Fragile Shapes Studio and publisher Beyond the Board has released a Steam demo for the “not a chess” game that involves puzzles, shifting tiles, and more.
The teams say that: “In Beyond The Board, players take control of a lone Rook, cast adrift after a bolt of lightning shatters a match mid-play and sends the board spiraling into a new dimension. As you pursue the enemy King through collapsing kingdoms and cursed lands, each step forward becomes a puzzle to solve — with shifting tiles, hidden pathways, enemy pieces, and powerful boss battles standing in your way.”
Check out a trailer below, for a better idea:
Guilherme Gama, Programmer & Visual Artist explains, “This demo is just the beginning, a first look at the shifting landscapes, defying puzzles, and quiet mysteries that define our game”, while Bruno Mascarenhas, Game & Audio Designer says: “Our design philosophy was to create a game that unfolds itself to you step by step, without saying a single word”.
Here’s the key features:
- Explore fracture lands: Step into a quiet, surreal world, where each area carries echoes of something that’s come undone.
- Solve puzzles with reimagined rules: Classic chess won’t be enough. Switches, moving tiles, and strange rules force you to rethink every move.
- Face enemies and bosses: Enemy pieces follow rules, but not always yours. Learn their patterns through observation and find the cracks in their essence.
- Unlock new paths and secrets: Return to past levels with new combinations to uncover hidden areas, strategies, and fragments of the story.
Inspired by evocative puzzlers like Monument Valley and Limbo, Beyond The Board unfolds as a minimalist, immersive journey.
Its story is told not through dialogue, but through visual storytelling, atmosphere, and sound — inviting players to make sense of this surreal world piece by piece, through mood, movement, and the spaces in between.
Beyond The Board is coming to PC via Steam, the demo is out now.