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Wanderstop
Key art of Alta and shopkeeper Boro sitting on a bench
Developer(s)Ivy Road
Publisher(s)Annapurna Interactive
Director(s)Davey Wreden
Producer(s)Patrick McDermott
Designer(s)Steven Margolin
Programmer(s)Andrew Nguyen
Artist(s)
  • Nat F
  • Temitope Olujobi
Writer(s)
  • Davey Wreden
  • Karla Zimonja
Composer(s)C418
Platform(s)
ReleaseMarch 11, 2025
Genre(s)Cozy game[1]
Mode(s)Single-player

Wanderstop is an upcoming cozy game developed by Ivy Road and published by Annapurna Interactive. It is directed by Davey Wreden, composed by C418, and co-written by Wreden with Karla Zimonja. It follows a former warrior named Alta, who seeks to heal her trauma from fighting in an arena by tending to a tea shop and helping its patrons.

After C418 and Wreden each had ideas for a video game by 2015, development on the game began around 2017. Though Wreden's vision was originally only to make a cozy game, Wanderstop's focus shifted to the subject of trauma when Zimonja joined development, and Wreden chose to integrate his feeling of burn out from developing The Stanley Parable and The Beginner's Guide into the narrative. Wreden, C418 and Zimonja co-founded the studio Ivy Road and formed a partnership with Annapurna. Ivy Road was first announced alongside its first game with Annapurna in July 2021, and the title was officially revealed in June 2024.

Wanderstop is scheduled to release on March 11, 2025 for PlayStation 5 and Microsoft Windows on Steam.

Gameplay and premise

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The game's protagonist, Alta, is a former warrior who has been traumatized by fighting in an arena.[2] She hopes that by working to maintain a tea shop, her trauma will be healed.[2] She adjusts to her life in tending to the shop in a forest, performing tasks such as growing and harvesting ingredients and mixing them together in a large flask machine, cleaning and decorating the shop, chatting with customers, or just sitting on a bench.[3]

Alta has trouble convincing herself that this low-stress life is working for her. She battles with her unresolved trauma throughout, yet still fights to enjoy her quiet life.[4][3] However, Alta cannot simply achieve progress by racing through her checklists.[2] The shop demands patience and rejects those who have come only in the "pursuit of growth unchecked",[4] and healing must be found for her and her customers in a more challenging way.[2]

Background

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Game composer and Ivy Road co-founder Daniel "C418" Rosenfeld

As early as 2015, composer and sound designer Daniel Rosenfeld, known by his pseudonym C418, had considered creating a video game. In an interview that year, he described a desire to create something that was "not really a game, but an experience based on it". He mused that "you’d buy it on Steam and you’d get the album and you’d also get the game frame", but admitted he was only experimenting with the idea, and that the game would take a while.[5] The musician had also completed a house album, and considered "hiring a couple friends to see if we can make interesting games based around listening to albums".[6]

At the same time in 2015, game designer Davey Wreden had just released his video game The Beginner's Guide. He had begun to daydream of going to a tea shop in the woods and lying on a bench by the water, and after sketching variations of the scene, decided that image would become the basis of his next game.[2] In a 2018 interview with Bandcamp, C418 disclosed that he was working on a game with Wreden. He called it a "crazy experiment on making a game where you don't 'earn' anything and there are no numbers that go up, but it's something you can maybe still obsess over if you want to." He remarked that there was much room to experiment with audio in the game and that he wished to spend "a while" working on it.[7]

In July 2019, Wreden began hiring for a gameplay programmer working on tea-related implements and a systems engineer for his next game.[8] In 2020, C418 said that he would serve as the "lead audio person" for a video game development studio based in Austin, Texas helmed by Wreden. The musician said of the studio's game, "I can tell you that there's going to be a lot of me."[9]

Development

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Development, which started around 2017,[10] was led by a small team.[11] Developers for the game include lead producer Patrick McDermott, lead designer Steven Margolin, lead programmer Andrew Nguyen, and 2D and 3D art designers Nat F and Temitope Olujobi, respectively.[12] Aura Triolo, who served as Animation Lead on the game, prioritized finding shortcuts to animate the characters with. When she began working on the game in 2019, she was the only animator employed by Ivy Road, though the animation team would grow to as many as four simultaneous people later on. She spent much of her early development on Wanderstop setting up animation technology to automatically handle many different situations, including character idle and active stances. She utilized procedural generation and inverse kinematics to apply universal animation sets across all characters, which would work for each despite them having different models. She called the earlier implementations "one of the simpler examples" of procedural generation present in the game.[11]

After his struggle with burn out following the developments of his games The Stanley Parable (2013) and The Beginner's Guide (2015), Wreden wanted to create a cozy game, describing a wish to create "something simple and peaceful that could heal me and restore balance to my life", though this did not work for him, proving to still be stressful.[1] Wreden did not find that the ideas of simply completing a list of tasks or just making a "cozy game" were satisfactory; it was only when Karla Zimonja joined development that Wreden realized they would make a game about trauma.[2] Zimonja also served as a writer on the game.[13] Throughout development, Wreden decided slowly that he would integrate his feelings of being burnt out and hopeless into the game's narrative.[1]

