Hey everyone, Shaman here!
First of all, thanks to everybody that started following Chyss there. I suspect some of you are from the Reddit post, then have a seat and introduce yourself if you want, let's make this game something good together!

Then I feel deeply sorry for the game staying that much broken. Since end of march, client version on itch.io wasn't up to date and may have ended with the game crashing if you tried it. Now this is fixed and you'll be able to play for at least a game!
Disclaimer: there probably are bugs hiding everywhere so you might end up crashing during actual gameplay.

So, first devlog post about the game! It's official!

Let me paste you the base storyline that you'll hear about in the game, once I start working on exploration mode (aka RPG mode):

The year is 12022.

Number of civilisations evolved from primitive life to being able to travel the universe.

In this universe, a game has evolved to become essential: The Chyss.

The Chyss has its roots in chess, but many have added to the rules in order to create its successor. A timeless, universal, and balanced game, allowing interplanetary competition, where fair play, game intelligence and risk-taking are the traits of legendary players.

Young children want to become great Chyss players, the vast majority of adults play, whether to have fun, relax, explore the possibilities, or to pursue their childhood dreams.

In this universe, a phenomenon affects about a third of the people...

About a third of people become incarnates overnight. Falling asleep as themselves, they wake up controlled by different, higher forces.

These forces do not want their loss, but simply direct their steps, their actions.

You are this higher force which is going to take control of an inhabitant of this universe.

You, and all the other players of this video game...

You will embody an incarnate.

This incarnate is now you.

Your goal will be determined by you. You can become the best Chyss player in the universe, but there are many pitfalls along the way.

There are many extremely strong, clever players in this universe.

The best Chyss player in the universe is anonymous. She is only known as "The Galaxy Queen".

Good luck! And battle with pride.

Now on to the game!

Chyss is a tactical 1v1 game and currently ONLY works as 1v1 online. That means if you download the game and click on play, you'll end up facing another actual person, no bots.
If you feel lonely or want to study how the game actual works, and since there is no tutorial ingame yet, you can launch the game twice to play against yourself. But the best player experience probably is to get in touch with someone and play a game or two (or ten) with them! Just ask them to download the demo and be sure to launch the matchmaking at the same time.

What about the core game? What's happening?

Chyss shares similarities with chess, and has big differences.

Similarities: your goal is to destroy your opponent's Leader, just like Chess. The game is played on a board, where you move your units in order to reach and destroy the enemy Leader and their team.

Differences: Units have Attack and Life points, different movement and attack ranges and values, and a different "rank" based on their role and power. Also, on top of having a team, you have an action and summoning deck, and a hand. instead of only moving a unit, when it is your turn, you have 3 types of actions:
- Moving. If you move a unit, it will consume your ability to move for this turn.
- Attacking. If you attack with a unit, it will consume your ability to attack for this turn. You can also Take a unit, which consumes your ability to attack, but moves your attacking unit 'for free'.
- Use a spell, an item, or summon a new unit: these depend on your current hand, that you draw from your action deck. They cost mana, and you receive mana every turn. You also have other ways to generate mana and draw actions or summons.

Looks very complex there but the game actually plays itself pretty easily!

Join us on Discord to find people to play with!

Here is 0.0.48 changelog, which is a big update:

Changelog: Added 5 new music tracks to the game!
General Mechanics:
-Your complete team no longer is there at game start. Instead, you start with your Leader and a random base team, composed of either 5 Lesser Units, 1 Greater and 3 Lesser Units, or 2 Greater and 1 Lesser Unit.
Base units are randomly placed on your 3 first columns. All other units are sent to the deck and shuffled. They can be summoned by consuming mana after drawing them.

-Player teams now have 3 more Lesser Units and 2 more Greater Units.

-Drawing a spell now happens every 2 turns instead of 3.

-Units now have skills printed on their description. However, most of the skills aren't actually developed in the game yet and will be available on the next prealpha version.

New Items
2 new items got added to possible actions, Refreshing Apple and Mana Potion.
- Refreshing Apple:
- Heals 2 to a friendly unit or Leader and draw 2 cards
- Manacost is 2
- Mana Potion:
- Use on your Leader to instantly gain 2 mana.
- Manacost is 0
Updates - Rust Defender:
- Now has 2 skills, only the summoning effect is actually activated:
- On summon: nearby Rust Defenders gain +1/+1
- Upon hitting end tile, teleports back to your starting side and gains +1/+1 (not functional yet)
- Mercurial Warden, Florid Phasma, Murreen Warlord: have skills that aren't functional yet.
- Thunderstorm: - Manacost reduced from 4 to 2
 Download >>> http://shamanforest.itch.io/chyss