I love the great outdoors. Working in games media means it’s easy to be cooped up all day, so I make a point of getting out and going for a walk somewhere, anywhere, once a day. Sometimes I explore a park, sometimes I walk through a city, sometimes I just walk as far as a shop next door and grab a cup of coffee. Either way, I get out and enjoy the beautiful scenery Ireland has to offer.
Given this love for the outdoors, you’d think that one of the countless survival games—where you get closer to nature than you probably ever want—might finally click with me. But none ever have. That is, until Witchspire.
### Thriving Instead of Just Surviving
Witchspire might finally be the survival game that gets its hooks into me. The secret? It shifts the focus from just surviving to truly thriving. By de-emphasizing the survival aspect commonly found in open-world survival games, the experience becomes more about open-world living, which is quite nice—especially when you’re inhabiting a magical world where you collect the spirits of monsters to help you fight as familiars.
There are definitely survival elements. You’ll be cutting down trees to build a homestead, for example. But Witchspire massively streamlines these tasks with the help of its magical backdrop. Instead of punching a tree ten times until it falls, you wield magic that lets you toss ethereal axes at multiple trees to speed up the process. What’s more, if you accidentally partake in a bit of deforestation while gathering wood, you can cast a spell to regrow trees instantly.
### Building Made Easier with Magic
The game’s enchanting setup also allows the developers to play with genre conventions, making building your home less of a hassle. In many survival games, I’ve seen the elaborate bases and forts that high-level players create and wished I could craft something similar—but the building processes in those games can be finicky and frustrating, especially in first or third person.
Witchspire changes that by letting you take an aerial view and astrally project your soul while building. This perspective gives you a much better, more holistic view of your construction, making the entire experience smoother and more enjoyable.
### A Streamlined Survival Experience
Envar Games, the studio behind Witchspire, explained their approach: they wanted the world to feel less hostile when you start out, creating a more “streamlined survival game.” This is evident the moment you enter the open world—there are no energy, hunger, or thirst meters to manage.
While this approach makes the early hours more forgiving, it’s designed to get players faster to the “good stuff.” Just like games such as *The Long Dark* have pushed players from rough survival to crafting impressive homesteads or diving into more complex combat without spending hours on menial tasks, Witchspire aims to do the same.
As you explore, Envar warns that “the world will start to push back.” This became clear during a developer demo, where teleporting to a higher-level area revealed how the player’s familiar struggled to deal meaningful damage to surrounding fauna, signaling that the challenge ramps up as you delve deeper.
### Fun with Familiar Friends
One of the aspects that helped Witchspire stand out for me—especially as someone often skeptical about the survival genre—is its combat system involving familiars.
Instead of simply scavenging solo or with your party, you quickly tame animal companions. When you defeat wildlife in the game, their spirits don’t die; they depart their bodies to begin a journey of reincarnation elsewhere in the world. Occasionally, their spirits linger, giving you a chance to capture, tame, or recruit (whichever term feels best to you) a magical monster to fight alongside you.
These familiars come with different skills and rarities, much like Pokémon. In fact, the system feels similar to Pokémon’s recent *Legends* titles—not just in the collecting and leveling mechanics but also in combat, which plays out in real time. Your familiar fights alongside you, taking commands as you give them, while you cast offensive spells to keep enemies at bay.
### The Core Loop
This blend of streamlined survival with RPG-style monster catching shapes the core loop of Witchspire. You’ll level up your own character alongside your familiars, gaining access to a skill tree that unlocks new abilities—ranging from improved resource gathering to magical powers like the ethereal axes for cutting multiple trees at once.
All of this progress is focused on one goal: reaching the central island on the map and climbing the Witchspire. To do this, you’ll need a witch’s traditional form of transportation—a flying broom.
### Learning and Growing
While Witchspire is still some time away from a full 1.0 release, the team plans an early access launch in 2026. The developers seem confident in the game’s current identity but view early access as a valuable period to fine-tune the balance between traditional survival gameplay and monster taming.
Though it’s unlikely Envar will add a hunger meter anytime soon, they are open to adjusting how quickly and harshly the world pushes back based on player feedback and telemetry.
### Final Thoughts
As it stands, Witchspire looks to be one of the rare survival games I’ll be watching closely, mainly because it’s willing to experiment with other genres and challenge survival game conventions. That said, it remains to be seen whether players eager to jump into an “open world survival crafting game” (as its Steam page lists it) will share my enthusiasm.
This preview is based on a PC demo viewed over Discord. The final product is subject to change.
https://www.shacknews.com/article/146492/witchspires-relaxed-vibe-and-survival-game-influences-seem-like-a-unique-spin-on-the-genre
