Two years after Enshrouded first appeared, creative director Antony Christoulakis says the studio is on track for a 1.0 launch in 2026 and will keep working on the game long after that milestone. The comment came during a wide ranging conversation about the Wake of the Water update and what Keen Games has learned while growing around the title.
Player numbers are up and the team has grown. Christoulakis says Enshrouded has attracted more than 4.5 million players since release and that daily concurrent counts bounce between roughly 10,000 during quiet periods and 30,000 to 50,000 after major updates. The studio has increased headcount from about 40 to roughly 80 staff, with some work outsourced, and Christoulakis describes the expansion as something they now want to slow down to keep things efficient.
He says the team does have a date in mind for 1.0 but is not ready to lock in specifics. Christoulakis highlighted a handful of areas the studio is still polishing before full release. Those include better onboarding at the start of the game, continued combat tuning, camera and player control tweaks, and work on console versions.
Sharing player creations is a priority. Keen Games hears daily about huge community builds and landmarks players create. For now players trade save files on Discord. Christoulakis said the studio wants an easier, more user-friendly way for people to share builds and worlds when the game reaches 1.0. The developer runs a public feature suggestion board where tens of thousands of ideas get posted and voted on. Some requests were surprising to the team. One example is separate quest progression for players on shared servers so people do not miss story beats when they are not present. The studio implemented that after players asked for it.
Christoulakis made clear that 1.0 will not be the end of the road. The studio plans to support Enshrouded with new content for years to come and has no plans to move to a new project after the full release. “There is no reason for us to stop after 1.0 now ‘the game is finished’“, he said. Enshrouded is currently discounted on Steam. The director noted the Wake of the Water content has helped bring players back and that the team sees steady interest in base building and creative play.
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