Heretics Amulet

Heretics Amulet is a dark, tarot-inspired roguelike card game. Each round, you're dealt a grid of face-down numbered cards with a limited number of draws. Get the total on the table as low as you can before the draws run out, because whatever's left is the damage you take!

Between rounds you spend collected souls on items that reshape your deck. Each of the 8 acts ends with a rule-bending boss and an endless freeplay mode is waiting for you when you're ready to see how far you can go.

How a Round Plays

Draw a card, then choose.

Do you place it in the grid and replace the card there, or do you discard it to reveal another face-down card? You start with six draws a round, so each one matters. Fill a row or column with cards of the same value and the whole line clears, awarding you bonus souls but be careful! If that last card never comes, you're left with the damage. Play it safe? Or give in to the greed? You get to decide.

Souls and the Store

The store between rounds has items that act immediately– add cards to your deck, remove or transforming the ones already in it, heal you, etc– whereas other items are permanent upgrades, which carry over to every future run. What are they? I'm so glad you asked:

Mala Beads give you more draws each round!

Sacrificial Daggers raise your maximum health!

Runic Feathers repair the Amulet, which starts broken and keeps only a fraction of the souls you earn, oh no!

Freeplay

Freeplay is a separate endless mode to scratch that roguelike itch. Stats start fresh each run, every five rounds the difficulty steps up, and your best round and best soul count are saved between sessions. How far can you go? (This is a chance to do some absolutely deranged things to your deck)

The World

You play as the Heretic. The world is built upon a Wheel of death and rebirth, and each time it turns, everyone's memory is wiped, but you remember. The Great Kingdoms want things to stay as they are, so they've exiled you and now send their mindless legions to your gate. Obviously, your Tarot Dealer is a possessed skull who speaks for each of them in turn, as it goes. The story is told through Tarot Cards featuring an original cosmology, unlocked as you clear each act, along with a written entry for every item you find. Most of it is left for you to piece together.

Features

• 8 acts, each ending in a boss with its own rule change

• 30 unique and weird items to find, including run items and permanent upgrades

• Endless Freeplay Mode with escalating difficulty and saved personal bests

• A collection of 12 original tarot cards, 21 achievements, and lore entries for every item

• 12 original music tracks to unlock for your in-game listening room

• Low-fi retro visuals with tarot-inspired card art, designed, drawn, coded and scored by one developer, that's me!

• And most importantly, a full release, complete at launch, no Indefinite Early Access here