When I reviewed Dragon Clash a few years ago, I awakened a deep and untapped fondness for turn-based card games. Games of skill, games with awesome art design, flashy graphics, gameplay that seems daunting and complicated at first, but once it gets its hooks into you and you begin to develop strategies to win, you can't help but go another round to get that sweet sweet feeling of decimating your foe. Haxity is another turn-based card game from developer Megapop that is available right now free to play on Steam, and it attempts to tap into the cyberpunk genre and goes big in terms of presentation and theatricality. But the question is, is Haxity another game that seeks to drain countless hours of my life in the pursuit of the perfectly executed hand, or is the game the kind of bus that cleans you out? Well, let's take a look as we review 2020's Haxity. The game's synopsis reads, quote, Haxity is a cyberpunk PvP action deck builder. Draft your deck, modify your fighter, and outsmart your opponent in intense head-to-head battles. Fight online, challenge your friends, or terminate the AI. Slot, hack, and execute. Welcome to Haxity. Experience intense, skill-heavy matches while you draft, punch and hack your way through your opponents. This is the only hardcore pvp deck builder out there and will you be the one to conquer the streets of Haxity? Now for players unfamiliar with turn based card games, the key in my experience is to find the knack the game is after you to master, some simple aspect of the gameplay that allows you to forge an advantage in every game that you play, and allow the minor details to click into place later. These minor details or quirks of the game allow you to start developing strategies and paths to victory against better players or losing situations, but so long as you master the knack you've always got a chance to win, and in Hexity that knack is the rock paper scissors or RPS mechanic that the game's unique twist on the conundrum appears to present. Each game is played utilizing one of three unique characters, selecting your deck to compete for the game using cards that will make up each hand you're dealt to deal damage to the hit points you're allocated at the start of each round, in a game of best of three. You'll have attacks, trap cards, as well as upgrades, passive buffs and most importantly, hacks. You see, while the game can seem quite daunting as most turn based card games seem to be, it effectively boils down to a game of rock paper scissors in two or more phases per hand. And the best way to win is to select an equal number of each type of the three power types, melee, ranged and special – and stack your hands with the swap ability. Each hand is played with three cards selected from five or more that you've dealt, and once both players show their cards, you can begin the real game, using the hacks to position your cards in such a way that ideally all three of yours trump all three of your foes. Melee beats special, special beats ranged and ranged beats melee. Now while that's a massive oversimplification of these games mechanics, like with all good turn based card games, there is way more detail in this game than we have time to go into. There's multi hits, special buffs, power buffs, individual abilities of each character, an energy meter to stop you spamming hacks and of course it's turn based so it's not about what cards you play as such, it's when you play them. But if you select your deck evenly and use your hacks to RPS or at least tie your opponent when attempting to win, you'll have a pretty solid chance of winning each round. And I have to say, I adore the gameplay and how balanced everything feels here. At every turn, you always feel like you can turn the tide of a battle so long as you pay careful attention to the round's progression and what your opponent is doing. And better still, at the end of each round, you have the ability to select a few extra buffs and cards, which really helps ratchet up the tension of the encounter without making the game seem too easy. It just makes the game more epic as you go. The three characters, Copperson, Dr Ratz and Banshee all utilise different card decks and specialise in combat differently. Copperson is your base level character who focuses on momentum, Dr Ratz is a master of debuffs and is a little harder to master, but Banshee, my favourite character, is a connoisseur of charges. Each character feels and plays a unique way without feeling superior to each other, however again my preference was to overwhelm my opponents with Banshee's charge attacks and ponch on for generating charge at a rate that allowed me to take advantage of the RPS mechanics. I had a bunch of fun working out different combinations of attacks to really put the hurt on my foes, adding multipliers, speed boosts and power ups to create devastating moves that would ensure my enemies defeat. Now I might sound like I'm speaking hyperbolically, but that's only because the game does an amazing job of presenting itself in a way that sells this as a properly full on, marvellous battle to the death. The design and animations of the characters, the backgrounds, the user interface, the cards and attacks and effects, it all blends seamlessly to develop this wonderful sense of empowerment and peril. Each time I landed an attack it felt great, and every time I lost a hand I felt like the round might be getting away from me. The soundtrack and sound design is wonderfully thematic, diverse and it doesn't feel repetitive at all. Even the backgrounds change regularly to help freshen up each round and keeps the game energised and feeling awesome on top of the game's amazing combat mechanics. And if you're the kind of person that's normally put off by card games given how long they can take, depending on the selection speed, rounds can take between 3 to 5 minutes each, meaning individual games never last more than 15-20 minutes. Which is great because the game never feels like it outstays its welcome or starts to become a grind or threatens to become a stalemate. But now we have a bit of a problem, because we have to talk about the game's biggest limitation. There's only 3 characters, and there's no story or narrative to speak of. This means only a maximum of 6 combinations of battles including mirror matches. This could limit replayability for a lot of people, because not only are there only so many battles you can have, there's no reward for accomplishing a win. No total win tally, no unlockables, no extra skins, no extra characters, no story progression, no evidence. And I understand balancing characters is an insanely difficult task in these types of games, so much so that a new deck can sometimes ruin new games. But I really have to insist on at least 5 or 6 characters, given that in order to win all 6 potential matchups you'll need no longer than 90 minutes to do so, in essence seeing all the game has to offer in that time. Also the games AI can be a bit slow, when deciding what hacks to use it sometimes feels as though the games AI will nip out for a cup of tea while it's contemplating its next move, not to mention the number of times the AI just so happens to have the RPS advantage when the first hands are shown. So admittedly a lot of your time in the first phases of gameplay is going to be spent playing off the back foot and some players might find that frustrating. And again coupled with the lack of a story or any real type of progression I can see why a lot of people would let their frustrations take over and ultimately abandon the game. And yet, despite the limited matchups, despite the fact that it doesn't have any real narrative or story or rewards to entice me into its steely clutches, I was drawn back again and again to the cold beating heart that is Haxity. I just couldn't resist, another game here, another round there, the way it all comes together is simply brilliant, so well balanced, with an excellent presentation, for me tons of replayability once you get the hang of it despite an admittedly small roster, it just has bags and bags of cyberpunk infused charm, I adore this game, and given the game is now free to play on steam, if you consider yourself a turn-based card game fan, you owe it to yourself to check Haxity out, give it all the support it needs to get the devs to consider beefing up the roster, giving it a story and maybe prompting a Cyberpunk sciad sequel. And with that, it's time to say adieu. Thank you very much for watching this edition of the Halcyon Show. I've been your host Lorne Risley, please like, share and subscribe. Stay tuned for more reviews and videos in the future and as always, take care of yourselves and I'll see you on the next episode. you