Ember Frontier

A Note from the Developer

I’m an indie game developer, which mostly means making games after work at night or during the weekends whenever I can find a quiet moment.

I’m not expecting this game to sell millions of copies. I simply enjoy spending my free time alone, making small games and experiencing the strange but wonderful happiness of being a one-person development team. Seeing one of my games finally go live, sending the store link to my friends, and watching them play something I made… honestly, that already feels like a pretty big reward. Haha.

This game started after a friend and I randomly sat down to play a tabletop game together. We had an idea, started building on it, and somehow ended up here. The game may not be perfect, but making it has been an incredibly enjoyable journey. I hope you’ll have fun playing it—and that you’ll share a little bit of that joy with me.

Bring the Lights Back On

After the Long Day, settlements lost contact with one another, leaving farms, water facilities, and transport networks scattered across the wasteland.

The Ironvault Alliance seeks to restore the infrastructure of the old world and maintain it for the common good. The Red Ember Convoy believes that no wall should monopolize roads, energy, or supplies. Both sides are trying to save this land—but they have very different ideas about how it should be rebuilt.

Lead an expedition across eight regions, compete for the Embers that keep settlements alive, and reconnect a lifeline that has long been severed.

One Card Can Change the Entire Front

Starting from your HQ, deploy Troops along a connected network of bases. Every card has its own value and ability, and every placement can open an attack route, break an enemy connection, or shift control of a region.

Advance along connected paths and extend your line toward key bases

Cover enemy Troops with higher-value cards to seize control of their bases

Turn the battle around with wild cards, additional deployments, recalls, movement, and other abilities

Decide when to protect a powerful Troop and when to commit it to breaking the enemy line

Covered Troops do not simply disappear—they remain underneath the top card at their base. A single recall or movement effect can bring an old card back into play, leaving every route open to a counterattack.

Choose How You Win

Every battle offers two main paths to victory:

Collect Embers: Control every required base surrounding a region to claim its Embers. Reach the map's Ember objective first to win.

Breach the Core: Build a connected route to the enemy HQ and cover it legally to end the battle immediately.

Focusing on regional control can create a stable advantage, but chasing Embers too aggressively may leave your own HQ exposed. Victory often depends on watching both fronts at once.

Eight Regions, Eight Sets of Battlefield Rules

The main expedition contains eight maps, each with its own mechanics and story. Restore a wind-powered farm and a ruined sorting line, defend twin shelters divided by floodwater, fight for a reservoir above the clouds, and cross a geothermal rift, radiant waterworks, a silent station, and finally the Blackline broadcast tower.

Different regions contain different Special Bases:

Recall your Troops from the battlefield or discard pile

Draw additional Troops from your reserve

Move adjacent enemies and reshape an established front

Restrict entry to Troops with specific values

Suppress the abilities of Troops deployed there

Temporarily lock one card in the opponent's hand

These mechanics do not exist in isolation. They interact with paths, covering, regional control, and Troop abilities, giving every map a different tactical problem to solve.

Complete an Expedition to Rebuild the Wasteland

The eight regions form a complete story campaign. Before each deployment, learn about the area's history, the conflict between the factions, and its central rule. After your first victory, the expedition map permanently records how that region has changed.

Collect all 24 Ember Stars, unlock new expedition rewards and challenges, and discover how the Ironvault Alliance and Red Ember Convoy ultimately decide the fate of the eight-region lifeline.

Neither faction is simply good or evil. Order can become monopoly, while freedom can become rule by the strong. The Ember Frontier needs a different answer.

Face an Opponent That Reads the Battlefield

The computer opponent analyzes visible routes, regions, threats to each HQ, and recent actions, adjusting its plans between offense and defense.

After completing the expedition on Standard difficulty, challenge a more aggressive and defense-minded opponent on Veteran difficulty.

Features

An interactive prologue of about seven minutes teaching paths, covering, Embers, and HQ rules

A complete story campaign spanning eight distinct regions

Free Battle mode

Standard and Veteran difficulty levels

Weekly challenges with fixed maps, decks, and random seeds

24 campaign Ember Stars and 10 Steam achievements

Eight core Troop cards with distinct abilities, character backgrounds, and flavor text

A detailed in-game rulebook, map guides, and contextual tooltips

From the first windmill brought back to life to the broadcast tower answering a distant signal, every deployment helps decide who will light the next beacon.