Screenshots
Watch trailer on Steam ↗Tomebound
Unicursal · Published by Unicursal
Last updated 7 Oct 2026
Rescue corrupted books from your library, harness their power and rally their forces to fight for you in this hexgrid tactics deckbuilder! Combine cards to create uniquely powerful spells. With thousands of permutations to explore every turn, no two battles will ever be the same.
Indie, Strategy · 2027 · More free games
Explore endless permutations of powerful spells as you rescue corrupted books and strategize battles in Tomebound, an innovative deckbuilder from Unicursal that challenges your tactical skills.
About this game
Your library is infected, books have been corrupted and entire wings of the library are overrun by thematic monsters. Defeat the creatures bound to these books, cleanse the books and reclaim them as powerful allies in your growing collection.
Choose 3 Books at the start of a run. Each book holds a unique set of cards and abilities themed to its content. From blood-soaked hooks and cleavers to cutting words from court jesters.
Battle on a tactical grid, where positioning matters as much as the cards you play.
Every card can be played in two ways:
Primary Effect - Utilise the card as a base spell. This will act as the base which can be empowered by any amount of secondary effects.
Secondary Effect - Burn the card to empower a base spell. These can add modifiers, stat boosts or unique bonuses.
When combined with the tactics combat, this creates endless combo potential, but every decision matters. Cards used as secondaries are also discarded, so care must be taken when constructing the perfect turn.
Each wing of the library is tied to a corrupted book.
Defeat its boss to cleanse the book and permanently add it to your collection.
As your collection grows, so does your ability to craft varied starting decks.
Explore the synergies between books to unlock their true potential.
Roguelike replayability: no two runs are the same.
Unique books with distinct personalities, innate abilities and spell lists.
Tactical grid combat fused with roguelike deckbuilding.
A card system built for creative combos every turn.
A grim dark fantasy world where books hold more power than just knowledge.
Hand drawn enemies and environments: enjoy the bizarre and surreal enemies and environments manifested by the corruption.
Can you discover and cleanse the infected books to rid the library of its corruption before it’s too late?
System Requirements
Will my PC run this? →Minimum
- OS *: Windows Vista, 7, 8/8.1, 10
- Processor: 2,5 Ghz
- Memory: 4 GB RAM
- Graphics: 2Gb Video Memory
- Storage: 2 GB available space
- Sound Card: any
- VR Support: N/A
- Additional Notes: No
Supported Languages
Latest news
AnnouncementsOfficial
The class clowns! (Devlog 6)
Hey folks, Nini here with a quick update on what we’re cooking up behind the scenes!The New TutorialFollowing up on our last post about fixing player onboarding, we’re currently locking in building a new tutorial. This shiny new intro will gently (or forcibly) guide you through the process of expanding your deck and acquiring more tomes and the various engine building rewards.Now Quill will guide you through some basics, note that a lot of the art is still placeholder and I am not happy yet with how he looks.And because learning is always better with a little flair (and we were going crazy constantly putting off new content), the new tutorial takes place in an all-new Jester tileset, complete with a fresh cast of enemies who are very excited to make your acquaintance (and test out your new spells).Playtest Taking a Quick PauseTo make sure we can properly wire up this new tutorial, tune the onboarding flow, and give these jesters the polish they deserve, we will be temporarily closing the playtest build once again.If you’ve been jump-starting your play sessions or breaking things in the current build, thank you! We’re taking all that data, tweaking, balancing, and preparing the game for its next public showing.We’ll give you a shout the moment the gates open back up with the new tutorial ready to go. Until then, stay tuned!Cheers,NiniRead full article on Community Announcements (Nini)AnnouncementsOfficial
Strategems and more playtesting!
