Defiant Development, the Brisbane-based studio responsible for the Hand of Fate series, has announced it will cease development of new titles. According to a statement on the studio's Facebook page, it will continue "in caretaker mode" in order to continue support for its existing titles.

"The games market has changed in ways both big and small in the nine years we've been in business," the studio's statement reads. "We have not been able to change quickly enough to continue with them."

Founded in 2010, the studio is best known for its Hand of Fate series, which blended deck-building and live action third-person combat. The 2017 sequel was especially well received, with our reviewer describing it as "a satisfying sequel and a meatier dungeon crawler [than its predecessor]". 

The studio's announcement makes note that its development team will be looking for new jobs.

"When we started this studio, we did so with a clear goal in mind," the statement reads. "To hire great people, to create great games and to do that in an ethical manner with respect for our team and our audience."

It continued: "The Defiant model has always focused on creating games nobody else would. Games that reflected the skills and passions of our team. Games that did something new. Our process has always been focused on iteration and exploration. We go into dark places, searching for hidden treasures. We set out without knowing where the journey will take us, and we do so knowing that the unknown is not always safe.

"That is a risky way to make games, and we knew that. When it succeeds it delivers things you could never have considered possible. When it fails, it leaves you without a safety net."

The statement was followed by a video showcasing the studio's in-progress game, which appears to be another spin on the "board game come to life" ethos. Frankly, it looks great: see it embedded below. We've reached out to the studio for further comment.

When he reviewed Hand of Fate 2 for us back in November, Eric Watson had plenty of praise for the solo card game that's also an action-RPG. He did, however, call out one aspect of it as a flaw: "Combat is unfortunately the least improved aspect of the sequel," he wrote, "despite still being a major focus of many challenges and cards."

That's set to change with the latest update, which developers Defiant are calling "Combat reforged". Among its changes are improvements to responsiveness, "addressing a number of issues from sticky animation transitions to unreliable dodge vulnerability." They've also changed the way artifacts work—where before they all had a limited number of charges before they were used up for good, now some artifacts have uses-per-encounter that recharge between fights. 

The bash move has also been altered. Where before it was very situational, only useful against armored or shielded foes, now it can be used as a general knockback/stun. One more new feature is Apprentice Mode, as seen in the original game, which lets players more interested in playing a deck-builder than a brawler breeze through combat, as it "automates combat maneuvers like ripostes and finishers while increasing player damage output. It also stops weapon charges from resetting during combat, ensuring Apprentice players are able to access their powers more frequently in a melee."

There's even more to the update than that, so check out the full patch notes.

Deck-building action RPG Hand of Fate 2 has benefited from multiple free updates since its release last November: developer Defiant Development added a new dealer companion in December and a mission creation kit in February. Today, the studio released a batch of "infinitely replayable" quests bundled together in a new Endless Mode. 

Each time you clear a quest in Endless Mode, the enemies in the Dealer's deck get more difficult. The Dealer also gains more and more pain and curse cards, which you're dealt whenever you complete a stage. To help keep long runs fresh, the update introduced "a plethora of new adventures, collectible token shards, enemies and narrative branches," Defiant said. You can also see how your best runs stack up on new leaderboards. 

Endless Mode was teased back in December as the first of many 2018 updates, the big new entree ahead of multiple side dishes. Defiant says those sides are still on the way, with a new enemy faction, more companions and new weapons in the pipe. 

Our own Eric Watson rather enjoyed Hand of Fate 2 despite its lackluster combat. "Hand of Fate 2 more than makes up for it in the vastly improved strategic layer, and lovely storytelling. The deck-building strategy remains satisfying and the new variety of challenges adds a roguelike replayability to obtaining the gold rank for each one," he wrote in his 82/100 review. 

Hand of Fate 2, the choose-your-own-adventure/Arkham brawler/RPG with cards, recently updated to give players access to its "Game Master's Toolkit".  These are the same tools the designers at Defiant Development used to create the game's quests, each a unique mix of cards and combat encounters, and are also the tools they're using to make future DLC.

As they say, "With the Game Master’s Toolkit, you’ll be able to create anything from a simple encounter all the way up to a full-fledged challenge with its own win conditions, blessings, curses and artefact rewards."

The toolkit is still in beta, however, so expect some potential hinkiness. Full details and some useful links are included in their news post announcing the update.

If you just want to check out what other people are doing, Hand of Fate 2 now has its own Steam Workshop where you'll find their creations. It'll be interesting to see what players come up with, placed one the Dealer's side of the table.