Music and sound design

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The game's original soundtrack was composed by Ivy Road studio co-founder Daniel Rosenfeld, known professionally as C418.[14][3] In the game, the music plays dynamically according to the player's actions.[13] C418 released the title track as a single on December 11, 2024.[15]

C418 also served as sound designer, and was directly involved in implementing the SFX into the game, a task he described as "extremely hands on in a way I've never been allowed to".[16] He described the audio engine as "too complex";[16] and remarked that the "talking" from the game's "pluffins" caused trouble for it.[17]

Promotion and release

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On July 29, 2021, C418, Wreden, and Gone Home artist Karla Zimonja revealed their game development studio Ivy Road, and announced a partnership with Annapurna Interactive. There, the company stated their intent to create a new video game with the company.[18] Their publishing agreement was one of four announced at Annapurna's showcase that day; the others were with Outer Loop, No Code, and Canadian developer Jessica Mak.[19] Studio co-founders Wreden, Zimonja, and C418 released an official announcement video with Annapurna in which the earlier two co-founders drank tea and joked about video games whilst Rosenfeld played an original piano piece in the background.[14]

During the Summer Game Fest 2024 showcase in June, the game was officially announced as Wanderstop, for the PlayStation 5 and Steam platforms. A trailer was revealed at the event, and the game was originally set to release later that year.[3] In response to the trailer, PC Gamer's Lauren Morton remarked that the game "[has] exactly the kind of commentary we'd expect from Wreden as Wanderstop's director and writer",[4] and GamesRadar+'s Hirun Cryer opined that Wanderstop "is The Stanley Parable creator's take on Stardew Valley".[20] Inverse's Robin Bea felt that the game had the potential to explore the "real-world stresses that players are seeking to escape by playing them", and mused that the game could be seen as "a parody of cozy games themselves".[21] Game Informer's Kyle Hilliard anticipated a deeper meaning to the game given Wreden and Zimonja's previous work.[22]

By the time that the entire staff of the game's publisher Annapurna had resigned in September, Wreden affirmed that the team at Ivy Road remained "100 percent okay", and that "Nothing's gonna stop us from getting Wanderstop out the door very soon" on an X post.[23] Rosenfeld concurred, writing "We're fine and our game is doing just fine!"[24] In October, the studio announced a delay to early 2025.[25] On December 5, the studio announced the release date as March 11, 2025,[26] with Wreden appearing as part of PC Gamer's PC Gaming Show to speak about his experiences throughout development.[1] On December 11, music from C418's score featured in the Day of the Devs: The Game Awards Edition showcase.[27]

Accolades

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List of awards and nominations for Wanderstop
Awards Year Category Result Ref.
PC Gamer's PC Gaming Show 2024 Most Wanted for 2025 9th Place [28][29]

