One of my favorite iOS wargames is Shenandoah Studio’s Battle of the Bulge ($9.99), so I’ve always kept an ear out for any game that has anything to do with that company. Unfortunately, as you might already know, after releasing some really good wargames, Shenadoah went bankrupt (for reasons that aren’t totally clear) and Slitherine decided to acquire the studio. What that meant is that Slitherine also inherited the kickstarted Gettysburg: The Tide Turns, which has been in development for too many years. Recently we wrote how Slitherine had given us Q3 2016 release window for Gettysburg, and if we go by the company’s announcement of the game going into beta testing for the PC imminently, the release shouldn’t be too far off.

Now, the initial Slitherine announcement didn’t mention iOS anywhere, and that got many gamers wondering because the game was kickstarted as an iOS game first and foremost. We’ve talked in the past about Slitherine walking away from iOS to focus on PC, so the announcement got people worried that we might not see the game on iOS after all. Slitherine, though, came out today to ease any concerns and reassured players that the iOS version will come; the company just considers it easier to develop and iterate on the PC before moving on to the iOS version.

As for the game, you can see in the teaser trailer above that the game has retained its lovely battle map-like aesthetic that stood out when I first saw it. According to the announcement, the game is easy to learn thanks to its minimalistic interface but challenging thanks to its innovative activation system. The game takes inspiration from board games and randomizes when each division moves and fights, which should help make the game feel fresh over the long run. I’ve been looking forward to this one for quite some time now, and my hope is that the app works better than the “redesigned" Battle of the Bulge one that fell short of the original pre-Slitherine one. If you want to join the PC beta, go here.