You would think that with 17 million copies sold to date over the last five years, Valheim has been ready for prime time for years. But after debuting the game in early access in 2021, Valheim developer Iron Gate is finally ready to announce that the game has hit its 1.0 status.
Published by Coffee Stain Publishing, the game is available tomorrow across Steam on the PC, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series XIS, Nintendo Switch 2, Linux and Mac. The fantasy survival open world adventure game is available as an online co-op title. It releases on September 9, but after years of early access, the game already holds a 93% Very Positive rating on Steam from more than 540,000 player reviews. Among the fans: sci-fi author Neal Stephenson.
At Gamescom in Germany, I did an interview with Lisa Kolfjord, senior artist; and Andreas Tomasson, QA manager and lead designer at Iron Gate. The fact that they have gotten to 1.0 is pretty amazing. Valheim was built for early access by a team of just five people. They released it in the middle of the pandemic, and players latched onto it as a way to play a social game when they couldn’t go out and meet their friends in public. It became a spectacular success.
There are now eight people on the team that, five years later, has taken the game to 1.0.
“We have also always liked the idea of being a small company, and we think that has been good for us and good for the game,” Kolfjord said.
Valheim is a collaborative survival game for one to 10 players set in a viking-inspired afterlife filled with deadly creatures and enemies. Players can build settlements and venture across the seas with friends in a brutal environment stacked against them, while crafting weapons and tools scavenged from their surroundings. And with this launch, you get the final piece of the puzzle for the world of Valheim: the Deep North.
Slain in battle, you have been carried to the tenth world. Here, in Valheim, you must conquer the realm and defeat the monsters which Odin banished here long ago. Explore deep forests and freezing mountains, build new settlements on the other side of vast seas – and gain the Allfather’s favour to become worthy of Valhalla.
Explore a world shrouded in mystery, discover distinct environments with unique enemies to battle, resources to gather and secrets to uncover. Become a viking, sail the open seas in search of lands unknown, and fight bloodthirsty monsters. Battle, build, and conquer your way to a saga worthy of Odin’s patronage.
Valheim was launched into Steam Early Access in February 2021 to universal critical acclaim, with millions of vikings setting foot in the game’s procedurally generated lands.
Gameplay features
● Massive procedurally-generated world where every biome is immersive and distinct, with unique enemies, resources and crafting recipes to discover.
● Play alone or with up to 10 players on player-hosted dedicated servers and experience unlimited world creation and enemies that scale in difficulty.
● Stamina based combat that rewards preparation and skill. Utilize weapon types with unique attacks, different blocking styles, ranged combat, dodges and parries to fight your enemies.
● A rewarding food system where you cannot starve and are not punished for not eating, instead you gain health, stamina and regeneration buffs depending on what foods you consume.
● Intuitive crafting where recipes are discovered as you explore the world, and pick up new resources and ingredients.
● Flexible building system that takes structural integrity and ventilation into account. Build a small shelter or an entire village, make outposts or claim abandoned buildings as your own. Then customize to your liking.
● Sail boats and ships to reach distant lands and explore the sea that offers riches to claim and monsters to fight.
● Epic boss fights that will test even the best prepared vikings and offer rewards that help you on your journey.
Iron Gate is a game developer studio located in Skövde, Sweden, founded by industry veterans who previously worked on games such as Magicka 2, Leviathan: Warships, and the Titan Quest series. Valheim, Iron Gate’s debut title, is a record breaking multiplayer exploration and survival game inspired by viking culture that arrived to Steam Early Access in February 2021. To find out more about Iron Gate, visit the official website.
Coffee Stain, meanwhile, is a game developer, publisher and investor with offices in Skövde, Stockholm, Malmö, Trollhättan and Gothenburg. Founded in 2010, Coffee Stain is responsible for Goat Simulator, the Sanctum Games, A Story About My Uncle, Huntdown, and Satisfactory. Coffee Stain is also the publisher of popular games such as Deep Rock Galactic, Valheim, Songs of Conquest, Goat Simulator 3 and Midnight Ghost Hunt, made by external developers.
