• Bitmap Bay is a new roguelike pirate strategy release coming soon
  • It's being developed by floppy disk artist Nick Gentry
  • Battle it out with historical pirates and deal with random events as you sail the high seas

The age of sail is one which rightly captures the imagination. And be it classics like Monkey Island or more modern takes such as Pirate Outlaws, everyone loves swashbuckling buccaneers. Now, floppy disk artist Nick Gentry is tackling a bold new retro take on the piratical format with Bitmap Bay!

Bitmap Bay is, in essence, a strategic roguelike. You'll take the helm of your own ship and set sail across a procedurally generated ocean mimicking the historical age of piracy. The goal being to build your reputation by exploring, trading and of course battling against 40 historically inspired pirates. There's a huge variety of random events that you'll need to cope with which make each playthrough different.

Grandom Games, Nick's developer, says that the focus with Bitmap Bay has been on balanced difficulty and deep but accessible gameplay. All paired with a surprisingly low-res aesthetic that harkens back to the days of old-school floppy disk gaming.

Bring me that horizon

Bitmap Bay is currently in testflight for iOS, with some rumblings of early access for Android. But either way I think that the aesthetic and concept behind it is quite the intriguing one, and I'm sure many of you agree.

Naturally, Bitmap Bay also hinges part of its appeal on being a fully offline, no-ads and a single purchase model with no microtransactions. Considering how popular pirates are, and considering the many hours of playtime to be had from a procedurally generated strategy experience like Bitmap Bay I've no doubt it'll find some popularity.

And if you think you can put your skills in strategy to the test before Bitmap Bay does release, then you're in luck. Put your skills on the battlefield where your mouth is with our list of the top 25 best strategy games on iOS and Android you can play right now!