Didn’t really think too much about and when it dropped, I was like, 

“Oh, wow, this is made out of Brisbane!”

When the opportunity came to work with these guys, I jumped at it!

I remember it was quite revolutionary. It was kind of a genre that was just starting to simmer and be a thing with the indie scene. 

There’s just been so many that have come out since then – it’s kind of crazy!

Someone posted in our Discord just the other day –  and I wish I could remember the game – but they’re like, “I love this reference to Hand of Fate!”

It was one of the lines from the Dealer they’d included in their game – a direct reference to Hand of Fate!

That’s such a nice homage to what we’ve done.

Gamers Heroes

Hordes of Fate is launching in Q3 – what are some of the final elements you’re looking to implement? 

I’m sure you’re listening to the community – as you mentioned, the demo is coming out soon and I’m sure you’ll be gathering feedback. 

Are there any standout elements that you’re looking to add? 

Cade Franklin

I think one of the things that isn’t in the demo is that there are obviously different heroes, and each of them do play very differently. 

We have our Mage in this one, which is basically firing out a whole heap of spells! He has a defensive spell, so it’s good for a newer player to get themselves through a run. 

However, some of the other characters have more aggressive, active abilities that allow you to play more aggressively – and it just feels different. 

That, in and of itself, is fun! 

There are a few twists and turns we intend to have in the full game, obviously. 

The thing that’s obviously not in the demo is that there’s not a lot of story. We’re not touching much on that at the moment. 

There is an introduction to the game, where you do get eased into what’s happening, why you’re there, and what the deal is up to this time – all of those elements. 

There are lots of other things that happen in the levels like traps and the like. 

In the demo, for example, we have bridges which change up the play space. This is one of the things that we really were inspired by from Deep Rock Galactic: Survivor. In that game, you have this mining mechanic, so you can kind of change up the play space. 

We were like, well, mining is not going to work for us; that’s not what we’re doing. But how can we do that? How can we change things up? 

So we’ve got a few things that get sprinkled throughout the different environments that have an impact on how things play. 

Then the bosses themselves are all quite varied!

I guess the big thing for me is kind of the structure of unlocking new cards and how that then feeds back into the game is quite unique. That kind of gets explored in the game proper – outside the demo.

I’m keen to have that be revealed to players as well.

So there are a few things it’s hard to kind of point to.

Gamers Heroes

I totally get it!

Cade Franklin

In some respects, we’re still kind of figuring that out ourselves. That’s one of the things that’s exciting about a game like this! 

Again, looking back at Capes, you kind of get fixed into certain mechanics, and then you’re basically building all the levels. 

Whereas with this game feels like, “We could just put this little element in this thing, or this spot or encounter does something slightly different to this one.”

And it feels right!

It feels like we have a lot of freedom of flexibility in that respect.

Gamers Heroes

Wonderful! Is there anything else you’d like to add?

Cade Franklin

If it wasn’t clear, I’m excited about this game!

I really do hope that people give it a shot, whether they’re familiar with Hand of Fate or not.  

There is an audience out there who are skeptical of the auto shooter or the roguelike genre, and I really would suggest you give this one a shot!

I think we’re trying to do something interesting that’s that’s a little bit out-of-the-box in terms of the encounter stuff, along with the experience that you would have in this game. 

There’s something there for everyone!

Gamers Heroes 

The energy is just infectious – it’s a huge honor, especially as a long time fan!

Wishlists for Hordes of Fate are now available via its official Steam page, along with the demo!

A Discord channel is also available for those that would like to join the conversation!

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