Chess usually starts with a familiar set of pieces and a fixed set of rules, but one promising indie strategy game does it quite differently. For starters, it literally lets you build an army of chess pieces, and if that piques your interest, the game is also free to claim on Steam for the next 24 hours.
Trabucco team’s Last Gambit is currently free to play, but the developer says it will cost €4.99, or the regional equivalent, after the early access ends on November 13. Anyone with the game in their Steam library before the shift will get to keep it permanently. This is not a free weekend event, so players can claim it before the Version 1.0 launch and keep access.
Launched in Early Access on August 27, Last Gambit’s main twist is that players don’t have to stick to the standard chess rules. The roster has 27 pieces, mixing familiar units with unique additions such as the Unicorn, Griffon, Void Queen and Phoenix. Some have abilities that would be out of place on a regular chessboard: the Void Queen can leave through one edge and reappear on the opposite side, while the Phoenix can return after being defeated. Catapults and Trebuchets can even launch pieces across the board.
Players unlock more pieces as they work through the story, win battles and complete challenges. They can also fuse units, clone pieces and evolve pawns during a match. The focus is as much on building a roster as planning each turn.
If you’re the lone wolf kind, there’s a single-player Story mode built around a branching map, with battles, merchants and bosses along the way. Runs also offer perks that can change how a match plays out, including the ability to rewind a move, freeze a piece, teleport it or revive a fallen unit.
As for multiplayer, there are two online one-versus-one formats in Last Gambit: Fixed gives both players the same pool of pieces and lets each ban one before building an army from the rest, while Budget gives each player a points allowance and assigns a cost to every piece, forcing a choice between a smaller group of powerful units and a larger, cheaper force. And for those who want to play on the same team, there’s online co-op too. Online matches support cross-play between PC and Android, while the game can also be played offline against the computer or locally with another player.
Last Gambit’s move to a paid release is not being presented as a shift towards in-game purchases. In its Steam announcement, the developer said it does not want to add advertising, subscriptions, paid pieces or an in-game shop. Instead, the €4.99 price is meant to help cover the game’s shared multiplayer servers and continued development. The team says version 1.0 will bring balance changes based on match data, final fixes and fuller Steam integration, including features such as achievements. A few extra pieces or skins are also being considered.
If you’re yet to grab Last Gambit for free, just open its Steam store page, and you should see a “Play Game” button to add it to your library. The developer has not given an exact cut-off time for November 13, so it is safer to claim it before that date rather than wait.
