- Terrahard Studio, a new title painstakingly crafted over 4 years, including the development of a proprietary tactical engine
- A brutal desert survival roguelite that uses even companions’ lives as resources
- Quality checked through Steam Next Fest, Gamescom, and PAX West
Dunebound Tactics, a turn-based tactical roguelite developed by London-based Terahard Studios and published by indie.io, has been officially released on Steam.
The new title ‘Dunebound Tactics’ tells the story of a sandboat and its crew exploring a desolate desert in search of the legendary sanctuary ‘Haven’. As implied by the premise that “those who pursued Haven all became part of the desert,” the game foreshadows a journey that is by no means smooth.
The official launch coincided with the opening of Steam’s ‘Party-Based RPG Fest’. The launch price is $14.99, with a 20% discount available until September 28.
Tactical depth perfected by destructive direction in basic strategic battles
While most tactical games were limited to analyzing a given battlefield and finding the optimal path, ‘Dunebound Tactics’ offers a differentiated system that allows users to directly change the battlefield itself.
In the game, three-dimensional gameplay is possible, allowing not only the destruction of cover and movement but also the ability to block enemy retreats by making ice pillars rise. Explosive pillars, which can be placed at every choke point, become booby traps that devastate the battlefield after a few turns, depending on the user’s design. Essentially, the limits of the tactics depend on the user’s creativity.
Strategic options outside the combat zone have also been expanded. By utilizing crew members’ exclusive skills, you can strengthen your party or secure new paths even on the outskirts of the battle area. The game’s biggest feature is that it incorporates the terrain itself as a core tactical element while maintaining the basic positioning fun characteristic of turn-based combat.
‘Elios’, which uses even the crew’s lives as fuel
In exchange for the freedom to change the battlefield, the price to pay for survival is high. The game world revolves around ‘Elios,’ a resource that rewrites life and death.
Helios is generated in the form of crystals at the sites left behind by the deceased and is used as the core power source to operate the sandboat’s engines. At the same time, Helios also exists within the bodies of each individual crew member.
Injured survivors can be sent to the infirmary for treatment, but if necessary, the Elios can be extracted and used as fuel for the sandboat. In this case, the crew member loses their life and is left with only a shell.
To survive in the desert, it is difficult to avoid such brutal choices. The crew can be configured by combining 15 classes, 16 traits, and over 50 modules, and 38 types of enemies, including Imperials and Arcanists, stand in the way of the journey.
A UK-Greece studio established in 2012 bears fruit after nearly four years of development.
‘Dunebound Tactics’ was developed by Terrahard Studios, founded in 2012. It is headquartered in London and also operates a studio in Athens, Greece.
The game first appeared in October 2024 at Roguelike Celebration, revealing its Steam page and first trailer. It was followed by a demo in February 2025, and then a full release after Steam Next Fest in June 2026 and Gamescom in Cologne, Germany in August of the same year.
Aris Tsevrenis, CEO of Terrahard Studios, revealed that they built their own tactical engine from scratch for game development.
The development team has been consistently checking user reactions by demonstrating the game at the Indie.io booth at Gamescom and PAX West in Seattle.
Perfection honed through long-term testing, and the fun of replayability.
‘Dunebound Tactics’, which received favorable reviews from users and critics through global game shows and testing for having “an original system and solid strategic depth,” has been steadily improving its quality since before its release.
In fact, since the demo was released in February 2025, we have been receiving user feedback for a long time, including participating in Steam Next Fest in June 2026, and have been refining the game by conducting live demonstrations at Gamescom and PAX West.
The system designed with replayability, the core of the roguelite genre, in mind is also noteworthy. Even if a challenge fails, modules and survivors can be recovered from the wreckage of the destroyed previous sandboat, and the dynamically generated world forms different paths each time, providing the user with a fresh gameplay experience every time.
In summary, ‘Dunebound Tactics’ is a turn-based tactical roguelite that cleverly combines destructible terrain, a dynamic world that changes moment by moment, and sophisticated resource management and crew training systems .
In particular, the novel system of directly modifying the terrain, breaking away from the framework of analyzing a given battlefield, and the brutal setting where even the lives of comrades must be weighed, provide users with both deep immersion and the pressure to survive.
Attention is focused on how Terrahard Studio, which has spent about four years developing its own tactical engine, will perform to global critics and users at the Steam ‘Party-based RPG Fest’.
Information regarding ‘Dunebound Tactics’
| item | detail |
|---|---|
| Developer | Terahard Studios |
| Publisher | indie.io |
| Genre | Indie, RPG, Strategy (Turn-based Tactical Roguelite) |
| platform | PC (Steam) |
| Release date | September 14, 2026 |
| language | Unconfirmed based on press release |
| price | $14.99 (20% launch discount until September 28) |
| Reactions/Evaluations | 5 user reviews, pre-score calculation stage |
| Steam Page | Shortcut |
