Hytale’s new owner has released a 16-minute video of “raw and broken” gameplay with the stated goal of “break the curse once and for all.” The footage is the first extended look at the game since Riot cancelled the project after years of troubled development, and the clip is intended to reset expectations while the team moves toward an early access plan.
What lands on screen is not a tech demo stitched from carefully selected footage. It is, as the uploader promises, rough around the edges. Still, much of what shows up looks like a complete survival RPG loop. There is world generation that actually looks pretty good, base building and resource collection, and combat that feels responsive if a bit floaty at times. The whole thing reads like a game that could reasonably enter early access and iterate in public.
Hytale has had a messy history. It was announced in 2018, was acquired by Riot in 2020, and was then cancelled after years of delays and an engine rewrite that the studio said pushed the game away from being release-ready. The project later returned to its original co-founder, and the owner now posted the new video to show progress. That earlier ownership changeearlier, when Hytale returned to its original co-founder, provides valuable background on where the project stands now.
The person who posted the footage, Laflamme, wrote that he promised “videos, screenshots and blog posts” to end a long silence. He said releasing raw footage immediately was important to “break the curse once and for all.” Alongside that message came the 16-minute clip and a pledge that more clips and screenshots will follow while the team works on an early access launch. Watching the footage, a few things stand out. The combat has weight but can feel loose at times. World and dungeon generation produce visually interesting spaces. Bugs and rough transitions are present, but mostly minor, in the segments shown. Taken together, it reads like a project that needs polish rather than a project that needs to be rewritten from scratch.
Given Riot’s previous decision to cancel the project, the most interesting line in Laflamme’s post is the one about early access. With the new owner promising regular updates and the video demonstrating a playable state, an early access window feels more likely than it did during the quiet years. That said, a proper timeline was not included with the footage, and the team will need to show steady communication to convince skeptical players. A short, blunt video will not erase seven years of development drama. Still, this clip does more than a press release. It gives a tangible sense of what the game plays like now and what the dev team needs to fix next. For fans who have been waiting since 2018, seeing systems in action is a meaningful step, even if the experience is imperfect.
Watch the video below to judge the state of the build yourself.
If you want a primer on how we got here, read our earlier coverage of Hytale returning to its original co-founder for more context on the ownership shift and what it might mean for the project’s future. That piece covers the sale after Riot’s cancellation and the first signals that the team intends to continue development in public.
X, Bluesky, and YouTube are good places to leave thoughts or follow for updates, and readers are encouraged to share their impressions of the footage in the comments.
