About

Chesstris.com is home to puzzle games conceived and created by Martin Grider. It’s a playground and a game development blog as well as a forum for me to openly discuss the casual games that I love. I like to think of these as casual games for people who like to think.

I am, perhaps obviously, inspired by board games, and especially those that require much strategic thinking, or “brain burning”. I imagine there is a very tangible link between action puzzle games and abstract strategy board games, both in concept, and also how these games focus your thoughts into a repetition of their specific logic.

More information about Martin can be found all over the web (just google it!). Martin has been developing iPhone applications since late 2008. Before that, he cut his programming chops working on server-side web development. He’s written games using both the high level Objective-C APIs as well as dabbled in in C++ and raw OpenGL ES draw calls for maximum cross-platform compatibility. He is passionate about mobile game development and game design for video games and board games. He is a proud member of the IGDA, where he has presented for the local Twin Cities chapter on iPhone Game Development and his own games. Recently, he started a group focused on mobile game design and development in Minnesota.


Bibliography

Video games I have worked on

  • For The Win (2012) – An iPhone board game conversion I worked on for Tasty Minstrel Games. I did all the iOS development.
  • Oppo-Citrus (2012) – My take on the opposite of Tetris. This was my concept and I did all the development sans graphics and music/SFX.
  • Tic Tac Math (2010) – I developed the original version of this app, as well as the second (Universal) release for IPMG while working at Clockwork.
  • ActionChess (2009) – This was my first iOS app, as well as the inspiration for this domain name. It was my idea, and I still think that idea hasn’t reached its full potential.
  • Go-Tetris! (2007) – This was my first game, written in ActionScript 2.0. It was also my first (and last) flash app of any kind. It’s my original idea, and I did all the graphics as well as development.

Board games I have worked on

  • Eat Thyself (2012) – A simple abstract strategy game created for the 2012 Global Game Jam. (BGG)
  • Spice (2011) – An abstract game using the Shibumi game system. Spice is based on another game called Ketchup.
  • SIX D SIX (2011) – This is actually a game “system”. I challenged myself to design a bunch of games (ended up with six) that use dice but do not feel random in their outcomes. (BGG)

Talks & Presentations