AI Behavior
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.
An Idea
During the pandemic, I went deeper down the rabbit-hole of board games. I’ve always been into the hobby and had really started playing wargames in the past few years. It was something I tried to do as a kid but never got into (read: couldn’t find anyone to play with). So I started playing even […]
Building a Wargame Hex Grid
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 […]
Counter Movement
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 […]
Design Diary – August 2022
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. […]
Design Diary – March 2022
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 […]
Hexes Part 1: A Brief History
Let’s go over a brief history of hexes in wargames and then I’ll delve into practical application and how I’ll apply it in my design in a follow-up post. Much of this is common knowledge among wargamers, and this is by no means meant to be an extensive history. Instead this is meant to serve […]
Hexes Part 2: In Practice
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 […]
Saving and Loading the Game
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.
Scenario Switching
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.