In this Blight: Survival article, we will be going through everything we know about the upcoming Extraction-Lite game. If you’ve been looking for a new Co-Op Action Survival game, then Blight: Survival might just be it!
Blight: Survival Everything We Know About the Upcoming Co-Op Medieval Roguelite
Haenir Studios has been working diligently on their debut IP Blight: Survival, an upcoming Zombie Medieval title that will combine Extraction, ARPG and Roguelite aspects with Co-Op. A Lot of people are calling this Medieval The Last of Us, and given that Last of Us II’s multiplayer just got cancelled a few days ago, maybe this game will scratch that itch for a lot of people.
Blight: Survival has been in the works for about a year and a half now, but has just properly kicked into gear since April now that the team has expanded from 2 indie devs to 12 veteran developers. The latest official gameplay trailer released about a year ago, was met with huge interest, and the game has gained a massive following with 650,000 Wishlists on Steam as of today. Let’s check out what’s new, with this title, and catch you up to speed if you haven’t heard of it before.
Story and Setting
Blight: Survival takes place in an alternate 14th century where a ceaseless war has broken out between 2 kingdoms, and the player, a Writhen, finds themselves in No Man’s Land in a full suit of shiny armour. Because of the substantial amount of corpses from the conflict, a new strain of deadly affliction named the Blight has immerged from the remains of the fallen. It grows stronger everyday from the blood spilled in war, rapidly spreading and turning men into monsters. Now, friends and foe alike have become blighted fiends, and the Writhen has been tasked to venture forth and vanquish the Blight.
You and up to three other trusty Writhen knights in clad iron armour will be going against monsters and enemy Knights from the warring kingdom in a desperate attempt to reach and destroy the source of the Blight. The motivation behind this goal lies in your origins; the Writhen are a nomadic tribe that were cast out from their kingdom as a result of having caused the Blight, or so the kingdom claims. Now, they roam the world in hopes of ridding it from the Blight so they may return and reclaim their homeland once more.
Core Gameplay and Genre
So, how does this translate into a game? Blight: Survival can be described as a Medieval Extraction with Roguelite elements, as well as Zombies and Co-Op. It is a 4 player experience, but can be played solo and in offline mode. From what’s been announced so far, it looks like players can choose missions through a hub called the Camp to venture into the area between 2 kingdoms, No Man’s Land, and fight to survive as long as they can to reap as many rewards as possible, or die trying.
Within these levels, you will be able to find Medieval Zombies, Enemy Knights, Wildlife, equippable items and various points of interest that provide lore scattered throughout as you make your best attempt to survive the 14th-century apocalypse.
The Roguelite aspect of the game comes into play if you die. If you survive by successfully extracting, you get to keep all items you have gathered and venture deeper into No Mans’s Land. If you die, you lose all your equipment and only keep a bit of experience that carries over to your next of kin, carrying on the lineage of your bloodline. It’s important to note that this game will have no classes, so you will be building your character as you progress without being locked to choosing a certain weapon because you chose a specific class early on.
Haenir Studio have coined the hybrid genre for this game as an Extraction-Lite since they combine things you would find in an extraction game with roguelite elements, but they are also planning to implement RPG mechanics as well. Exploring the map and killing enemies will reward you with loot like crafting materials, coins, weapons, armour and XP.
To use those crafting materials, players can pay an Artisan back at the camp to upgrade their gear. To upgrade gear, the player needs to upgrade individual gear slots in their armour and weapons which make up the whole item. For example, the knight’s signature Bascinet is composed of a Coif, a Visor, and the Bascinet itself, and each of those individual pieces can be upgraded using Materials and Coins. You can also spend your crafting materials and coins on crafting Remedies, such as bandages, torches, herbs and potions.
Crafting will likely be the main progression players will experience in this game, as you will unlock new weapon type movesets, new armour types and useful remedies that may get you out of a pinch. However, every single one of the items that you gain will likely be lost when you die, giving the player a huge incentive to be more strategic and careful so as to avoid losing their progress.
Apart from crafting, another RPG mechanic that is going to be added is an XP mechanic. It’s not exactly clear which of the mechanics XP is used for yet, but it’s likely that it could be a currency level Player Attributes that in the game, of which so far there are 3: Skill, Endurance and Vitality. There will also be Talents and Traits that you can acquire, but not a lot of information exists on their implementation, though we do know they will be present in the game. Remember that if you die, you get to keep some of this XP for your next character, so you will get stronger even when you fail.
Another cool RPG feature is the religion in the game. You may have noticed in the gameplay trailer that the player could make offerings to a sculpture; these are likely sculptures dedicated to the deities of this fictional 14th century world. Providing an offering to one of the several religions can result in acquiring a random blessing for the rest of the run, somewhat similar to Hades.
