At this point in 2025, to say that there are more than a few survival titles on the market is an understatement. However, while the feeling of genre fatigue may either be setting in or has set in entirely, developer Treehouse Games is looking to melt away that lethargy with its debut title, Voyagers of Nera. Armed with an eye-popping visual veneer, a road-trip-like approach to player cooperation and a fresh take on building mechanics, here’s why Voyagers of Nera is shaping up to be the most enchanting survival adventure to come along in a good while.
Voyagers of Nera envisions a mystical world where vast oceans cover almost all of the surface and where all manner of secrets lurk both above the waves, on the few landmasses that remain, and also in the murky depths where only the truly brave dare swim. Against this evocative backdrop, Voyagers of Nera invites players to uncover these secrets and brave a magical nautical world, as well as to also become part of that world, to live and breathe within its boundaries and to travel its glistening blue expanses and golden sunsets.
Essentially, then, Voyagers of Nera is made up of two halves that aren’t necessarily split from one another, but instead complement each other perfectly. As a survival adventure first and foremost, Voyagers of Nera tasks the player with securing themselves amidst their environment and surroundings. This means not only collecting and refining the materials needed to create something resembling a home base, which can act as a sanctuary, but also the crafting of weapons and means of traversal, too.
You see, the world that Voyagers of Nera takes place in is one that is painted in hues of tropical sun and clear blue ocean waters. So, in taking advantage of this sumptuous setting, Voyagers of Nera allows players to not only craft hardy wooden boats to carve a path through the oceanic contours of Nera, but also a natty surfboard, too, to ride the waves and tides of this resplendent blue world.
Certainly, if you were to compare Voyagers of Nera to something like Disney’s Moana, you wouldn’t be far off – such is the vibrant depth of its charming visual design and the lively colours of its tropical palette. As such, rather than just chucking the player into some non-descript wilderness, identikit urban environment, or otherwise droll looking expanse, developer Treehouse Games instead wants to trigger the senses of the player and encourage a sense of exploration that other survival adventures simply fail to do, as you build, fight, ride and surf your way through a world filled with emergent possibilities.
This is an experience that is very much geared for co-operative play, too. Supporting up to ten players in a single instance, Voyagers of Nera isn’t just about fighting one another or squabbling over trite resources; it’s about travelling and discovering the world together, uncovering its secrets with friends and facing off against the darkness as a single united community.
For the longest time, the manner of building structures in other survival fare felt depressingly uniform and banal, but Voyagers of Nera has a different idea about how this key mechanic should be employed. Rejecting the usual tile-by-tile construction system that so many other titles have embraced, Voyagers of Nera instead employs a bespoke ‘frame and socket’ system, which has two chief benefits.
The first is that this sort of building method allows players to construct startlingly complex and intricate interlocking structures that would not be achievable using the old tile-by-tile method. The second benefit is that, despite the seemingly grand, sophisticated outputs that this new building method enables, its implementation is straightforward enough that players of all levels can build these structures in an intuitive and swift fashion. Ever wanted to get creative with building structures in games like this, but found it too time-consuming or complicated to learn? Voyagers of Nera has you covered – and then some.
Rather than just being some relatively aimless survival adventure romp, Voyagers of Nera is very much anchored to a central, almost narrative objective. Though its world is an almost unrelentingly beautiful one, there is a darkness at the core which players must confront. Chiefly, this darkness has manifested itself as an obscure dark force that is scattering lost spirits across the world and shattering the harmony of the biomes which those spirits used to protect.
Rather than just being a static element of Voyagers of Nera’s lore, this spiritual theme actually dovetails directly into the gameplay. As you work with other players to discover the myriad secrets, buried treasure and ancient ruins which litter the world, you’ll come across a host of exiled powerful spirits that are hiding from the dark creatures which threaten them. Once rescued, each of these spirits offers a boon to the player, which comes in the form of new magical skills and crafting blueprints, offering ample encouragement for players to keep on rescuing these poor lost souls.
Beyond the relief of these lesser spirits, there are also elder spirits which once held sway over entire biomes when they were alive. In death, players must reassemble their spirit fragments in order to reawaken them and not only inherit their incredible elemental powers, but restore equilibrium and harmony to the part of the world those spirits once called their own. The upshot of this, then, is that progress in Voyagers of Nera isn’t just tied to the progression of your crafting prowess or the size of your base, it’s also tied to the literal fate of the world itself – and that’s a hugely refreshing, yet compelling prospect.
Set to sail into Steam Early Access on September 16th, 2025, Voyagers of Nera will already boast a sizable amount of content and day one functionality for players to get stuck into. Early Access, however, is just the beginning. Over the coming months and well into next year, developer Treehouse Games won’t just be optimising the game and providing numerous quality-of-life fixes; the studio shall also be introducing new biomes for players to explore, new enemy factions, new elder spirits to discover, new spirit abilities, and so much besides. Easily one of the most promising survival adventures in a while, Voyagers of Nera is absolutely here for the long haul, and that’s a good thing, not least because its tantalising world, which is so steeped in style and beauty, is one that we can’t wait to be part of for years to come.
Add us to your RSS feed