DEATHMATE
DEATHMATE is a chess roguelike deckbuilder.
Build an army of pieces, stack a deck full of moves, and battle your way across the map towards the Grim Reaper.
Made in four days for the GMTK Game Jam 2026.
Play cards, not moves.
Each turn you draw a hand and spend blood to play as many cards as you can afford.
Add cards to your deck after winning battles or visiting a shop. Build the ultimate deck to defeat the Grim Reaper!
Time is running out.
Death doesn't need to outsmart you, he can simply wait.
Your pocket watch counts down one segment every turn. When it reaches zero, you die.
The only way to gain time back is through violence: every enemy piece you capture ticks your watch back up by one segment.
Capture the enemy King before you run out of turns!
Featuring 46 cards with upgradeable versions, 40 relics that bend the rules of the game, a final boss, and endless mode.
Controls
All you need is your mouse. ESC opens the settings at any time. Fullscreen recommended.
Credits
Luke Peters (@vazillion) — programming, game design
Violet Schofield (@vippori) — art, animation, sfx
Hannah Conway (@hanerpop) — card designs
- Low-poly chess pieces created by LowPolyAssets.
- Relic designs adapted from vector icons made by RhosGFX.
- Background adapted from Balatro's swirl shader — go buy Balatro!
- All music/SFX from CC0 sources.
- Inspired by Slay the Spire and The Seventh Seal (1957).
Comments
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This is actually peak
it wont load. i enabled cookies for the subdomain. "inspired by the seventh seal" lol.
I managed to win first try with a Pawnstorm deck. 10/10
Made it to loop 4 and got every relic. jameplay.
insane, really fun, congrats to the team on getting this made in such a short timespan!
This game is full of juice. My deck was just pawns and a king and I dominated. Great stuff!
W chess
Love it 10/10 great idea great execution compared to mine this is a master piece :D
I was able to capture the boss King using a March card, before all of the other pieces were captured?
NO EN PASSENT THIS GAME SUCKS /j
Did 6 loops, got to $12k and my entire board is made of pawns. 10/10 would play again
The Best Chess Game I've ever played, (other than the original chess of course)
The game is quite fun, I enjoyed it, no real complaints! 5 Stars
I had sm fun playing this gg
You've removed the very thing people love about chess: choice. The ability to move as you please has been handed over to randomness. It feels like I'm blindly trying to hit a target with a dart
It helps to not think like you're playing chess at all, because this really has no similarity to chess as a game. Just think of it as a card game where you already know how the pieces move.
I tried thinking that way, but it doesn't change anything
I enjoyed the premise and the art style. My only substantial criticism is the optimal strategy was pretty easy to find, so there isn't much replay value.
I know for a fact, that if this came to SteamDeck or mobile, i'd play it forever
great game, found a bug where the march card ignores the aura around the bos
Fantastic Game. Everything is spot on!
Phenomenal Game! Beautiful art style and amazing game design sense. I'd really love to hear your thoughts on our silly lil pigeon game since y'all made such a banger! Best of luck in the jam!
This is fantastic! Great job.
no en passant, get the brick boys 0/5
This has to be a full game one day, its incredible
Chess inscryption, sorry for thinking about being in game development
gg's mate
and we have the winner
fun game! but pawns OP