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Early Access - Version 35 vs Version 36
Jun 4, 2026, 07:08 PM
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11Windrose entered Steam Early Access on April 14, 2026 for PC. The game launched on Steam, the Epic Games Store, and Stove at a base price of $29.99 USD, with an optional $39.99 Supporter Bundle that adds the soundtrack and wallpapers. Kraken Express is the developer and self-publisher in most regions, while Pocketpair Publishing handles the Japan-region publishing role.33The current official expectation is that Early Access will last roughly 1.5 to 2.5 years. Kraken Express says the goal is to grow the game by about 50 percent before 1.0, but the studio has not published a date-by-date roadmap yet and is still in the launch-feedback phase.55Launch Snapshot77CategoryVerified Early Access FactEarly Access release dateApril 14, 2026Platforms at launchPC only: Steam, Epic Games Store, and StoveBase price$29.99 USDSupporter Bundle$39.99 USD with soundtrack and wallpapersCurrent launch-week peak97,981 concurrent players on April 15, 2026; peaked at 113,930 on April 16, 2026Main-story scopeRoughly 50 to 70 hours for the Chapter 1 launch campaignOfficial co-op capUp to 8 players, with about 4 recommended for smoother late-game performanceDedicated serversSupported at launch through the free Steam dedicated-server toolSales through first 48 hours500,000+ copies sold (per Kraken Express post, April 16, 2026)Launch-window Steam review scoreApproximately 88 percent positive, settling at Very Positive across the first ~48 hours of reviewsLaunch-window Twitch peakAround 106,000 concurrent viewers during launch week, per third-party tracking.99What Shipped at Launch10103 launch biomes: Coastal Jungle, Foothills, and Cursed SwampsAbout 30 procedurally generated islands with over 90 hand-crafted points of interest in official pre-launch FAQ wording, commonly rounded up in press coverage3 main combat-capable player ships at launch, with the dinghy acting as the starter transportA full survival-crafting loop covering building, station upgrades, quest progression, food, alchemy, factions, and ship combatA fully explorable Tortuga hub and multiple faction merchant networks1212One correction matters here because older Windrose pages and some third-party coverage got it wrong: the third launch biome is Cursed Swamps, not Ashlands. Ashlands remains a planned future biome, not a launch biome.1414Pricing and Launch Offer1616Steam launch messaging set the base game at $29.99 and the Supporter Bundle at $39.99. The April 9 pre-launch Steam announcement also said a 10 percent introductory discount would run through April 21, 2026. Owners keep the eventual 1.0 release without buying the game again, even if the full-release price rises later.1818Players who completed the February 2026 Steam Next Fest demo were also promised an exclusive decorative spyglass cosmetic in the full game. That bonus is part of the launch-window reward structure, not a gameplay advantage.2020Current Multiplayer Position2222The most reliable current reading of Windrose multiplayer is conservative. Official launch-facing materials and the Discord FAQ mirror consistently describe the game as supporting up to 8 players. Dedicated servers are live at launch, but the studio still recommends smaller groups for a smoother experience and still frames naval combat around one player commanding one ship.2424This matters because some host listings and older community writeups floated higher player counts or implied deeper shared-ship play than the official FAQ supports. The right current baseline is 8 players total, PvE focus, and fleet-style co-op rather than a mature multi-role shared-ship simulation.2626Launch Momentum2828Windrose did not enter Early Access quietly. The February 2026 demo peaked above 22,000 concurrent players during Steam Next Fest, pushed the game past 1.5 million wishlists before launch, and reportedly drew more than 800,000 total demo players. The game then recorded a 69,544 first-day peak on April 14, climbed to 97,981 on April 15, and set a new peak of 113,930 on April 16, 2026.3030That climb is the important part. Interest kept growing after release instead of collapsing, with concurrents rising through April 15 and reaching a new all-time peak on April 16, which is unusually strong behavior for an Early Access survival game.3232Two days after launch, on April 16, 2026, Kraken Express announced Windrose had passed 500,000 copies sold within 48 hours of the Steam and Epic Games Store release. The game held the top Steam best-seller slot during the same weekend. Steam review sentiment settled around 88 percent positive, giving the store page a Very Positive rating across the first wave of user reviews. On Twitch, the game logged a peak of roughly 106,000 concurrent viewers during launch week, with well-known streamers such as zackrawrr, CohhCarnage, shroud, and PirateSoftware driving much of the viewership.3434Roadmap Direction3636Kraken Express has deliberately not published a locked sequence of