The Huntsman: Winter's Curse

The Huntsman: Winter's Curse is a game that features an interesting card-based combat system and an interactive story.

The concept of an interactive story always sounds better than it really is, but even if the developers of The Huntsman: Winter's Curse are using this definition, the game is closer to a turn-based fighting game that also happens to have a story behind it. This is an important distinction this game happens to be quite exciting or at least much more interesting than a simple interactive story.

Making a turn-based fighting game interesting is a tall order, and it you combine cards with that concept than you get a very specialized system that needs to be well thought out in order to work. Fortunately for The Huntsman: Winter's Curse, the card system seems to work, even if there isn’t a very well balanced system.

The Huntsman: Winter's Curse follows the story of Elisabeth, a girl that sets out to find her four brothers who have gone missing. At the same time, Queen Freya’s army is preparing to conquer the White Lands, where Elisabeth lives.

She finds somehow who can help her navigate a dangerous forest that’s also the place of disappearance on one of her brothers. She’s betrayed, and she’s forced to find him. This is how the story starts.

The basic gameplay principle is pretty simple. You and the enemy each take turns at attacking and you can choose from three different cards. Depending on your setup, those cards can be about attacking, defending, dealing, and so on.

The only problem is that you can’t really know what cards are you going to get since they are not preserved from one hand to another. Many of the attributes that can be found on cards are related to the gears that're been equipped.

Soon after you start the story you also get a companion, so the fights are not going to be all that difficult, but they are going to get more challanging as you progress through the story.

The first part of the game is free, but the other books for this story are DLCs, and they have to be bought.