I built a game for your characters. Then I had to start again.

How the Hall led to Battlegrounds, why Jan went back to the drawing board, and what changed in Unbound.

Jan November 6, 20263 min read

Historical Battlegrounds party interface from an earlier local layout capture, showing hero cards and reserves with sample account balances. Archived predecessor interface; not current Unbound gameplay.

I wanted the characters in the Hall to have something to do together, so I made Battlegrounds. I kept adding to it. The game still didn't feel as fun as the idea in my head.

Eventually I had to start again.

I'm Jan, the artist behind FramedFantasy. I work on our portrait commissions with my team, and I built the Hall of Heroes because I wanted a place for people to share the characters they love. I liked being able to read a character's story alongside their portrait. You could get a sense of the person at the table behind them.

A room full of characters who hadn't met

The Hall kept giving me the same thought. These characters had lives in their own campaigns. What would happen if they met here?

I wanted to give them something to do. That became Battlegrounds, my first attempt at turning the Hall into a game. The idea still makes sense to me. The game I made around it didn't. It got messy, and the play didn't feel as dynamic as I wanted.

It's tempting to clean up that part of the story. To say the first version was an important milestone and move along. I was disappointed with it. That's more useful to say, because it explains why Unbound looks and plays differently.

Unbound hero choices showing Calyx the sorcerer, Cinder the monk and Raduu the rogue, with their starting and later abilities. — Where the restart led: a choice of heroes with different moves. October 30 build.

I went back to the table

I kept thinking about the board in D&D. The moment before your turn, when you're looking at where everyone is and trying to make one decent decision. Sometimes that decision is heroic. Sometimes it's remembering that you should probably stop standing next to the thing that's about to explode.

I wanted a board where you could see your options, then make a choice that changed the fight. A hero's move should give you something to work with, and the enemy should give you a reason to rethink it.

Unbound still asks you to choose your movement and your actions. The game handles the resolution around those choices. You don't have to set up a table or gather a whole group to see a fight take shape.

Heroes fighting across the burning arena. A sample fight from the October 29 development build. Silent clip.

Watch the short GIF version (animated)

Open this only if you want a repeating animation. The video above has pause controls.

Burning-ground arena battle with hero turns and effects. Silent looping FramedFantasy Unbound capture. Representative encounter staged through real game engine QA setup with automated hero decisions; not an uninterrupted progression run.

The portrait was already the beginning

When someone commissions a character, I hear about details that don't fit on a stat block. A piece of clothing they kept for a reason. A choice that changed how they see themselves. The person they keep trying to save.

Those details can guide a portrait. They can also guide a boss encounter. A character who protects everyone around them ought to feel different to fight from a character who wants you cornered.

White-haired fantasy character with a circular back tattoo and two glowing purple blades. — Which of these details would you carry into a boss fight?

That's why the new portrait and Unbound upgrade makes sense to me. You get the portrait, and the upgrade gives us room to develop a special Hall card and an official boss encounter around your character, with abilities and theme music. Those places are limited by the work each encounter needs. It's a separate upgrade, so ask me about the current scope and availability before ordering.

I want you to have an opinion

You can try Unbound here. Watch a fight before deciding what you think. Play a turn that goes well. Ideally play one that goes badly, too. That tends to reveal more.

Cinder at the first short rest, with a round reward, restored health and the Fangs of the Fire Snake ability. — One round later: Cinder has a new move to try. This is the first-round reward from an October 30 run.

Then tell me what you'd want to see. The reason I started again was that I still wanted a good game for these characters. I'd like yours to have a place in that conversation.