Once a Pawn a King

Announcement Post from the official discord of the game: Nettart — 5/6/2026 12:11 PMWednesday, May 6, 2026 12:11 PM Hey @everyone I’m sorry for the long silence. It’s been a difficult time, and unfortunately, I have some tough news to share. Last month, the company under which we developed Once a Pawn a King (and which still owns the IP) let go of its workers - ourselves included. We’re still doing what we can to fix bugs and make small improvements, but as things stand right now, the game is no longer in our hands. Once a Pawn a King is set to fully release in about a week, in a very unfinished state. There will be some new features and dialogue, but there won’t be a third floor, and the King will remain eternally missing. We are currently exploring the possibility of buying back the IP from our previous employer, but due to existing agreements with a publisher, the situation is complicated. I’m truly sorry to share this news. Your support has meant the world to us, and the community we started to build around this game is something we’re incredibly grateful for. From the entire Perrenormal team - thank you. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The owners that fired the dev team are doing nothing to fix the game and pushed a 1.0 release that crashes constantly, and have made no indication that they are doing anything to fix it; they do not respond to request tickets/posts. This game would be good if fixed and polished instead of the team that made it getting canned over financial B.S.

Great game, good concept, unfortunately, indie.io strikes again, forcing an indie game out before it's fully cooked. The "1.0" release basically added a few text box, and updated a few graphics, unless a miracle happens it's probably gonna be stuck in a lukewarm buggy mess state forever. The Devs and the game deserved more, better luck next time guys.

Overall? It's pretty good. I'd give it a 6/10 on it's own, but a 7.5/10 among early access games. As of today (08/31/2025) It's very clearly unfinished, but it has lots of potential, and a fairly well executed gimmick. [h3] The Good: [/h3] - Good Core Mechanics Each piece is unique in it's capabilities and 'vibe'. You can choose a certain play-style depending on how you prefer to move around the levels. i.e.: Which chess piece you're most comfortable with, for me this was the almighty pony. The shops, upgrade vendors, and encounters felt good to progress through and interact with. Solid foundation. - Killer Sound Track But with the caveat that there should be more diversity. It's a good start, but needs more meat on the bones, so to speak. The sound design in general is serviceable. Not fantastic, but definitely not bad. Repetitive sounds are present, but not overbearing. - Consistent Theme With gameplay becoming increasingly complex and difficult as you go through floors I never felt drawn out of the experience by something jarring or incongruent. I believe the animations and drawn cutscenes contribute a lot to the charm and identity of this game. All these things together make for a great experience. - Good Gameplay The clicking and moving of pieces is tight, responsive, and satisfying. I don't think I've ever encountered a bug playing as intended in this way. - Good meta-progression. I love me some meta-progression in rougelikes, this feels very much like Hades' Mirror of Darkness, and the accompanying keepsakes were mashed together, in a good way. [h3] The Bad: [/h3] - Very seldom are things made clear to the player. I found myself saying "What is that?" or "What did that do?" frequently while playing. I understand that games, and especially rougelikes are more fun when experienced for oneself, and discovering things as you play is part of the charm, but there were multiple, repeatable instances of me finding something new or picking something up and I had 0 idea what had just happened and seemingly no way to check aftert the fact. More tooltips would be welcome, and maybe a way to see what happened in a previous turn. [h3] Spoilers Within This Paragraph [/h3] [spoiler] Specifically, on the first boss it is not made clear to the player what the boss is/can do other than visual cues which is fine, but can feel unfair. The boss will also debuff any piece that touches it, which would also be fine if the only ways to tell a piece was debuffed was not a very small indicator next to the piece and the new power value on the piece's portrait. Granted, if you hover over the small icon indicating [i] something [/i] was going on with your piece, it would explain the debuff, but I feel like this could be made more obvious. [/spoiler] There was a recurring feeling of the game failing to communicate important information to me. And this can make for some frustrating and [i] seemingly [/i] unfair deaths, which is something to be avoided in a rougelike in my opinion. - No en passant? I love chess, but I never felt that my knowledge of the game helped in any way while playing. There is little correlation other than the pieces moving in the same way (except the pawn which can move backwards). You are given precious few pieces, so any strategy involving trading pieces is immediately nonviable. The opponent is allowed to move every one of their pieces in a single turn, while you are only allowed to move one piece. This disallows any discovered attacks, threatening moves, recaptures, or really any form of strategy beyond straight-up material gain. This is alleviated somewhat by the abilities you can unlock and use, but the lack of follow through with the idea was disappointing. - Replayability Even with my small amount of time playing, I found myself memorizing encounters. The bosses, specifically are very static and unchanging, if you know a way past, it will work every time. I feel like it could get stale without more randomization or something else to spice runs up and help differentiate them. I feel like these are the most important points, but above all I did have fun playing, and will continue to play this and follow the development.

