So rather than animating the complete Motivator, I’m shifting focus immediately to the last Early Access minion so we can fill out this nice family portrait for Hex Gambit‘s Kickstarter. I’m giving myself until the end of this week, then it’s pencils down to start putting all this together into a video. It’s a painful thing for an artist, showing off unfinished work, but I’ll suck it up somehow.

If things go smoothly this month, expect to see Hex Gambit on Kickstarter sometime in July! And you definitely don’t want to miss that campaign, because supporting us early comes with an awesome discount plus some cool, limited edition reward stuffs. You’ll also have your foot in the door for the very first season of Hex Gambit: Early Access later this year. The better our Kickstarter and Early Access do, the more minions we can add to the game (I’ve got blueprints for about 17 unique ones). Sign up for an email reminder right here!

He’s looking even more dapper in 3d. This guy should have some pretty interesting animations.

Want to know more about our upcoming turn-based strategy game, Hex Gambit? Stick around! We’ll be posting lots of artwork and details here weekly. If you haven’t already, be sure to sign up for our mailing list to get email reminders when we hit big milestones, like the launch of our Kickstarter, Early Access/beta, and the official release.

Another fresh class for Hex Gambit, the Motivator is a very different support unit from Outwitters‘ medic. He’s got a flexible passive ability called “Inspire” to help or hinder units standing beside him, plus a nifty “Shout” that can reactivate a spent character. He’s another of the 5 minions we’ll have playable for Early Access later this year.

Lots of big changes to the alpha this week. We’re messing with shorter play sessions, reducing the Victory Point goals from 20 to 10. In Hex Gambit terms, that’s 5 pillar taps or 10 minion kills to win (or a mix of both), completing a match in about 10 turns. At 1-2 minutes per turn for familiar users, that’s 10-20 minute matches for players that know what they’re doing. Pretty cool to fit a few matches into a single sitting. We’d love to hear your thoughts on that approach in the comments.

Want to know more about our upcoming turn-based strategy game, Hex Gambit? Stick around! We’ll be posting lots of artwork and details here weekly. If you haven’t already, be sure to sign up for our mailing list to get email reminders when we hit big milestones, like the launch of our Kickstarter, Early Access/beta, and the official release.

Here’s an early mockup of how our league territory control metagame works in Hex Gambit. You’ll choose a space on the big map to play for, and the Victory Points you earn in that game (win or lose) get applied there for your faction. Whoever owns the most territory at the end of the season gets the big victory trophy! Above, we’re simulating a bunch of wins and losses to see how things might progress.

Want to know more about our upcoming turn-based strategy game, Hex Gambit? Stick around! We’ll be posting lots of artwork and details here weekly. If you haven’t already, be sure to sign up for our mailing list to get email reminders when we hit big milestones, like the launch of our Kickstarter, Early Access/beta, and the official release.

Here’s a goofy little animation I just wrapped up for the Soldier’s idle state. We’ve just about got three minions down, 2 more and a board for the league metagame are next on the list! That should give us a decent showing for Kickstarter and enough content to get Early Access started later this year.

Want to know more about our upcoming turn-based strategy game, Hex Gambit? Stick around! We’ll be posting lots of artwork and details here weekly. If you haven’t already, be sure to sign up for our mailing list to get email reminders when we hit big milestones, like the launch of our Kickstarter, Early Access/beta, and the official release.

Here’s an early pass on one of our Defender’s stronger late-game abilities: blockade. He can throw up two temporary, indestructible barriers that last through your opponent’s turn. It also has a one turn cooldown, so you’ll need to get ready for whoever you’ve trapped behind that wall. They won’t be very happy next turn.

Want to know more about our upcoming turn-based strategy game, Hex Gambit? Stick around! We’ll be posting lots of artwork and details here weekly. If you haven’t already, be sure to sign up for our mailing list to get email reminders when we hit big milestones, like the launch of our Kickstarter, Early Access/beta, and the official release.

As we start tidying things up and thinking about our Kickstarter, it’s time to knock out some particles and effects! These are Molera‘s flame spaces, little death traps she can plant that murder anyone unlucky enough to step there. You can avoid them, sacrifice an injured minion to clear them, or you might even get pushed in by other characters’ abilities.

Want to know more about our upcoming turn-based strategy game, Hex Gambit? Stick around! We’ll be posting lots of artwork and details here weekly. If you haven’t already, be sure to sign up for our mailing list to get email reminders when we hit big milestones, like the launch of our Kickstarter, Early Access/beta, and the official release.

She’s all rigged up and starting to be animated! Sorry for the poor frame rate, my old computer struggles with these video captures sometimes. Can’t wait to get the effects for her Dash ability ready to show off.

Want to know more about our upcoming turn-based strategy game, Hex Gambit? Stick around! We’ll be posting lots of artwork and details here weekly. If you haven’t already, be sure to sign up for our mailing list to get email reminders when we hit big milestones, like the launch of our Kickstarter, Early Access/beta, and the official release.

Click to enlarge.

Here’s a look at some of the ability icons I’ve done so far to give you a hint at just what your Soldier, Runner, and Defender will be capable of. Each character comes with three abilities. One is usually a melee (but not always), and the other two can do all sorts of useful stuff.

But you already knew that, so here’s something new: your character’s strongest abilities won’t be available on turn 1. As your match progresses, they’ll gain access to their craziest moves to ratchet up the madness in the late game. A skilled strategist can even leverage a few turns where, say, their Defenders have access to moves that their opponent’s Defenders don’t yet. Later we’ll tell you exactly how that works (don’t worry, it doesn’t involve a store or an upgrade tree; it’s super simple and fun).

Want to know more about our upcoming turn-based strategy game, Hex Gambit? Stick around! We’ll be posting lots of artwork and details here weekly. If you haven’t already, be sure to sign up for our mailing list to get email reminders when we hit big milestones, like the launch of our Kickstarter, Early Access/beta, and the official release.

Our Runner class has achieved the third dimension. The texture is a placeholder to help me animate her, she’ll look much nicer once I get her in Unreal. It’ll be exciting to have more characters running around the map than just that lonely Soldier!

Want to know more about our upcoming turn-based strategy game, Hex Gambit? Stick around! We’ll be posting lots of artwork and details here weekly. If you haven’t already, be sure to sign up for our mailing list to get email reminders when we hit big milestones, like the launch of our Kickstarter, Early Access/beta, and the official release.