What it is
Banners of Yunhe is a turn-based strategy game for one player against five computer houses. Each month every officer may do one thing: develop a city, sell grain at the market, raise or train soldiers, search for talent, send an envoy, scout a neighbour or march to war. Gold comes in once a year and the harvest once a year, so every choice is a trade between wealth, the people's trust, food and soldiers.
Invasions are fought on a hex battlefield with a river, a bridge, hills, woods, a walled gate and a keep. Take the keep to win the city, or hold out for twenty days.
The campaign is The Broken Seal: 18 cities, 6 houses and 48 officers. Every place and person in Yunhe is invented, and all the artwork is painted by the program as it runs.
Screenshots
How it plays
Cities
- Taxes in Month 1, the harvest in Month 7
- Workshops, terrace fields, waterworks and planting
- Trust, relief, levies and a market whose prices change every month
- Floods, drought and sickness
Officers
- Six roles, five attributes, loyalty and heirlooms
- Search for free officers and recruit them, or tempt a rival's
- Prisoners after battle: release them or offer them service
- Succession when a sovereign is lost
War and diplomacy
- Draft or hire soldiers, train them and buy bows and mounts
- Foot, archers and cavalry on a 13 × 9 hex field
- Alliances, gifts, requests for aid and demands to surrender
- Scouting reports that age and expire
The game
- Choose any of the six houses; two difficulties
- A seed number: the same seed and orders give the same game
- Ten save slots and an autosave; export and import
- Full keyboard control; plays fine muted
Guides
Both guides are built into the game: press Guide at the top of the screen. They are also included in every download and readable here:
- How to play: the screen, a month, officers and roles, every order, battles, saving and the keyboard (text file).
- Strategy guide: the first months, money and food, the people, officers, armies, battle tactics, diplomacy and the late game (text file).
Installing
The quickest way to play is in your browser: nothing to install, and saves are kept in that browser. Export and Import in Save / Load move a game between the browser and the desktop versions.
Windows
- Download
Banners-of-Yunhe-1.1.0-windows-x64-setup.exeand run it. - The installer is not code-signed, so Windows SmartScreen may warn you: choose More info, then Run anyway.
- Choose where to install it (no administrator rights needed). It adds Start menu and desktop shortcuts and an uninstaller.
Linux
- On Ubuntu, Kubuntu, Debian, Mint and similar systems, download
banners-of-yunhe_1.1.0_amd64.deband install it:sudo apt install ./banners-of-yunhe_1.1.0_amd64.deb - Start Banners of Yunhe from your applications menu.
On other 64-bit Linux systems use the AppImage: make it executable and run it.
chmod +x Banners-of-Yunhe-1.1.0-linux-x86_64.AppImage
./Banners-of-Yunhe-1.1.0-linux-x86_64.AppImageF11 switches full screen. The desktop version makes no network connections.
Downloads
Version 1.1.0, 7 November 2026.
Banners of Yunhe 1.1.0 for Windows
Installer for 64-bit Windows 10 and 11. Installs for your user only, with Start menu and desktop shortcuts.
SHA-256 9de4261e6398f2713003d546ad2a1afa7f04f91ab7b0a529b4b179073f8d432d
Banners of Yunhe 1.1.0 for Linux
Package for 64-bit Ubuntu 22.04 or later, Kubuntu, Debian 12 and 13, Mint and other Debian-based systems.
SHA-256 f40e342b3699c8087a114c339b487edb90e81f19413eb9c37f91ceeefe58d024
Banners of Yunhe 1.1.0 for Linux, portable
A single file for other 64-bit Linux systems: make it executable and run it. Nothing to install.
SHA-256 acf9055fd7e2c58a9e046b196551f51a1b8abed591979cbbd8b6d08d80128bc5
Banners of Yunhe 1.1.0 source code
TypeScript source, the campaign data, the rules tests and the build scripts for the browser, Linux and Windows. GNU GPL version 3 or later.
SHA-256 916d6da1d84974597534ed7a2996ede0ea02801f9232df1b9a48ffcde1e21f93
Checksums
SHA-256 checksums of all the files above.
SHA-256 2d8cd3c0edd1115035fcfe1a1c3ed7a4d550d73fb954b7e86a2b93581794154b
This is the first release. The Linux version is tested here; the Windows installer is built here but has not yet been tried on a real Windows PC. If something doesn't work or plays badly, please let me know.
What's new
1.1.0: new artwork throughout. The map changes with the seasons, with lit mountains, paddy fields, walled towns that grow with their cities and house flags that flutter. The battlefield has painted terrain, squads of soldiers under their house flags, and animated marches, charges, arrow volleys and damage. Officer seals and the title picture are repainted. End month is now in the top bar, so it is always in reach. The game can also take an artist's pictures in place of any painted one.
1.0.0: the first release: the full campaign of The Broken Seal, hex battles, ten save slots, and the how-to-play and strategy guides.
Licence and source
Banners of Yunhe is Copyright © 2026 Michael Slater. It is free software: you may copy, change and share it under the GNU General Public License, version 3 or (at your option) any later version. It comes with no warranty. It is written in TypeScript with React and PixiJS (both MIT licensed); the desktop versions use Electron. The source, with the rules engine, its tests and the build scripts, is in banners-of-yunhe-1.1.0-source.tar.gz above.
Contact
Questions, bug reports and suggestions are welcome. Email slaterm@theiguru.au, or leave a message for the sysop on the Kalgoorlie Retro BBS (telnet bbs.theiguru.au).