Hey folks!Nini here with some more news.We're excited to share that Tomebound will be part of Strategems, and we have a new build for you to playtest, Starting May 28th, 7pm CEST, you should head over and check out the awesome selection of strategy games. https://store.steampowered.com/curator/46073222/sale/strategems2026Massive thanks to Goblinz Publishing!Come chat to us, report bugs and flex your builds on our discord.Alternatively please use our Feedback Form. Also here are the changes since the last playtest earlier in the month:ChangesSpellsNew reward type "secondary" where you get to pick out of 3 secondaries to overwrite your cardsBuffed all of the secondaries (whatever it takes to get folks to combine spells)Balanced a bunch of the spellsAdded 7 new spells, including a higher tier spell for each tome.StepsYou now start combat with 3 stepsDefault starting steps for base spells changed to 0Certain base spells given a number of steps (some have more than 1)All basic starting spells start with +1 Steps secondary componentCards now changed to no longer show steps by defaultCuriosCurios no longer all trigger on cast, now they have between 1 and infinite charges, charges are spent on spell castSome Gristle curios are now "passive" (infinite charges)Added 6 curios for ShaegrinUIHovering enemies now shows their contribution to the overall damage"End turn" now glows when you are both out of cards/mana or steps. Add on hover effect for end turn when "end turn" is selectableRefresh tome curious on reward select so that you can see rarity when collecting rewardsCreate and implement pouch display UIReduce parallax spin in pouch displayChanged the tool tip spriteSlightly reduced forecast sizeCurio tooltips no indicate remaining chargesOtherMinor visual changes to the card art for certain spellsNew sounds for certain spellsSwitched to another temporary music track which should stand out lessReworked the tutorial to reflect the changes to curios and stepsBugfixesNo longer s...Read full article on Community Announcements (Nini)AnnouncementsOfficial
Playtest Extended for ANZ Indie Showcase
We’re stoked to be part of this year's showcase alongside some incredible indie games made right here "down under."Playtest Extended: To celebrate, we are continuing our playtest from May 8th (7:30pm AEST) through to May 14th!Jump in, explore, and let us know what you think, all feedback is massive for us. Huge thanks to www.theindiebrew.com.au for organizing such an awesome event!Read full article on Community Announcements (Nini)AnnouncementsOfficial
Tomebound Open Playtest
Hey folks,To celebrate Steam’s Deck Builder Fest starting today, we’re opening the vault for a brief Tomebound playtest. Feel free to jump in and do your worst, try to break the spells and find the exploits.Come chat to us, report bugs and flex your builds on our discord.Alternatively please use our Feedback Form. Happy breaking! Cheers!Read full article on Community Announcements (Nini)AnnouncementsOfficial
These Boots Are Made For Walking (Devlog 4)
Hey folks, Nini here!Today, I’m pulling back the curtain on a design challenge that has haunted us since day one: Movement. In a tactics game, movement is very important. In Tomebound we had the additional challenge of finding a system that doesn’t clash with the dual component card system.In our very first prototypes, we had dedicated movement cards. Too bad we’ll end up wasting this card art.Eventually, we moved away from those and introduced "Steps." But we quickly ran into a problem: players were juking and weaving very effectively, especially with enemies moving after they attacked.Enter: The Step PoolWe’ve recently introduced a new system that shifts the focus toward strategy. It’s taking our playtesters a little longer to get the hang of, but the payoff is much more rewarding (and gives us some juicy design levers to pull).Now, every card you play offers a specific number of steps which are added to your step Pool.Every card offers a number of steps when played, and these are added to your steps pool.To make sure you aren't a sitting duck, you’ll still start with one base step by default. This gives you at least one chance to react to enemy moves once you’ve placed your tomes. This might change as we tweak the balance.The Panic Button (Burning Cards)There are times where you can’t target enemies with any spells to accumulate steps, or maybe you want to accumulate more steps to set up a strong spell.In these moments of crisis, you can now click on the "steps" icon and burn a card to convert it directly into movement.Different tomes, cards, and Curios will now play a huge role in how you generate (and spend) your steps. This is a big shift, but it makes every card play feel significantly more impactfulCheers!Read full article on Community Announcements (Nini)
