Keen Games GmbH, the studio behind Portal Knights, has announced a new action-RPG inspired by Valheim and The Legend of Zelda.
Enshrouded is launching this year with support for up to 16-player online co-op. Like Valheim, your chief responsibility is to keep your player alive primarily by gathering materials and crafting things like armor, weapons, food, and a place to camp out away from big beasts and even bigger boss beasts. There's also an "in-depth" skill tree you'll interact with to gain new abilities and powers.
As for the parts of Enshrouded more directly inspired by Zelda - and yes, Keen Games' co-founder Antony Christoulakis told PC Gamer the project is "Valheim meets Zeda" - well, it takes place in a big open-world that isn't procedurally generated like Valheim. Combat definitely looks a lot more similar to Zelda games than Valheim, and there's even a paragliding skill that lets you survey the world from the skies like in Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom. There's also a seamless freedom of exploration in Enshrouded that will feel immediately familiar to fans of the aforementioned Zelda titles.
While it's openly inspired by two very popular games, Enshrouded isn't simply a mash-up of existing ideas. For example, the world of Embervale is partially covered by a deadly fog, and the only parts that are safe from its noxious fumes are on mountaintops. Players will often need to go beneath the fog to traverse the map, collect loot, and occasionally rescue NPCs, but they'll only be able to survive there for so long before they need to re-emerge.
Enshrouded definitely looks like a unique and intriguing new indie game, but we'll have to wait until it launches in Early Access sometime this year to see if it can stand out from the crowd of 'X game meets X game' releases we see all the time.
In the meantime, here are some games like Zelda that are certifiably good.
