23 Feb 2026Developer post

WolfQuest 2.7/Classic Login Issue

Earlier this year, AgeCheq (our longtime third-party provider for verified parental consent for players under age 13) shut down. We have found a new provider for WolfQuest: Anniversary Edition, but due to ever-evolving technology, we are no longer able to update WolfQuest 2.7/Cla

31 Mar 2025Developer post

Multiplayer Shut Down on WolfQuest Classic (v2.7)

Multiplayer for WolfQuest Classic (v2.7) is no longer available due to new new security protocols on the server. The single-player game will continue to work and the game remains available on the iOS App Store and is still included if you purchase WolfQuest: Anniversary Edition f

08 Nov 2019Developer post

WolfQuest Returns to Yellowstone: Slough Creek

Though not as vast as the Lamar Valley or as spectacular as Yellowstone’s geysers or waterfalls, Slough Creek is one of my favorite areas in the park. It was a delight to return there during our visit last August! Susan and I hiked up the valley, often bushwacking through tall gr

26 Oct 2019Developer post

WolfQuest: Anniversary Edition v1.0.1 with new animal behaviors!

We’re excited to release this update, which has a bunch of bugfixes and minor improvements, plus some bigger and more exciting new features that give the NPC residents of our WolfQuest world more to do: from hunting to fighting to just hanging out. It’s available now and should a

We’re excited to release this update, which has a bunch of bugfixes and minor improvements, plus some bigger and more exciting new features that give the NPC residents of our WolfQuest world more to do: from hunting to fighting to just hanging out. It’s available now and should auto-update via Steam or the WolfQuest launcher.

Devblog video: https://youtu.be/f2HGe8nRqX4

NEW ANIMAL BEHAVIORS:
* Stranger wolves (dispersals and pack wolves) hunt prey.
* Bull elk rut: Bull elk challenge the resident bull in a large herd to a fight, involving a lot of bugling, circling, and clash of antlers.
* Buck mule deer rut: Buck mule deer will converge near small doe herds and challenge each other to a fight, involving a lot of circling, eyeing each other, and antler clashes. Since mule deer don't live in herds as elk do, this is harder to witness. Try following mule deer scents and hope to find a situation where two males have converged on a family group of does and fawns.
* Eagles are present throughout the game world: flying around, perching on dead trees, and hunting. Bald eagles hunt fish in the Lamar River while Golden eagles (new species!) hunt snowshoe hares.
* Ravens are present throughout the game world.
* Coyotes hunt snowshoe hares.
* Foxes hunt small prey.

OTHER NEW AND IMPROVED THINGS:
* Custom markers on the World Map now appear on the Compass (faded with distance).
* Added a third Gore level, now No Gore (carcasses do not turn bloody), Low Gore (carcasses turn bloody), and More Gore (carcasses turn bloody and skeleton and innards revealed during consumption.) The original intent was for Low Gore to be as described here, but it inadvertently switched to what we're now calling No Gore. We've renamed "Low" to "No" so it preserves your previous visual effect, but you can change it to Low Gore if you want a bit of blood.
* Carcasses have improved textures (fur only on the skin, not on the exposed innards).
* Adjusted colliders on the rock at the top of Fairies' Falls. Should be possible to jump onto it, and should be quite hard to get stuck.
* Player wolf will sometimes crouch when facing an opponent, preparing to attack.
* Moon casts shadows at night.
* Competitors should be less likely to get stuck running in circles near you.
* Minor performance improvement when many elk are spawned in vicinity.
* Controller support: Added a steering sensitivity slider for controllers. (Many more improvements for controllers still to come.)
* Stranger territory audio now part of Interface Audio (so not muted if music is muted).
* Animals use walking turn more now, don't do the spin-in-place turn except in urgent situations.
* Bite cursor should be hidden in Photo Mode.
* Removed "mate" from badword filter for wolf bio.

