AI Behavior

Created by billk on November 3, 2022 7:44 pm

New Video! It’s been a while, but I think this is a fun one. I go over some of the tricks I used to make the enemy AI behave in a bunch of ways that reflect history but also allow for reacting to the human player.

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Scenario Switching

Created by billk on September 10, 2022 6:35 pm

I’ve added the ability to switch scenarios. This also begins the UI work outside of the main game area. Here I’m going from Chaeronea to Granicus (still under construction) and back.

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Loaded Game Screen

Design Diary – August 2022

Created by billk on August 5, 2022 12:42 pm

Hi there! It’s been an interesting time since my last update in coding my hex-and-counter game, Arete: The Battles of Alexander the Great. I visited Gettysburg for the first time and, apart from being impressive and impactful for its history as you’d expect, it’s a fantastic town to hang out and spend some time in. […]

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Loaded Game Screen

Saving and Loading the Game

Created by billk on April 28, 2022 9:06 am

Well all my Find/Replace work paid off and this is exciting. Save and Load work and allow for the all-important “Resume Game” option. Here’s a vid going from a new game to a saved one.Note this also shows a sneak peek at the set-up for The Battle of Chaeronea.

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Chaeronea temples

Design Diary – March 2022

Created by billk on March 27, 2022 3:55 pm

Well, it looks like the weather’s finally warming up for us in the Northeast US. You know what that means. That’s right, more sitting behind a monitor designing and coding, yeah! Thought this would be a good time to document some recent progress as I’m in the weeds now and the changes aren’t as big […]

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Hex-and-Counter on iPad

First Test Running the Game on iPad

Created by billk on February 6, 2022 2:37 pm

This is the first attempt running the game on an iPad Pro as a native app. Not purely native as the game itself isn’t coded with Swift, but in a Swift container and building a real app. This was a tough way to discover that Safari on iOS doesn’t support CSS filters on SVG elements […]

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Game Progress January 2022

Hex-and-Counter Game Progress, January 2022

Created by billk on January 23, 2022 9:11 am

Walkthrough of the game after around 8-9 months of designing and programming. Still under construction with a long way to go, but it’s a full game and – dare I say – fun to play.

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Possible destination hexes

Counter Movement

Created by billk on January 6, 2022 2:44 pm

Long time since my last post, but it’s because I’ve been going full throttle with the development. Fixin’ bugs and takin’ names! Last time I discussed how I went about building a dynamic wargame hex grid with counters. To get this feeling like a game, the next thing we need to do is make those […]

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Hex grid with varying terrain

Building a Wargame Hex Grid

Created by billk on April 28, 2021 6:37 pm

This is going to document some of the first steps I took in planning and creating my digital hex-and-counter wargame. I’ll share some decisions I made and why I made them, touching on technology and design choices. If you haven’t read them already, check out my posts about the use of hexes in Part 1 […]

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Hex grid

Hexes Part 2: In Practice

Created by billk on April 22, 2021 8:37 pm

In part 1 of this two-part post, I gave a brief overview of the history of hexes in tabletop wargames. Now I want to share my initial findings in planning my own digital hex board game and some unique hex geometric characteristics. I think you’ll also see why, to a developer, hexes require a bit […]

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