hi, its austin.

the Checkmage! demo is out on itch and steam! it's so playable right now. there are absolutely zero bugs. if you're reading this and you haven't tried it, please do and let me know what you think! the game is in an early state in terms of balance but i really think some of the mechanics  feel good to play around with.

I made a trailer last week for the game so I could start promoting it a little more confidently. I recorded some gameplay and used a free video editing software to cobble together a second trailer. Our musician put together a trailer-specific cut of the battle theme to fit the video, which makes it feel so professional!

i had to learn first-hand how difficult it is to get a good looking clip for a trailer.

I made an instagram account to post the trailer and clips of the game, and repurposed my old twitter account into a checkmage! marketing account, which i think is more fitting for that platform. most of my followers there are bots though, and all the messages i get on that account are spam, so i'm not sure how useful my posts will be there

^ my twitter dms

my speculation is that twitter either doesn't purge or even actively incentivizes bots on the site, both to inflate numbers and to incentivize the real users to purchase the platform's premium membership. kind of scummy for a social media site, but elon musk's gotta make back his 44 billion dollar investment somehow!

I also made a youtube account so i could host the trailer somewhere, and i didn't consider how important it would be to provide links to the Steam page from my youtube and actually customize my profile on there

it turns out i got over a thousand views on the video and i'm almost up to 400 wishlists on the Steam page, which is so neat!

my plans are to make some more short form videos and upload them intermittently leading up to the release of the game next year. it's also likely that i'll show this demo at a convention somewhere, now that it's a playable thing people can give feedback on

Checkmage! is still in active development. If you want to support me, please consider sharing with friends. The game will be released on Steam and Itch for sale when I'm done making it.

Checkmage! on Steam  - play the demo now!

Bluesky - more updates, videos and sneak peeks