BUGS FIXED
* Animals sometimes have snow on them when it hasn't been snowing.
* Weird snow pattern on bears.
* Sometimes grass density settings don't persist in later game sessions.
* Unable to save your game or overwrite existing saved game (fixed a couple bugs; there may be others still)
* Ravens gather at some distance from carcass.
* When running in dual-monitor setup, with game on one screen in Fullscreen Windowed mode, game minimizes when you click on other screen.
* Elk calves have Cow Elk label.
* Fox fur looks bad.
* On some computer systems, the mouse cursor has "hand grab" icon instead of pointer.
* In "My Wolves" in main menu, sometimes one wolf is missing, and arrows are missing too so can't select another wolf.
* Dispersal wolf is occasionally frozen.
* The "So Sleepy, Bug..." alert is missing text.
* Grass sometimes bends quite excessively in the wind.
* Improved lighting on trees when viewing towards sun.
* Reduced acceleration and deceleration speeds for cougar, coyote and fox.
* In Basic mode, some areas have grass when grass is disabled.
* In Customization, fur pokes through radio collar if you change coats after choosing the collar.
* In Basic graphics mode, at some places in the game world, some distant terrain sections are missing.
* Can get stuck on far side of Lamar River, stuck between two world-edge barriers.
* Thin vertical lines appear around grass in Basic graphics mode.
* Controller: Fixed incorrect labels on Controller Help image (ack!)
* Sometimes wolves don't growl or snarl during wolf fights.
* Various terrain tweaks.

Original post

20 Sep 2019Developer post

Cliff Face Lift (Devblog)

The cliffs of Amethyst Mountain have been troublesome from the start of the project. I’ve made several attempts over the past two years but have never been that satisfied with the results — including the version that we released into Early Access, which was something of a last-mi

07 Sep 2019Developer post

Back from Yellowstone! And a few troubleshooting tips

We're back from Yellowstone National Park, where we had an excellent time exploring the areas where the game is set: Amethyst Mountain, Slough Creek, and Tower Fall, We also met with Dan Stahler, YNP wolf biologist and one of our science advisors for the game. As usual, he had a

25 Jul 2019Developer post

Release for Early Access: Update

Like elk hunts, game launches are not 100% successful on the first try. Thank you all for your patience and support as we persevere. We are working on it! Update: We have released the game on itch.io so if you purchased it there originally, it'll be available on your download pag

21 Jul 2019Developer post

New Beginnings (Devblog)

This is a special news announcement because we want to share some information about WolfQuest: Anniversary Edition before the release on Thursday. We’ve decided to scrap a particular feature that we’ve mentioned over the past few years, and we wanted to get the word out before th

https://youtu.be/KSIrH57zb0g

This is a special news announcement because we want to share some information about WolfQuest: Anniversary Edition before the release on Thursday. We’ve decided to scrap a particular feature that we’ve mentioned over the past few years, and we wanted to get the word out before the release. We know it’ll be disappointing to a lot of players, but we do think it’s for the best.

And that feature is: importing your wolf from the old game into the new game. It sounded good two years ago, but since then the new game has grown substantially bigger (and better, I think) and it’s problematic in several ways to import old wolves into it. You can easily recreate your wolf from the old game with the customization features – and it has new options, as well – but you won't be able to import your wolf from the old game. That will be a big disappointment to a lot of people– especially those who have been working to earn more XP and climb the ranks in the old game.

But we’ve thought about it a lot and even aside from the technical issues, we think it's just the right decision — partly because it doesn't really make sense start the game as two year old dispersal wolf with a lot of XP and a high rank. Furthermore, we are developing a totally new XP system with some very cool stuff, but it won’t be ready for awhile yet, and so carrying over XP from the old game gets messy. So we are very sorry to scrap this feature at the last minute, but we hope that everyone will take on the challenge of starting fresh in WQ: Anniversary Edition to chart their course as a young wolf in the Lamar Valley.

We’ve been getting many questions about how to get WQ: Anniversary Edition once it’s released. It’s pretty simple:

* On Steam, if you’ve purchased the old game, the new game will simply appear in your Library, ready to download.

