The roguelite deckbuilder turns Rock Paper Scissors into a first-person combat system with card modifiers, upgrades, and a cramp-based fatigue mechanic.
I introduced Handmancers on my pages last November, and today I received the pleasant news that sign-ups are open for a playtest starting on January 20. It’s an intriguing roguelite RPG built around a rock–paper–scissors core, featuring a first-person perspective, developed by 58BLADES.
The core fights stick to the classic triangle. Each Sign beats one and loses to another, so every turn starts with a simple read. The twist is how much the game asks players to commit to a build that makes those reads matter.
Cards modify how a Sign behaves, then upgrades push those effects further, so the power curve comes from stacking small advantages until a single play swings the duel. Each card can take up to three modifiers, which is where a lot of the run identity comes from, since it lets the same base gesture behave in very different ways depending on what you have fused into it.
Handmancers leans hard into fatigue management. Heavy plays raise a cramp value that restricts options until you recover, so there is a cost to grabbing the biggest damage line every time it appears.
That pushes a pacing layer into the usual deckbuilder loop, since players can chase fast kills or conserve flexibility for longer fights. On the campaign side, Corruption spreads across the map and disrupts the usual rules, tempting players with stronger rewards while adding danger that can follow them past a single encounter.
Faction choice is tied to the three Signs, which shape the kind of deck the game wants you to build. In the playtest description, Scissors is framed around heavier damage, Rock around defensive play, and Paper around buffs, so the starting angle looks like it will influence what artifacts and modifiers make sense later in a run.
Corruption is described as a fourth “unbeatable” element that can be tapped for power with a meaningful downside, which sounds like it is meant to break comfortable patterns once a run starts to stabilize.
To join the playtest, players can head to Handmancers on Steam and use the Request Access button under the playtest section. Steam will notify them if and when access is granted. The developers are explicitly asking for feedback on balance, pacing, difficulty, and UI clarity during this test window.
Besides the playtest, there is a demo available on Steam, which gives a way to get familiar with the basic flow before the January build goes live.
Handmancers is being developed by 58BLADES, with a release window target for Q1 2026 on PC in early access, where the team expects roughly six months in that status, with plans to expand the game during that period through more content, improvements to UX, effects, localization, plus bug fixes. Below is the Official Playtest Trailer.