Played the demo for a long time before buying this game, but since I enjoyed the demo I didn't check the reviews before buying it. Experienced just how much of a buggy mess this "finished" product actually was from the get go. Somehow the demo is the superior product. If everything that's being said about the original devs being sacked, the publisher forcing an early release and so on, is true - the future looks bleak for this game. I'd highly recommend sticking to the demo for now.

EDIT: Thanks to another reviewer, it seems this game is no longer in hands of original developers. It was released in an incomplete state, thus why only two floors and an assortment of bugs. Unless this comes back to original developers, DO NOT BUY! Original: At this time, I would not recommend buying this game until the bugs are resolved. Currently, it requires a lot of restarts or avoiding certain areas to play the game. OTHER THAN THE BUGS, it is a great concept, intriguing gameplay, basic but inoffensive story, interesting mechanics, and wonderful artstyle, There is great ideas wrapped in Chess mechanics making it a puzzle roguelike game. The bugs are very infuriating though. I so far have only been able to complete up to the 2nd floor and then the game resets. I've completed multiple runs but I haven't gotten any more story after unlocking the ability to sculpt. I do not think this game is complete yet, or if it is, requires way more grinding than I thought since I stopped getting stories after more than 4-6 victories.

Amazing Idea, since full release too buggy to play it was actually better in early access somehow? Will come Back to check if it is fixed sometime,

I should state that I have not read any patch notes so I have no clue if any of my issues are getting fixed but at this moment I have some issues. 1. As far as I'm aware there is no undo button, I know that the game shouldn't baby me all the time but an easy mode that has an undo button would be nice especially when my pieces die due to a game mechanic I didn't understand. For example I pulled a rook with the hook ability over an ice tile and it killed my piece and ended my run when I assumed the rook would have just sat on top of the ice tile. 2. In the same run just before losing I only had a bishop left and if I did not have the hook ability I would have been soft locked because of my pieces limited mobility, the push tiles placement, and the ice tiles. This is my only experience with a potential soft lock so I have no idea if there is already an anti soft lock mechanic. 3. Bosses feel impossible without cheesing, I have only beat a mini boss and a normal boss once but both times I had to use a bishop to cheese the pawns movement. Every other time I fought a boss all my pieces would die because they get pushed off the map or because of my pieces limited movement. I know it's chess but as someone who enjoys roguelikes but does not enjoy chess very much I would rather not have to plan 10+ moves ahead just to get a single hit on a boss with 8 health and have no movement to get out of the way of the bosses next turn when it can move 3 tiles and I can only move one. 4. The hook ability feels incredibly broken compared to almost every other ability I've read, especially at max level. (I haven't gotten that far into the game) 5. It feels really hard to keep track of which tiles will get my pieces killed because white just has so many pieces compared to me and all the holes and obstacles in the map really limit my movement. These are the only complaints I can think of right now, Im gonna take a break from the game until the next update but I have high hopes most of the issues will be fixed soon. (Yes I know some of my complaints is just a skill issue.)

If you have an ultra widescreen monitor you are cooked. The game is unplayable. I cant even get past the start menu. The game loads up and the title is over the top of the play button. I can click on "settings" but then it opens a menu that simply has move speed options and none of the other settings can be clicked or navigated to. I Tried - Verifying game files - Clean install - Forcing to windowed mode - Using various commands on the steam launch settings to change resolution and set windowed. Nothing worked, GG , refund I guess.

For some reason, the game wont let me bypass the Angel due to there being no resolution settings for this game.... I cant see where I need to click to exit the angel and the menu's are all squished. I have a 3440x1440 monitor and even the main menu has overlap (Play is under the title screen for some reason) seems like the bottom of the screen is missing when in maps. I got through the first 2 battles with this being no issue but as soon as I hit the first angel after buying my options I cant exit and even going back to the map it wont allow me to proceed to the next fight. I tried using the -windowed trigger and that wont resize or window the app.... very frustrating as I want to get further than the tutorial and 2 battles!!

Needs an undo button or at least a way to purchase an undo. I don't have time in my life to restart a new run because of one mistake. I won't be playing again until they add an undo.