Overall, on paper the game seems to blend and tie up these genres quite nicely, with a clear image of a satisfying progression system and a good risk and reward mechanic with choosing when you want to extract.
Medieval Combat
Haenir Studio have stated that they took inspiration from the Dark Souls series for their combat system, as well as Mount and Blade, which if you haven’t played, has a directional combat system where you can swing your sword in different angles to block and attack enemies. The system is easy to get into, but hard to “git good” at, allowing some skill expression.
The official twitter account for Blight: Survival posted a video a few days back showcasing the 5 direction combat system with their own twist, as certain directional attacks will be more effective against specific enemies, and as you progress in the game, you will be able to unlock new movesets to spice up your playstyle.
The combat shown in the pre-alpha gameplay trailer has a very weighty feeling to it, with each attack visibly staggering the enemy and the killing blow finishing them off with a satisfying brutality cutscene like you would see in God of War. Since enemies seem to be fairly easy to take out, there is a stamina bar that we can see in action to counterbalance that.
The way you can approach combat is really diverse, with parrying, dodging and blocking in the game to mix up playstyles, as well as ranged weapons. There is a run mechanic where you can Leroy Jenkins charge straight into enemies, knocking them down in a clean setup for a finisher with your sword. Or, you can stealth right up to enemies and assassinate them to avoid any possible danger.
What’s really interesting about the stealth combat is that the devs have actually thought about the armour you wear while crouching or proning, and have stated that different armour types will have a different impact to the noise you make while performing either of these movements, so wearing that clanky knight armour will negatively affect your stealth experience, whereas wearing leather armour will make stealth much easier.
As for enemies, so far there have been 3 Blight enemies confirmed; the Rattler, a common infected peasant or knight, the Swelter, a special mutant merging of 2 enemies that releases toxic gas and the Bellower, another merged enemy that screams to attract more infected to your position. Of course, the game is a WIP so it’s pretty safe to say they will be adding many more enemies, and probably even bosses to the game as well, on top of human enemies.
Audio and Visuals
Despite being in a very early stage, the graphics from the pre-alpha stage look phenomenal. Haenir Studios has chosen to use UE5 in this development, and the mastery really shows. The highly detailed environments look really immersive from the trailer, with beams of sunlight seeping through the trees, lights from torches reflecting off your armour, and the overall fidelity having a level of clarity and sharpness that is really impressive.
The overall atmosphere of the map in the trailer is very desolate, being what looks to be an abandoned village or outpost of sorts that has just seen the aftermath of a great battle. Corpses, some overrun with blight, litter the ground, fires can be seen everywhere, and once sturdy wooden barricades have fallen apart. The rest of the environment outside looks great too, in the foggy marsh and near the sunny wheatfield. Overall, the game boasts some really realistic graphics that will probably pull anyone into at least trying out the game.
Another aspect of the impressive visuals is the animations. The animations of the knight attacking and moving around are very smooth and impactful when it needs to be, like when the knight stabs a Rattler right through the jaw, with blood splattering all over the screen, or when another Rattler tanks an arrow right to the head, and stands for a second before flopping over and falling to the floor.
With all the new movesets coming in the form of weapon types, it will be interesting to see what cool finishers or attacks come next, and if they can top the animations we have seen so far.
One final thing I want to mention in the graphics category is the UI. UI is not usually a huge deal when it comes to graphics in previews, but the design of just picking up the Belsorian Guard adds a noteworthy aesthetic touch. The detail that went into it gives the game an added feeling of polish, in just a pre-alpha stage.
Release Date and Platforms
Blight: Survival is in very early development as of now, and does not have an official release date, or even an expected year. The game started out with just 2 Scandinavian indie devs, and turned into a proper team project only about 8 months ago, so it may be a while before we get any kind of confirmation or projected release date. Keep in mind that since this game is not even in early access, a lot of the stuff we have talked about is subject to change.
That being said, it’s likely that the game will launch at least an alpha sometime during 2025 unless the scope of the game widens even further. As for platforms, there are plans to launch the game on PC with full controller support, as well as Xbox Series X and Playstation 5.
Final Thoughts
Based on what we have seen and know so far, Blight: Survival is looking to be a fantastic game that aims to strike gold with their new creative concept of an Extraction-Lite. It’s very clearly a passion project that aims to deliver with only the best possible product that they can make, and definitely is something you should be putting on your radar for upcoming games. Hopefully, they will be able to find the time and resources to not only develop, but publish a finished product that will maintain the level of polish and appeal that the trailer and media we have seen so far promise.
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