HELLCARD II just got an extensive new gameplay trailer, and it’s one we’ve been waiting on since we had such a good time with the original. In our HELLCARD first impressions, we basically called it multiplayer Slay the Spire and singled out its co-op as the real draw, so a bigger, deeper sequel is an easy sell for us. The new trailer shows off a fresh chapter called Blackmail Manor along with a heavy RPG overhaul, ahead of the co-op deckbuilding roguelite’s Q3 2026 launch on PC and consoles.
Blackmail Manor is a sprawling new chapter set in an opulent, gothic paper estate, where the job is to infiltrate the manor and teach a rebellious lord a lesson. Getting through it means navigating traps, solving puzzles, and making joint decisions that open up different story paths. The trailer also shows the series’ spatial combat returning, where you have to track whether monsters are in melee or ranged positions and split enemy aggro to survive.
The bigger shift is structural, trading the original’s linear dungeons for a living, pop-up storybook where the party’s cooperative choices steer which paths open across each page. On the RPG side, characters are now shaped by core attributes like Strength, Dexterity, Intelligence, Constitution, and Wisdom, which players can upgrade between card rewards to scale damage, shore up defense, or gain extra mana. Those same attributes feed into the story, gating certain options so a party might need high Strength to force a door or high Intelligence to crack an arcane contraption. There’s also persistent gear earned through achievements that carries across runs, altering deck composition, passive buffs, baseline stats, and even adding new mechanics.
The co-op is what has us most interested, with HELLCARD II bumping the original’s three-player setup up to a four-player fellowship built around stacking card synergies. After Slay the Spire 2 showed just how good co-op deckbuilding can be, we’re all the more eager for a deeper HELLCARD to dig into with friends. Developer Thing Trunk and publisher Skystone Games have it slated for Q3 2026 on PC via Steam and consoles, with specific systems still unnamed, and it’s up for wishlisting on Steam now.