dated content drops yet. The current official position is that the team wants to absorb launch feedback first and then turn that into a clearer roadmap. The studio's public messaging still points toward more biomes, more ships, more enemies and bosses, more weapons and armor coverage, and continued quality-of-life work.3838Ashlands is the best-documented future biome, but it is still future content. Console versions are also still in the ambition stage rather than the schedule stage. Launch-week reporting says the team is enthusiastic about eventually reaching consoles, but has no concrete console update to share yet.4040What Early Access Does Not Mean4242It does not mean PvP returned. Windrose remains a PvE-focused game.It does not mean microtransactions or live-service monetization. The game is explicitly buy-to-play.It does not mean a fixed public patch calendar exists already. The roadmap is still being shaped by live launch feedback.It does not mean demo progress carried over. The studio said the Steam Next Fest demo could not transfer into Early Access.4444Post-Launch Momentum (April 14 to April 22)4646On April 19, 2026, five days after Early Access launch, Kraken Express announced that Windrose had passed one million copies sold and briefly hit a new concurrent peak of 202,000 players. The studio paired that milestone with Hotfix 0.10.0.3.104, which added a manual connectivity server picker, a Direct IP connection option, and an automatic save-backup system that keeps up to 30 rolling backups per launch. That pushed the cumulative hotfix count to three in the first six days: 0.10.0.1.6 on launch day, 0.10.0.2.54 on April 17, and 0.10.0.3.104 on April 19. See Patch Notes for the full per-hotfix change list.4848Kraken Express has publicly confirmed two post-launch directional points that shape how players should read Early Access. First, PvP is explicitly not on the roadmap; Windrose remains a permanent PvE-first game. Second, the studio has repeated its no-microtransaction, no-battle-pass, no-cosmetic-store stance in every post-launch update, and is targeting roughly 50 percent more content before the 1.0 release. The expected full-release window is late 2027 to late 2028, which matches the 1.5 to 2.5 year Early Access length announced in the launch FAQ.5050See Also5252Windrose - broad overview of the current buildRoadmap - the current public future-content framingLaunch Reception - launch-week performance and community responseMultiplayer - co-op structure, dedicated servers, and current limitations5454Offline Play and Cloud Saves5656Windrose does not require a constant internet connection to play the single-player campaign. Once the client is installed and authenticated through Steam, the full pirate campaign can be played entirely offline in solo mode, including building, combat, sailing, and the main story.5858An internet connection is still required to download patch updates through Steam. Because Windrose is in early access the cadence of content and bug-fix updates is frequent, so most players will want to be online regularly even when the game session itself is offline.6060Solo vs Co-Op Sessions6262Soloa single-player session with no other human players. Fully playable offline. The NPC Crew still staffs the ship in solo play.Co-opa host starts a session and invites friends through Steam using an invite code. All co-op play is PvE; Windrose does not support PvP.Dedicated Serverplayers who want a persistent world can run a dedicated server for more control over settings, hosting hours, and world state. Dedicated servers are supported at launch through the free Steam dedicated-server tool.63+Solo: a single-player session with no other human players. Fully playable offline. The NPC Crew still staffs the ship in solo play.Co-opa host starts a session and invites friends through Steam using an invite code. All co-op play is PvE; Windrose does not support PvP.Dedicated Server: players who want a persistent world can run a dedicated server for more control over settings, hosting hours, and world state. Dedicated servers are supported at launch through the free Steam dedicated-server tool.6464Steam Cloud Saves6666Cloud saves are enabled on Steam. Character and world data is automatically backed up to Steam Cloud when the game closes, and the same save data is available on any other PC signed into the same Steam account. A deeper breakdown of save file locations and local backups lives on the Save Files page.6868Steam Client Features7070Steam Family Sharemembers of the same Steam Family group can download and play Windrose from an owner's library under Valve's Family Share rules.Steam Inputcontroller support runs through Steam Input, which lets unsupported controllers use community-made presets while the developers continue to improve the built-in controller layout.Automatic Updatespatch downloads are handled by the Steam client in the background when the client is online, even if the game itself is currently closed.71+Steam Family Share: members of the same Steam Family group can download and play Windrose from an