References

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  1. ^ a b c d Taylor, Mollie (December 5, 2024). "'Healing is messy, and it is bitter': The Stanley Parable's creator has used his newest game as an outlet to explore his own burnout". PC Gamer. Future plc. Archived from the original on December 5, 2024. Retrieved December 5, 2024.
  2. ^ a b c d e f Benson, Julian (August 14, 2024). "Wanderstop: challenging the cosy escapist fantasies of burnt-out workers". The Guardian. Archived from the original on August 23, 2024. Retrieved August 23, 2024.
  3. ^ a b c d Castle, Katharine (June 7, 2024). "Stanley Parable and Tacoma creators fight back against onslaught of coffee games with tea-themed Wanderstop". Eurogamer. IGN Entertainment. Archived from the original on June 8, 2024. Retrieved June 7, 2024.
  4. ^ a b c Morton, Lauren (June 7, 2024). "The Stanley Parable developer's next game is a cozy tea shop sim where you have some trauma to process, actually". PC Gamer. Future plc. Archived from the original on June 8, 2024. Retrieved June 7, 2024.
  5. ^ Burns, Todd L (August 21, 2015). "Interview: Minecraft's Soundtrack Composer C418". Red Bull Music Academy. Archived from the original on April 2, 2023. Retrieved April 2, 2023.
  6. ^ Fenwick, Tom (September 5, 2015). "Can You Dig It: FACT meets Minecraft composer C418". FACT Magazine. The Vinyl Factory. Archived from the original on June 30, 2018. Retrieved September 9, 2024.
  7. ^ Muggs, Joe (September 6, 2018). "With "Excursions," C418 Moves On From "Minecraft" and Into Original Compositions". Bandcamp. Archived from the original on March 27, 2024. Retrieved August 8, 2024.
  8. ^ Cox, Matt (July 11, 2019). "Davey 'Beginner's Guide' Wreden is hiring for a new game". Rock Paper Shotgun. RELX. Archived from the original on June 6, 2024. Retrieved September 24, 2024.
  9. ^ Callwood, Brett (July 1, 2020). "C418 Offers Block-Rocking Beats". LA Weekly. Semanal Media LLC. Archived from the original on September 22, 2022. Retrieved June 26, 2024.
  10. ^ Daniel Rosenfeld [@C418] (June 7, 2024). "Hi everyone I've been making a game for the last 7 years with @IvyRoadGames and here is a trailer sorry I was gone" (Tweet). Archived from the original on June 7, 2024. Retrieved August 6, 2024 – via Twitter.
  11. ^ a b Triolo, Aura (July 2, 2024). "Tech Animation on Wanderstop, Part 1: Tea (Holding)". Archived from the original on August 6, 2024. Retrieved August 6, 2024 – via Cohost.
  12. ^ "Meet Ivy Road". Ivy Road. Archived from the original on August 8, 2024. Retrieved August 8, 2024.
  13. ^ a b Windom, Jenny (December 5, 2024). "Wanderstop, a cozy game about change and tea, coming to PS5 March 11, 2025". PlayStation.Blog. Sony Interactive Entertainment. Archived from the original on December 6, 2024. Retrieved December 5, 2024.
  14. ^ a b Wen, Alan (July 30, 2021). "'Minecraft', 'Gone Home' and 'Stanley Parable' devs start new studio Ivy Road". NME. BandLab Technologies. Archived from the original on February 13, 2024. Retrieved June 9, 2023.
  15. ^ "Wanderstop | C418". December 11, 2024. Archived from the original on December 11, 2024. Retrieved December 11, 2024 – via Bandcamp. Songtradr.
  16. ^ a b Daniel Rosenfeld [@C418] (September 5, 2024). "Fun fact about @IvyRoadGames Wanderstop that keeps being missed, I'm not just the composer, I'm also doing all the SFX AND I'm doing ALL the implementation into the game! I'm extremely hands on in a way I've never been allowed to. The audio engine has gotten… too complex, lol" (Tweet). Archived from the original on September 5, 2024. Retrieved September 7, 2024 – via Twitter.
  17. ^ Daniel Rosenfeld [@C418] (August 5, 2024). "I already struggle with my audio engine complaining about the pluffins talking too much. I think at a million, the engine would ask for a refund" (Tweet). Archived from the original on August 5, 2024. Retrieved August 6, 2024 – via Twitter.
  18. ^ Holt, Kris (July 29, 2021). "'Stanley Parable' and 'Gone Home' devs team up to form Ivy Road studio". Engadget. Yahoo! Inc. Archived from the original on July 31, 2021. Retrieved July 31, 2021.
  19. ^ Romano, Sal (July 29, 2021). "Annapurna Interactive to publish new games by Outerloop Games, Jessica Mak, Ivy Road, and No Code". Gematsu. Archived from the original on June 11, 2024. Retrieved June 11, 2024.
  20. ^ Cryer, Hirun (June 7, 2024). "Wanderstop is The Stanley Parable creator's take on Stardew Valley". GamesRadar+. Future plc. Archived from the original on June 9, 2024. Retrieved June 7, 2024.
  21. ^ Bea, Robin (June 10, 2024). "Two New Indies Are Giving Cozy Games A Dark Twist They Desperately Need". Inverse. Bustle Digital Group. Archived from the original on June 26, 2024. Retrieved June 26, 2024.
  22. ^ Hilliard, Kyle (June 8, 2024). "The Stanley Parable Creator's Next Game Is About A Cozy Tea Shop (We Think)". Game Informer. GameStop. Archived from the original on June 9, 2024. Retrieved August 14, 2024.
  23. ^ Kennedy, Victoria (September 13, 2024). "Developers rush to reassure players of forthcoming releases following Annapurna Interactive mass exodus". Eurogamer. IGN Entertainment. Archived from the original on September 13, 2024. Retrieved September 13, 2024.
  24. ^ Serin, Kaan (September 13, 2024). ""Nothing's gonna stop us from getting Wanderstop out the door": Annapurna Interactive partners react to mass resignations, as Remedy says its Control 2 deal is unaffected". GamesRadar+. Future plc. Archived from the original on September 13, 2024. Retrieved September 13, 2024.
  25. ^ Caldwell, Brendan (October 9, 2024). "The simmering emotions of cosy tea-brewing sim Wanderstop have been repressed until next year". Rock Paper Shotgun. Gamer Network. Archived from the original on October 9, 2024. Retrieved November 16, 2024.
  26. ^ Romano, Sal (December 5, 2024). "Wanderstop launches March 11, 2025". Gematsu. Archived from the original on December 6, 2024. Retrieved December 5, 2024.
  27. ^ Sheehan, Gavin (November 22, 2024). "Day Of The Devs: The Game Awards Edition 2024 Reveals Full Roster". Bleeding Cool. Avatar Press. Archived from the original on November 22, 2024. Retrieved November 22, 2024.
  28. ^ Lahti, Evan (November 14, 2024). "Here are the nominees for PC Gaming Show: Most Wanted". PC Gamer. Future plc. Archived from the original on November 14, 2024. Retrieved November 17, 2024.
  29. ^ Gardner, Matt (December 6, 2024). "Here Are The 25 Most Wanted PC Games Of 2025 And Beyond". Forbes. Integrated Whale Media Investments. Archived from the original on December 7, 2024. Retrieved December 6, 2024.
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