ORIGAMI OCTOPUSGAMES

INDEPENDENT GAMES / A FEW DIFFERENT DIRECTIONS

Eight arms. Lots of ideas.

Moody chess pieces. Rowdy animal taverns. Bird overlords. Overgrown spaceships. Quiet neon fish. Welcome to the Origami Octopus game shelf.

Origami Octopus Games: a brightly colored folded-paper octopus

01 / PLAY NOW

Current games

Pick a world. Play online or take it offline.

Rowdy Rooks artwork: a neon lion, raccoon and gorilla behind a glowing green rook on a synthwave chessboard

AUTO-CHESS / ROGUELIKE

Rowdy RooksComing soon to Steam

Chess, but you don't move the pieces. Their moods do.

Every piece has a mood, and the mood makes the move. The Glutton takes anything it can reach. The Coward runs. The Vengeful hunts whoever took its friend. The Zealot charges the King. Draft a club full of personalities, read the enemy's moods, and set your pieces up so their instincts walk straight into your forks. Then press Fight and watch it play out.

Forks, pins, checks and checkmates all score Chips × Mult. Collect rule-bending Openings, survive four Nights at the club, and keep going in Endless while the score climbs into the millions.

Rowdy Rooks key art with the neon Rowdy Rooks logo
  • 188 Openings to collect
  • 24 Grandmaster bosses
  • 12 starting clubs
  • 4 Nights, then Endless
  • Daily run and world leaderboard
  • Synthwave soundtrack
A battle in progress: moody pieces score a Promotion while the move log tallies Chips and Mult
The battle plays itself
The Undertaker's neon sign lights up before a Grandmaster battle
Meet the Grandmaster
The scoresheet after a win: every tactic, its Chips and Mult, and the payout
Read the scoresheet
The shop between battles: buy pieces, Openings and Tactics, then arrange the board
Shop and set the trap
Pick your club: twelve starting armies, each with its own house rule
Pick your club

24 Grandmasters. Each one breaks a rule.

The Tyrant neon sign. A Glutton or Stoic Queen joins the enemy army.
The Tyrant
The Critic neon sign. Each Tactic scores in full once, then at half.
The Critic
The Drunkard neon sign. Every piece on the board is Drunk, yours too.
The Drunkard
The Gambler neon sign. The target is rolled, anywhere from ×0.7 to ×1.5.
The Gambler
The Turncoat neon sign. On turn 20 your most valuable piece changes sides.
The Turncoat
The Mirror neon sign. The enemy army is an exact mirror of yours.
The Mirror
The Pit neon sign. The four centre squares are holes.
The Pit
The Clock neon sign. This battle lasts only 28 turns.
The Clock
The Copycat neon sign. Every enemy takes the mood of the piece you just moved.
The Copycat
The Mob neon sign. All Pawns and Knights, three rows deep.
The Mob
The Wall neon sign. The enemy fields a full row of Sentry Pawns.
The Wall
The Rewriter neon sign. Two of your pieces get random new moods.
The Rewriter
The Undertaker neon sign. Every piece you lose costs you 2 Mult.
The Undertaker
The Bouncer neon sign. Your most expensive piece sits this battle out.
The Bouncer
The Heckler neon sign. Check and Double Check score nothing.
The Heckler
The Fog neon sign. Enemy moods are hidden until a piece moves.
The Fog
The Arbiter neon sign. Moods are suspended for the first 8 turns.
The Arbiter
The Censor neon sign. Your most-studied Tactic is forgotten.
The Censor
The Taxman neon sign. No interest is paid after this battle.
The Taxman
The Miser neon sign. Capture Chips are halved.
The Miser
The Escape Artist neon sign. Checkmate starts at ×1 here.
The Escape Artist
The Collector neon sign. Your first capture of each piece type scores nothing.
The Collector
The Landlord neon sign. Pieces that never left home cost you Mult.
The Landlord
The Heirloom neon sign. No checks while the enemy King keeps 3 or more officers.
The Heirloom

NEW SHORTS EVERY DAY

Watch Rowdy Rooks in action

Fresh clips go up twice a day: Coward armies, drunk bosses, chains that won't stop, and scores that get out of hand. The player shows every Short released so far.

All Rowdy Rooks Shorts on YouTube ↗Follow on TikTok @origamioctopusgames ↗

Play the free demo in your browser now (Nights 1 and 2). The full game is coming soon to Steam.

Play free at rowdyrooks.com Coming soon to Steam
Critter Cantina: Animal Bar artwork

DECK BUILDING / TAVERN MANAGEMENT

Critter CantinaAnimal Bar

A deck-building tavern management game where an ever-growing cast of animals show up each turn. Seat and serve them—then find out how the drunks mess up your bar!