Content updates
Since its early access release in 2021, Valheim has received a range of content updates including:
● Hearth & Home, introducing a range of new furniture pieces, an overhauled food and stamina system, new crafting stations and the taming system
● Mistlands Biome Update that revealed a new biome shrouded in mystery and mist, bringing with it a new magic system, the friendly (?) Dvergr and a plethora of new enemies with wings and mandibles galore
● Hildir’s Request, introducing a new vendor called Hildir, mini-bosses, a range of new clothing and armor, and adjustable difficulty settings
● The Bog Witch, adding a new vendor into the Swamps biome, expanding the cooking and farming skills, adding a range of new tonics and draughts and fleshing out existing biomes with new ingredients
● Ashlands Biome Update that thrust players into the most violent biome yet against an onslaught of skeletal enemies and cursed monsters, introducing siege engines, weapon enchantments and more
● Call to Arms Update, overhauling the combat system, reworking parrying, introducing new trinket items and adrenaline and yes, you read that right, bears.
● Deep North Biome Update that releases alongside Valheim 1.0, and with it a new land hidden in snow and wrought with ancient evils and lurking threats, serving as the ultimate test of players’ might as they seek to impress Odin and ascend to Valhalla.
Developer interview
In our interview, Tomasson said that the game’s new trailer makes you wish that Valheim was like an anime series instead of game. He noted there are cinematics to unlock at various parts of the game. Your job is to save the world.
Kolfjord noted that Valheim went into early access in February 2001or about five and half years, to be more exact. In the Deep North, she noted that the first thing you meet when you arrive is “super ice.” There are some baby seals. You can ignore them, kill them or otherwise enjoy them. Kolfjord made the seals so she was not pleased that Tomasson was killing them in our demo.
Then you can start fighting enemies, including a giant troll inspired by Norse mythology.
“The story that we have given them here is that they are the trolls from the beginning of the game, but much older, and they are slowly turning into stone and becoming part of the nature. And they are also very different from all of our other enemies. When you kill them, they will petrify into stone. Then you can mine his body for the new materials,” Kolfjord said.
The new area is bigger than Ashland, which came before the Deep North.
“We have other biomes, where we mix and match all the different islands. But since we were adding them later on as well, and we prepared the game way back to be like ready for these biomes, it made more sense and also easier for players to find a way through,” Tomasson said.
The recent regions now have a lot more detail. In the past, they were empty places. There’s a lot more content now where there used to be nothing. There are two dungeons in the biome, multiple new enemies, several new armor sets, like a blood thunder sword and a frost ax. there are new mage weapons as well that fire thunder or beams of light.
As they demoed the game, a moose wandered into view. Kolfjord created the moose, and she noted you can tame the moose and ride it.
In the particular mission at hand, Kolfjord said, “We have to find like a special altar in the dungeons, and that will trigger an event that starts all over the world. So you will have to travel to those places and start those events to finally be able to unlock something.”
There’s a new grappling hook which you will be able to use earlier in the game and navigate vertical areas more easily. The new terrain has a lot of mountains and high tops to reach. you can bring everything you have crafted into these worlds — all of your weapons, your armor, and more, Kolfjord said. Now there’s more story to the game.
“We haven’t really had a strong lore in the past. We’ve never been very lore focused. But since we are making an ending for the game, we want to tie it all together and make it make sense. So we have the interesting method that tells the story of how or why the viking has woken up in Valheim, and then will try to get to the final boss,” Kolfjord said.
Kolfjord said there is a lot of new content that could entice new players into the game. They can join the world and play with many different play styles. They don’t have to fight. And now they can join a world with a complete story and an ending to the experience.
“You can be the adventurer or the fighter or the builder. You don’t have to be like the super good gamer if you don’t like fighting. You can build the bases, and your gamer friend can do the difficult tasks. So it’s a game that works well for most friend groups, I would say, because it caters to different people,” Kolfjord said.
The menu is easier to use, as it’s easier to navigate through a lot of items now. Those who spent a lot of time with it have to get used to the change, as it’s like changing muscle memory, Tomasson said.
Asked why Valheim was so popular when it launched, Kolfjord said, “Timing had a lot to do with it. It’s a good game to play with your friends because because it allows for different playstyles. It was released during COVID when people really needed a way to connect with their friends and family when they couldn’t meet in real life. So I think Valheim was the perfect game for that.”
Kolfjord said there are around 20,000 concurrent players on any given day, which the team considers to be a healthy number of people. There are occasional spikes.
She added, “I think it speaks to a lot of people who really like the retro look. They feel nostalgic for games they played in their childhood when they see graphics. I think that’s one thing that may have drawn people.”
How long would it take to traverse the world of Valheim on foot? Kolfjord and Tomasson didn’t know.
Disclosure: Gamescom paid my way to Germany for the event. The content of this story is solely the responsibility of GamesBeat.