What would you do to have absolute control of your life? What would you do with the power of control? Would you do good or evil or maybe a bit of both? Hand of Fate 2 mirrors life with the themes of fate, power, and morality.
What is Hand of Fate 2? HoF 2 is a Rogue-like deck-building card game where the player attempts to pass all challenges to get to the end of the game by keeping their health above zero through enough food, gold, and money. Before each challenge the player chooses his companion (a card/character that helps the player in combat and with mini-games), encounters (cards which give the player resources), and supplies (beginning resources). The challenge begins by placing a player on a random map of cards. The player jumps from card to card, revealing the encounters as he goes, until reaching the final card of a challenge. Once complete the player receives new encounters, equipment, supplies, and companions to use in subsequent challenges. HoF 2 uses these mechanics and the narrative within to mirror life and comment on fate, power, and morality.
First, HoF 2 handles the question of "How much control does one have over his life?" with “none," “some," and “complete." The player guides the hero through the 21 challenges of the game until facing the final boss. Each challenge must be completed to get to the end. Similarly in life, we see through the books of Daniel, Isaiah, and Revelation that certain events in the history of the World occur. In Daniel 2, we see that there will be four Kingdoms: Babylon, Medo-Persians, Greece, and Rome. In Isaiah 53, we learn that Jesus will come and take the wrath of God and "justify the many as He will bear their iniquities" (NASB). In Revelation 20 & 21, Christ returns to conquer and setup " a new heaven and a new earth" (Rev. 21:1, NASB). These events as shown in the Bible have happened, must happen, and will happen just as the 21 challenges must be completed to arrive at the end. However, how exactly everything will happen is not determined.
Inside each challenge, the player has some control. The player has already chosen the companion, some of the encounters, and the starting supplies. The player decides how to approach each encounter and what they will gain or lose from them. But the player doesn't decide what the path of encounters will be or how the dice will fall. As in life, we do not get to choose what other people will do and how that will affect where we go. Biblically, people have some control over life. Do they accept or reject Jesus as their Savior? Does a Christian follow the urging of Paul in Ephesians 6:10 & 11 to be "strong in the Lord" and "put on the full armor of God"? As in the game, a Christian will overcome encounters more easily with the right armor. The player's hero and the player in life do have some control over their lives. However, Hand of Fate 2's end game differs from reality.
At the end of the game, the hero controls everyone’s fate and presumably lives forever unless someone else kills him and takes control of the cards. Scripture teaches in Hebrews 9:27, ”And inasmuch as it is appointed for men to die once and after this comes judgment" (NASB). Each person will die and be judged for what he did in life. HoF 2 also reveals the sinful desire to make oneself God, which is similar to Genesis 11 and the Tower of Babel. In contrast to lifting ourselves up, an unbeliever must "repent and believe in the Gospel" (Mark 1:15, NASB), then live his life in holiness (Rom. 12:1).
Second, HoF 2 illustrates the nature of power. Some power comes from the equipment and skills at ones disposal. However, true power comes from the person who holds all of the cards. In the game, it first seems that the emperor holds the power. He says who lives and who dies. He controls massive armies. However, upon his assassination, the hero realizes that nothing has changed, someone new will rise up and take the emperor's place. The power behind the throne comes from whoever holds the cards of the game, so the hero confronts this person, eventually gaining mastery and takes the cards for himself. However, we see that God is the one who truly holds all of the cards as Daniel 4:35 says, “All the inhabitants of the earth are accounted as nothing, but He does according to His will in the host of heaven and among the inhabitants of earth; and no one can ward off His hand or say to Him, ‘What have You done?” (NASB).
Finally, HoF 2 pushes the player to question the morality of the current world and what might come. HoF 2 doesn't deal with the origin of good and evil, but it implicitly labels good as actions that help people and evil as the opposite. People in power can easily cause pain and suffering, which is seen in the man-controlled world with starving farmers, genocidal goblins, and marauding trolls. Our world is also marred by evil (Gen. 3). Our world, like the world of Hand of Fate 2, needs someone to solve the problems of pain and suffering. That man is Jesus, "who abolished death and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel" (1 Timothy 1:10, NASB).
Hand of Fate 2 mirrors life while looking at fate, power, and morality. May we live out the details of life for God with confidence that the movements of this world are shaped by our Creator.