Saboteur Sasha's Drunk Check: tips and drunk animal effects
Drunk Check
Closing time: bar value, closing receipt and run statistics
Closing Time
Build your bar: buying tables, drink capacity and new workers
Build Your Bar

Play in your browser, or download the offline-compatible app from the game site.

Play or download the app Critter Cantina on itch.io ↗
Neon Reef artwork

CREATIVE / AMBIENT AQUARIUM

Neon Reef

A quiet tank. Draw a shape and it becomes a creature in a calm, musical tank: your outline decides how it moves, sings, and plays!

Part idle game, part simulator, part zen garden, part lofi jukebox, part screensaver. No goals, no score, no timers—just a tank that keeps living whether you're watching or not.

Neon Reef gameplay: hand-drawn neon creatures swimming through a living aquarium
Watch the Neon Reef trailer on YouTube

Play in your browser, or download the offline-compatible app from the game site.

Play or download the app Neon Reef on itch.io ↗
Ostrich Overlords: Fit for Duty artwork

SQUAD MANAGEMENT / FITNESS

Ostrich OverlordsFit For Duty

A fitness tracker disguised as a squad-command campaign. Your steps, water, reps, and square meals become the radar, medi-kits, and firepower your soldiers take into battle against the flying alien-enhanced ostriches!

The browser game is available now. Step tracking uses the Android app; store release is in preparation.

Ostrich Overlords gameplay: radar, squad resources and an active recovery mission
Play Ostrich Overlords

02 / IN THE WORKSHOP

What's taking shape

Works in progress. Plans can change.

IN DEVELOPMENT

GRAFT

BULLET HELL / ROGUELITE

GRAFT title screen: Reyes in black armor faces a glowing turquoise garden in an overgrown spacecraft

A colony ship has been swallowed by the Bloom. Fight through its overgrown decks and graft the enemy's biology onto your own body. Every new power brings you closer to the thing you're fighting. The dead officers ride along as salvaged neural chips, advising you, judging you, and watching you become it.

A developing game with no announced release date.

Watch the GRAFT preview on YouTube
PUBLIC PLAYTEST

Ostrich Overlords:
Boarding Party

TACTICAL SQUAD CONTROL

Board enemy ships, open and seal bulkheads, steer your squads, capture navigation archives, and bring your personnel home alive.

Try the Boarding Party playtest ↗
PROTOTYPE

Dead Air

RADIO CRISIS STRATEGY

A rain-soaked late-night radio studio with a mixing desk and tape machines

Keep a town listening. One transmitter, eight minutes until midnight. Work the night shift at WZRD 88.7 and decide which claims go on air, then hear what happens next.

Play Dead Air ↗

03 / PROTOTYPES & EARLY IDEAS

The other arms

Experiments, working titles, and possible next games.

Some ideas become full games. Some stay experiments. And some go in the trash!

Three experiments from the 22-project notebook.

Infinite Alpha Strike

One operative. A tactical puzzle.Prototype

A solo skirmish tactics experiment built around operative selection, stealth, and careful decisions.

Prototype / working title. No release announced.

Cutthroat Cauldrons

The potluck brew-off!Prototype

The potluck brew-off! To create the most delicious concoction possible, each witch takes turns handpicking their ingredients—but beware, your coven is quite competitive and might have some tricks! A handful of special ingredients modify each game. Designed for 3-6 witches.

Prototype / working title. No release announced.

Hungry the Bear

Hide. Listen. Make it to morning.Prototype

A horror-lite hide-and-seek game for solo play or parent-and-child pass-and-play. Hiding spots disappear as the nights get more dangerous.

Prototype / working title. No release announced.

Browse the other 19 projects

AFTER-IMAGE

The Bloom, in short bursts.Concept

A rapid-run experiment in the GRAFT universe: watch the descent, study the replay, draft against what killed you, and go again.

Early idea / working title. No release announced.

Afterbloom

Tend a swarm of light.Concept

Tune the rhythms, colors, and clustering of bioluminescent wisps, then send them into a shared dark field. An early ambient game concept.

Early idea / working title. No release announced.

ANTLINE

Three trails. Two anthills.Concept

A lane battler where waves of bugs fight automatically and your deck shapes their chances. Build spawners, issue orders, and break the opposing towers.

Early idea / working title. No release announced.

Big Iron

A Western-themed shootout with over +50 cowboys.Prototype

A Western-themed shootout with over +50 cowboys. A love song to movie and anime. Scaling mods challenge your reflexes!