* If you purchased the game on the WolfQuest website or itch.io, the new game will be available on your WolfQuest download page. Your email receipt from itch.io has the link for that, or you can have that email sent again. See our Knowledge Base for details:

Original post

19 Jul 2019Developer post

Looking Forward, Looking Back

We are one week away from the release of WolfQuest: Anniversary Edition early access for PC and Mac computers! It has been a lot longer haul to get here than anybody expected but this initial release is in sight and, of course, there's lots more to come after that: Slough Creek,

11 Jul 2019Developer post

Hunting for the Hardcore (Devblog)

WolfQuest: Anniversary Edition will offer three difficulty levels, which we hope will make the game fun and engaging for a wide range of players. Today we look at how we’re crafting the hardest difficulty level. Most of this work has been done by our summer intern George, who is

https://youtu.be/wLAY8q2c-yw

WolfQuest: Anniversary Edition will offer three difficulty levels, which we hope will make the game fun and engaging for a wide range of players. Today we look at how we’re crafting the hardest difficulty level. Most of this work has been done by our summer intern George, who is a college student (majoring in computer science), competitive Counterstrike player, and coincidentally, my son. So he’s how he tackled it:

When I first started designing the Accurate difficulty, I had two primary goals. The first was to create a difficulty that increased the challenge of the game, without turning hunts into lengthy, boring slugging matches where player skill is secondary to simple time spent on the hunt. The second was to try and replicate the success rates of real wolves in the wild. The core changes that make Accurate different from other difficulties reside in the multipliers Player Damage Dealt and Player Damage Taken. As a reference point, for the Challenging difficulty, the default difficulty of the game, these numbers are both set at 1. On Accurate, Player Damage Dealt is set to 1.5, meaning the player deals one and a half times as much damage to prey, and Player Damage Taken is set to 2.7, meaning the player takes more than two and a half times as much damage from prey on Accurate than on Challenging. Those are some big changes, and they make Accurate feel like a very different game. Hunts tend to be shorter but require more caution and active thought. Even the most skilled players won’t succeed on every hunt. Knowing when to give up the chase is crucial, otherwise your wolf might not survive the harsh wilderness of Yellowstone. Accurate is not for the faint of heart and is by no means necessary to enjoy WolfQuest: Anniversary Edition to the fullest. The game is designed to be engaging and well-rounded on Challenging, which offers a test of skill without being overly punishing, and there will also be an Easy difficulty, for those who want a more relaxed experience. But for the bravest souls, Accurate offers our most realistic, most difficult representation of the life of a wild wolf.

_______________
We are releasing the first episode, Amethyst Mountain for PC/Mac on Steam and itch.io, as Early Access on July 25. That will be followed by multiplayer and Slough Creek some months later, then followed by the mobile versions. We’ll then resume development of the next episode, Tower Fall.

WolfQuest 3 will be a free update to players who own WolfQuest 2.7.

Original post

04 Jul 2019Developer post

Shadow Play (Devblog)

There are so many elements to make a vast open-world environment believable — from the ground textures to the vegetation to lighting, fog, and weather — but one of the most important is shadows. But shadows are very expensive (that’s game dev term for “slows the game down”), so w

28 Jun 2019Developer post

WolfQuest, Graphics Cards, and You (Devblog)

We’re seeing more questions from players about what kind of computer hardware is necessary to run WolfQuest: Anniversary Edition. Given how much bigger and better this game is compared to the old version, that’s a good question — so that’s what we’ll look at in today’s devblog po

20 Jun 2019Developer post

Early Access Release Date

We’re still cranking away on the game, and while there are days when the bug list doesn’t seem to get any shorter, we are definitely making great progress. In fact, we’ve finally reached the point where we are confident enough of the game state to announce — yes, believe it or no

13 Jun 2019Developer post

Carcass Camera Trap

A large kill, like an elk, provides a lot of meat for a wolf pack. Living in a feast or famine world, wolves often go several days without successfully making a kill, but they can gorge themselves and can quickly consume 20 pounds each. Wolfing down your food is a handy skill in

06 Jun 2019Developer post

Meet the Prey

Yellowstone National Park provides an ungulate banquet – so these large, hoofed mammals are also the main course in WolfQuest. Elk are the top choice and were a key reason of why the park was chosen for wolf reintroduction. Swift mule deer and nimble bighorn sheep might feed a cl

30 May 2019Developer post

Battling Bulls (Devblog)

We are all cranking away on the many, many little things that need to be in good shape for Early Access release (PC/Mac) — refining interface elements, optimizing the game for lower-end hardware, polishing many aspects of gameplay, and, of course, a great deal of bugtesting and f

