If you're anything like me you'll have lost a few friends to miniature painting. It's subtle at first. A few photos on social media. "Hey, this is fun!" Then next thing you know they've set up an Instagram account specifically to post close-up photos of all the tiny little knights and goblins they've painstakingly painted. I get it, though: it's clearly a lot of fun, and from what I hear, brilliantly de-stressing. This is something Moonbreaker, the next game from Subnautica creator Unknown Worlds, is tapping into. It's essentially digitised tabletop wargaming, letting you indulge in this increasingly popular hobby without having to spend a fortune on models and paints, or get Berserker Bloodshade all over your jeans. It's such a good idea that I'm amazed it's taken this long for someone to make a game like this.

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I saw Moonbreaker at Gamescom, and I'll be honest: I tuned out a little when the turn-based strategy part of the game was being explained to me. It doesn't look bad, but I was just so besotted with the fact that the game also features a fully fledged miniature painting simulator. It's so true to life, in fact, that all the pre-painted units in the game have been coloured, textured, and weathered by actual miniature painters—using the same techniques they use in real life. With a 3D viewer I was able to pull a selection of impressively detailed, evocative models, zoom in, spin them around, and admire the precise brushwork of these talented artists. I'm not even into miniature painting and I was blown away by them. I feel like this game is gonna be a powerful gateway drug to this hobby.

I tried some painting myself. If you have a steady hand you can completely freestyle it for an authentic experience. But I was glad of the option to snap to a particular piece of the model, meaning I was prevented from painting outside the lines, even with my sloppy, amateurish so-called technique. I used this to paint a character's leather belt brown, then picked a darker shade to add some scuffs. It looked like a child's drawing compared to the experts' masterful paint jobs, but it was immensely satisfying nonetheless. You can even use a palette to bring in different shades of paint and realistically mix up your own colours. People are going to spend hours on this thing, and the developer tells me it's expecting some players to pick Moonbreaker up just for the painting, not the strategy layer.

It's a surprisingly deep, fully featured tool, reminiscent of digital painting software like Procreate. As well as the aforementioned colour mixing you can also swap between an airbrush, dry brush, and wash, helping you create interesting textures and convincing looking weathering. Oh, and there's an undo button, which I'm sure many miniature painters wished they had IRL. I also love the model designs, which are stylish and expressive. They have to be, because there's no animation in Moonbreaker—at least in the traditional sense. When you move a unit, you pick it up and drop it as you would a model in a real tabletop game. But the way it moves and attacks reflects the personality of the character in question: a neat idea that brings a lot of life and spark to these otherwise static boards.

Unknown Worlds really has gone all-in on the tabletop gimmick. Even the levels have been designed to look like they've been cast in resin and painted—which is evident when one of the developers zooms in on a charmingly plastic-looking waterfall. This studio makes great games, so I'm sure the turn-based strategy part of Moonbreaker will be worthwhile. But I was just so taken by the painting stuff in my Gamescom demo that I'm going to have to wait till the game hits Steam Early Access on September 29 before I get a sense of how it actually plays. I've always been intrigued by the world of miniature painting, but never quite enough to splash out and order the required kit. This, however, seems like a good (and cheaper) way to satisfy that curiosity without splattering paint everywhere.

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Andy Kelly is a Features Editor at TheGamer. He loves detective games, anything with a good story, weird indie stuff, and Alien: Isolation.