Fresh from bringing his canceled Minecraft competitor back from the dead, Hytale boss shares new gameplay footage as "a taste of things to come" – but there's still "a lot of work" to be done

After entering development in 2015, hotly anticipated sandbox game Hytale went through years of trials – most recently, Riot Games' cancellation of the unreleased project and the closure of developer Hypixel Studios.

The news came years after Riot's purchase of the studio in 2020 – one that was accompanied by promises of the small development team remaining in creative control over Hytale and working independently – and was especially disappointing considering past delays and the fact that, in 2023, Hypixel Studios unveiled the game was still in the prototyping phase. It's been a test of patience for fans, for sure, but things are now looking up.

Earlier this week, the community saw a positive twist in events as Riot sold Hytale back to Hypixel Studios, who promised 10 years of support, an early access date soon, and a return to the "original vision" of the Minecraft-inspired sandbox game. Since then, studio founder Simon Collins-Laflamme has gone on to post a whopping 16 minutes of raw gameplay footage – a longer unedited peek at Hytale than ever before.

In a response to the video, Collins-Laflamme explains that it's all truly "just raw, random footage." He continues, "I mean, I even forgot to mute my mic, so you can hear me click. Keep in mind, Hytale is incomplete and buggy, but still beautiful and fun. We have a lot of work to make this a good game, but I believe in my team. The progress we have made in the last few weeks has been incredible." The team lead then outlines his promises for Hytale.

"I made three promises: 1. Save Hytale, 2. Release more videos/screenshots, 3. Launch Hytale. We are now working on promise #3," he concludes. "See you soon." Does that imply a release date is on the horizon? It certainly sounds like it (or perhaps I just hope it does), but there is still plenty of work to be done ahead of the long-awaited launch. In a separate reply to his gameplay footage, Collins-Laflamme confirms as much.

"Please note that this gameplay is unfinished, raw footage recorded this morning," he assures yet again. "It's missing many NPC configs (which is why some are just auto-attacking). The overlay for wood cutting is too dark, and wood cutting in general is too fast for the Iron tier. The bow was basically in debug mode and gave signature moves for every attack. The NPCs are not balanced yet in terms of HP/DMG and other stats."

He doesn't stop there: "The weather with the biome transitions is not good. Countless bugs. I didn't include crafting/cozy because I didn't prepare this video at all, I just recorded on the fly; we will post something more cozy/living world later… and the list goes on and on. The character sheet UI is temporary. The portal at the end is unfinished, but I decided to put it anyway. The gun near the end sounds weird, but it was a funny meme to put on."

After outlining all of the problems fans may see in the 16-minute clip, including "missing NPCs in many zones, Collins-Laflamme admits, "I have over 100 notes from this video. Working on it, fixing it all." It's no small feat addressing these issues – but after over a decade of development and various setbacks, I'm sure it seems like a minor list to iron out ahead of a very massive launch… one that's now more than 10 years in the making.

The fanbase itself seems thrilled with the footage, with one excited YouTube commenter writing, "This is the moment we've waited for…" Another jokes, "Simon be like, 'guys it's not that good yet, trust' and then drops this BANGER!" Here's hoping Hytale proves a banger indeed.

Be sure to browse through our roundup of the most exciting new games coming this year and beyond for even more fresh titles to wishlist.