Valheim publisher Coffee Stain announces new deckbuilding roguelike As We Descend

Valheim publisher Coffee Stain has announced a deck-building roguelike from a couple of developers previously at Stunlock Studios, the outfit best known for V Rising.

Box Dragon was set up by Kevin Chang and Karl Bergström two years ago; today they announce details of the studio’s debut game As We Descend.

The game will feature turn-based card battles set in a dystopian “feudal cityscape”.

Players will explore the world to gather resources and forces, before battling “deadly monsters threatening humanity’s existence”.

Art direction is from Aleks Nikonov, who previously worked at Riot Games as a character and environment concept artist.

“It feels like only yesterday we were announcing that Box Dragon existed, and here we are over two years later unveiling what we’ve been crafting for all this time,” said Chang, game director at Box Dragon.

“We’re ecstatic to begin playtests in our closed beta to help shape the development of our game. We still have a lot of work ahead of us, but we know that we can make As We Descend an S-tier roguelike deckbuilder with the help of passionate players who love this genre and are eager for something new and big.”

Both Box Dragon and Coffee Stain operate from Sweden. Box Dragon was founded in 2020 by Chang and Bergström, who previously worked on team arena brawler Battlerite.

“This project started years ago when Coffee Stain teamed up with Karl and Kevin to start Box Dragon, a brand new stand-alone studio within Coffee Stain that would focus on creating their own original IPs,” said Joel Rydholm, producer at Coffee Stain Publishing. “This game is the first in that line – and I’m very excited to finally be able to reveal it to the world.”

Coffee Stain is known as the publisher of Valheim, Deep Rock Galactic, Goat Simulator 3, Satisfactory, and more.

As We Descend will soon head into closed beta, sign up on the game’s website.

Card games are certainly having a moment, though Balatro is leading the charge – it received 1m sales in its first month.