Tic-Tac-Jutsu

ABOUT

Tic-Tac-Jutsu was one of two ideas for building something new from tic-tac-toe. The other, Chess-Tac-Toe, put chess pieces and their movement rules into a game of three in a row. But I could never make it fun: the pieces either got stuck or could reach almost every square.

I was heavily inspired by Archon II: Adept, which I grew up playing on the Amiga. In Archon, attacking a piece sent both into a live arena. You could make a smart move on the board and still lose the square in the resulting duel. That mix of strategy and reflex stuck with me for life.

I started with Archon’s projectile-only combat, but it was too linear. I added a dash to give players more ways to outplay each other. From there, I chose the aesthetic theme because projectile attacks and sudden dashes felt unmistakably ninja.