Prototype / working title. No release announced.

Dispatch

Plan the economy. Command the battle.Concept

An early RTS concept combining production queues you set up in advance with a handful of live commander abilities.

Early idea / working title. No release announced.

Ember Run

Bank the haul, or go one zone deeper.Concept

A push-your-luck salvage concept set in a dying underground power grid. Strip charge cores, survive security drones, and decide when to cash out.

Early idea / working title. No release announced.

FRONT LINE

Six rounds. Secret orders. About three minutes.Concept

Every round, both sides secretly commit one order, then the armies auto-clash. No unit micro, just scouting, timing, and commitment.

Early idea / working title. No release announced.

Get the Cheese!

Second mouse gets the cheese.Prototype

A simultaneous-choice microgame for two or three players. Try to be the second mouse to reach the cheese: first springs the trap, last misses out.

Prototype / working title. No release announced.

Golem Boxing

A golem boxing experiment.Prototype

An early boxing project with playable simulation and economy experiments. Working title; no release announced.

Prototype / working title. No release announced.

Losing Lovers

Every secret is a thread someone can pull.Prototype

A relationship simulation set in a large social circle, where conversations build trust, attraction, and suspicion.

Prototype / working title. No release announced.

OVERMIND

One shared market. One shared clock.Concept

A real-time card engine battler with a finite card pool. Build economy, acquire technology, and pressure the opposing base as the clock keeps moving.

Early idea / working title. No release announced.

PAPER TEETH: Split the Saint

Fight through the permanent parade.Prototype

A solo combat experiment in a neon pageant carrying the faces of dead gods. Break armor, interrupt attacks, and expose the heart.

Prototype / working title. No release announced.

Petal Pairs

A quiet garden with difficult decisions.Prototype

Pair numbered seed tiles, spend your blooms carefully, and try to reach each season's growth target.

Prototype / working title. No release announced.

REFUSE

Fight what you left behind.Prototype

Draft a loadout, then watch it auto-resolve against a gauntlet built entirely out of the cards you refused.

Prototype / working title. No release announced.

RUNBACK

You coach the kid who plays.Prototype

A fighting game coaching simulation. Choose training, study opponents, and make adjustments between games; the fighter handles the buttons.

Prototype / working title. No release announced.

SILENT PODS

You see the whole map. The squad doesn't see you.Concept

Plan the hidden side of a tactical encounter. Commit your position blind, before the enemy squad picks its path, then slip a hidden asset past them.

Early idea / working title. No release announced.

Sneaking Puff Puff Past

A stealth-comedy experiment.Prototype

A series of increasingly risky stealth situations, built around detection, timing, and isometric dioramas.

Prototype / working title. No release announced.

SPLIT SECOND

Plan the heist. React when it goes loud.Concept

Two rival crews raid opposing vaults. Careful planning gives way to quick combat reactions under one shared reserve clock.

Early idea / working title. No release announced.

Woods Story

Hidden objectives in a small woodland world.Prototype

A three-player hidden-objective card game experiment.

Prototype / working title. No release announced.

05 / THE PEOPLE BEHIND THE PLAYTESTS

Thank You

I'm a life-long gamer making games for other gamers. So if you're reading this, you have my sincere thanks.

Whether you've been here since the early builds, or don't even know me IRL, this all exists because friends kept showing interest, sharing ideas, finding bugs, and helping me make better games. That's a gift I don't take lightly. I appreciate you being here!!

04 / THE PERSON BEHIND THE GAMES

About me

Christopher Morgan playing a video game as a child
Been at this a while.

Christopher Morgan (@AndLoHeSpoke)

Father / Game Designer / Bullet Chess / Publisher / Poet / Lebanese / Mecha'thun Druid / Golgari / MortarBait / Proxy Hatch / Alekhine's Defense / Haqqislam / Dahshat Company / Jinteki / Anarchs / DnD 3.5 / knights > bishops / Rogue (Black Control) Decks / Urgot / Faust + Zappa + Venom+ / Ganondorf / HP Stack Pyg / Maokai Mill / Bombs for Hands / Lifelong Gamer ////

THE STUDIO

Origami Octopus Games

Independent games by Christopher Morgan. A growing collection of strategy, strange creatures, small experiments, and worlds worth coming back to.

Instagram @origamioctopusgames ↗
Facebook @origamioctopusgames ↗
YouTube @OrigamiOctopusGames ↗
TikTok @origamioctopusgames ↗
Discord: Origami Octopus Games ↗
Get in touch ↗
Thank You
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