Yesterday, The Astronauts laid out plans for the early access launch of Witchfire, exclusive to PC via the Epic Games Store for a year. It revealed that two maps would be available, each “more or less” the size of the world in The Vanishing of Ethan Carter. The real question is: How long will early access be for?
Director Adrian Chmielarz said it will be for “About a year, maybe a couple of extra months more – but that’s it. We don’t plan on dragging it forever.” An early access roadmap will also be available after launch on the website and store page. Controller support is also promised, and there will be character progression outside of runs, though to what extent remains to be seen.
While the game pauses when entering menus, you can’t quit a run and resume it midway. As for whether co-op will ever happen, Chmielarz stated, “For now and possibly forever, this is a single-player game.”
“There is a very slight chance we will attempt to do co-op, but please do not count on it. Witchfire works very well as a single-player experience, and we’re not sure if we want to risk destroying that feeling. Apart from all the potential technical challenges of co-op, of course.”
As for other post-launch plans, The Astronauts will “be doing everything we can to make it the best game possible”, and updates will stop “only when we are all fully satisfied with the results.”
A new video is coming soon, which will outline the gameplay loop, so stay tuned for that. Witchfire launches into early access on September 20th.