owner's library under Valve's Family Share rules.Steam Input: controller support runs through Steam Input, which lets unsupported controllers use community-made presets while the developers continue to improve the built-in controller layout.Automatic Updates: patch downloads are handled by the Steam client in the background when the client is online, even if the game itself is currently closed.7272What Offline Play Does Not Include7474Joining another player's co-op session requires an internet connection and an invite code from the host.Running or joining a dedicated server also requires a network connection.Steam Cloud will only sync after the next online launch. Playing offline for long periods and then switching PCs can trigger a cloud save conflict until the client reconciles local and cloud copies.7676Second-Week Sales and Engagement7878The second week of Early Access pushed the launch metrics significantly past the April 19 milestones. Independent sales-tracking analytics placed cumulative sales at roughly 1.3 million copies sold by day ten of Early Access, with gross revenue across Steam reaching approximately $30 million in the same window. The all-time concurrent peak settled at 222,134 players on April 19, 2026, eclipsing the 202,000 figure included in the official one-million-sales announcement.8080Daily active user counts told a similar story. The first Sunday after launch (April 19) saw roughly 527,000 daily active users, and the launch-fortnight floor held at approximately 450,000 daily active users across the following week. By day ten, roughly a third of the 1.3 million purchasers had logged 20 or more hours, and approximately six percent had crossed the 50-hour mark. Those engagement depths are above category averages reported around comparable survival-game launches and helped justify the studio's stated stability-first patch cadence in the absence of new content patches between April 19 and April 26.8282MetricLaunch Day (April 14)Day Three (April 16)Day Ten (April 24)Concurrent peak69,544113,930~153,020 (24-hour)Cumulative salesNot disclosed500,000+~1.3 millionSteam review trajectory~92% positive (~52 reviews)88% positive89% positive (Very Positive)Patches shipped0.10.0.1.60.10.0.2.54 next day0.10.0.3.104 (April 19)8484Steam top sellers the week of April 14 placed Windrose at the number two slot by revenue, behind only Counter-Strike 2. That position held against Capcom's Pragmata, which launched the same week with substantially heavier marketing support. The Steam Next Fest demo from February 2026 generated approximately 474,000 new wishlists at an 11.3 percent conversion rate, roughly double the five-to-seven percent rate that survival demos typically achieve, which retroactively explained the second-week sales pace as the activation of a deep wishlist pool rather than purely launch-week impulse buying.8585Independent sales-pace tracking placed the 1.3-million-in-ten-days curve well above recent survival launches at the same window, including RuneScape: Dragonwilds (roughly 2.6x slower), StarRupture (roughly 2.3x slower), Grounded 2 (roughly 2.1x slower), and Dune: Awakening (roughly 1.2x slower). Those comparisons frame Windrose's Early Access opening as one of the strongest paid Early Access launches on Steam in the survival genre at large.8787Three-Week Sales Milestone8989On May 14, 2026, one month after Early Access launch, Kraken Express announced that Windrose had passed 2,000,000 copies sold. The studio paired the announcement with confirmation that full production has begun on the next major content update. That makes Windrose one of the fastest-selling paid Early Access launches in 2026, especially in the survival category.9191The 2,000,000 figure follows roughly the same conversion curve already established in the first ten days: the launch wave climbed from 500,000 copies in 48 hours (April 16) to 1,000,000 copies in six days (April 19) to 1,500,000 by April 30. The May 14 number indicates the second-month curve is steeper than the simple decay typical of survival launches, partly because the wishlist pool from the February 2026 Steam Next Fest demo continued to convert in.9393Pricing and Early Access terms did not change with the milestone. The base game remains at $29.99 USD with the optional $39.99 Supporter Bundle, and the studio reiterated that the buy-to-play model has no planned microtransactions, no battle pass, and no cosmetic store. The 1.5-to-2.5-year Early Access window from launch communications also remains unchanged, and the studio's stated 50-percent-content-growth target before 1.0 is unchanged.9595The studio also used the milestone to clarify development cadence. Hotfixes like 0.10.0.5.120 (the May 4 save-system overhaul) will continue to ship between major drops, but the next named content beat is the Ashlands biome introduced in the late-April community update. Players reading the Roadmap page should treat the milestone post as a confirmation that production has now formally started on that next major drop, not as an acceleration of the announced six-month minimum timeline.
