The troubled sandbox Hytale got a chance for a fresh start in November 2025 when one of the project's creators, Simon Collins-Laflamme, bought the game from Riot Games and took control of its development again. However, behind this "happy ending" lay more issues than expected.
According to Collins-Laflamme, the state of Hytale after years of development within Riot was more infuriating than joyful.
The game has insane potential, but four years of engineering went into reworking the engine instead of developing gameplay. As a result, we have a four-year gap and an urgent need to catch up, and this rebuilt engine won’t even be used.
When you don’t invest in gameplay, you lose not only time. The pace, iterations, and player feedback disappear. Now the priority is gameplay and restoring trust by actually starting to release updates and working versions quickly.
Simon Collins-Laflamme
When the developer regained access to the project, Hytale barely started. The camera, movement, combat system, crafting, building, game loop, sound, and rendering were all malfunctioning or not working at all. Collins-Laflamme outright calls it a miracle that within a few weeks the team managed to bring the project to a playable and, more importantly, engaging state.
However, there was no celebration. The developers decided not to slow down and continued working at an accelerated pace to make up for lost years. Collins-Laflamme himself invested more money, time, and personal resources than he initially planned to bring the project up to par.
At the same time, he deliberately lowers audience expectations. At the end of 2025, the author of Hytale showed 16 minutes of “raw and broken” gameplay and honestly stated that the current version is far from ideal. For this reason, early access is priced at just $20—a price Collins-Laflamme intentionally set low.
No meetings, trust the team, push to main and pray. Solid vision, no prototypes.
Cutting some corners, will pay some tech debt later.
Lower expectations means we don’t need to make 5 prototypes for a single feature to try to reach perfection.
We make all features V1 and then…
— Simon (@Simon_Hypixel) January 2, 2026
The secret to rapid progress, according to the developer, is simple: minimal meetings, trust in the team, and a focus on results. Technical debts are to be paid later, and the main goal now is to release working features and move forward.
Remember, you can try the resurrected Hytale on January 13 on PC. The game will only be available through a special launcher—there are no plans for a Steam launch at the start.