Charlie Haro (known online as Boss Grand) has announced Fame or Folly, a Fantasy Renaissance deckbuilding game that’s designed to “completely reimagine the genre’s core loop.”
Haro is the co-founder and CTO of Raise, formerly known as HelloOffice — a commercial real estate platform that reached a $100 million valuation, which was eventually acquired by a Fortune 200 company. Haro then walked away from this career to pursue making video games in his garage.
Fame or Folly makes the deckbuilding aspect of the game the “main event.” Every turn is a casting call where players draft new cards from a rotating shop, trigger their effects, and fire the ones they don’t need. It’s a game of rapid adaptation, combining the structural escalation of Balatro with the agonizing push-your-luck tension of the hit board game The Quacks of Quedlinburg.
“In most other games, deckbuilding is the meta layer,” Haro said in a press release. “It’s what you do outside of the encounter. In Fame or Folly, every round, every hand, you have the opportunity to recruit new troupers and modify your deck. The entire challenge is deckbuilding.”
The game is set in an alternative Renaissance-era of history where conflicts are settled on stage rather than the battlefield. Players lead a ragtag caravan of performers competing for the King’s Patronage at the Grand Festival. With over 150 unique Trouper cards across five distinct classes (Minstrels, Vendors, Mystics, Outcasts, and Wardens) and 100 game-changing Banners, players must balance their troupe to generate raw score while managing the rising tension of a crowd ready to riot.
Despite operating out of a garage without a publisher or a studio, Haro has assembled a global team to bring Fame or Folly to life. He coordinates pixel art from Poland, UI design from the Netherlands and sound design from London, while hand-composing every multi-layered, parallax card scene himself. The game’s voice acting is even provided by his wife, recorded right inside their home.
With the indie market racing against the looming shadow of Grand Theft Auto 6 later this year, Haro is in a sprint to get the game into players’ hands.
Fame or Folly is slated for a Q3 2026 release on Steam with a fully playable public demo will launch during the Steam Deckbuilders Fest from May 4–11, 2026.