23 May 2019Developer post

100 New Things in WolfQuest 3: Anniversary Edition

Last week we showed some things that are NOT coming to WolfQuest 3, so this week, to mark the 100th devblog, we’ve put together a list of 100 things that ARE coming to WolfQuest 3: NEW GAME WORLD * Huge open world maps * Dynamic day-night cycle * Dynamic weather with clouds, rain

https://youtu.be/q6ly2jqO64I

Last week we showed some things that are NOT coming to WolfQuest 3, so this week, to mark the 100th devblog, we’ve put together a list of 100 things that ARE coming to WolfQuest 3:

NEW GAME WORLD
* Huge open world maps
* Dynamic day-night cycle
* Dynamic weather with clouds, rain, snow, and storms
* Realistic trees and vegetation
* [NOT YET REVEALED]
* Immersive natural soundscape
* Lamar River and many mountain creeks
* Spectacular cliffs overlooking the Lamar Valley
* The summit of Amethyst Mountain
* New and improved petrified trees in the fossil forest
* [NOT YET REVEALED]
* [NOT YET REVEALED]

GAMEPLAY
* All new gameplay, designed and built from the ground up
* Sophisticated new ecological simulation
* Complex and realistic AI simulations
* Naturalistic movements of all animals
* Realistic scents on the ground and wind

HUNTING
* New showdown gameplay with prey
* Persistent elk herds roam the landscape
* Large herds of elk move and flee in realistic formations
* Challenging hunting tactics and mechanics
* Realistic biting mechanics
* Mothers protect juveniles from predators
* High and low-gore carcasses
* Coyotes harass wolves at carcass
* Dangerous competitor conflicts at carcasses

WOLVES
* NPC wolves, adults and pups, have personalities
* Persistent wolf packs claim and maintain territory
* Strangers wolves fight to defend their territory
* Freeform fights with stranger wolves
* Potential mates roam the landscape
* Freeform courtship with prospective mates
* Trial period to get acquainted with prospective mate
* Interactive emotes with prospective mates

MULTIPLAYER
* More information about each game displayed in lobby
* Players can read other's wolf bios
* Chat panel is resizable and collapsible
* Players can side-chat with other players
* Hosts can close the game to prevent more from joining

PLAYER WOLF
* Upgraded wolf model with many more actions
* New HD coats based on original coats
* More realistic fur
* More howls for your wolf
* Secondary howl for pack rallies
* More body customizations
* Customizable eye color
* Wolf bio for single- and multiplayer
* [NOT YET REVEALED]
* [NOT YET REVEALED]

WOLF PHYSIOLOGY AND ACTIONS
* Resting restores health
* Eating satisfies hunger
* Sleep 16 hours a day (or suffer the consequences)
* Carry small prey around
* Pick up and carry carcass chunks
* Drink from ponds and rivers
* Use emotes while moving
* Jump like a real wolf
* Howl while sitting
* More poses when laying down
* Slide down steep slopes
* Inverse Kinematics (IK) for more realistic physical actions
* Permadeath option for player-wolf
* Permadeath option for your mate
* [NOT YET REVEALED]

CONTROLS
* New wolf controller
* New camera controller with free cam
* [NOT YET REVEALED]
* Photo mode with freeze action
* Better controller support
* Rebindable key mapping

ANIMALS
* New elk herds with bulls, cows, spikes, and calves
* New grizzly boars, sows, and cubs
* New cougars
* New ravens
* New foxes
* New coyotes
* New snowshoe hares
* Moose bulls, cows, and calves
* Mule deer families with bucks, does, and fawns
* Bighorn rams, ewes, and lambs
* Beavers
* [NOT YET REVEALED]
* [NOT YET REVEALED]
* Bull elk bugling and fighting
* [NOT YET REVEALED]
* [NOT YET REVEALED]
* New wolf pup models and actions
* Genetics and K-Locus DNA simulation for mate and pups

MUSIC
* Adaptive music system
* Many new music tracks
* Expanded versions of old music tracks

AND MORE
* New achievements
* New collectables
* [NOT YET REVEALED]
* [NOT YET REVEALED]
* [NOT YET REVEALED]
* Custom markers on world map
* Customizable interface scaling
* More audio volume controls
* [NOT YET REVEALED]

Original post

16 May 2019Developer post

Some Things That Are Not Coming to WolfQuest 3 (Devblog)

Believe it or not, we’ve pretty much fixed all the IK (inverse kinematics) issues that provided such hilarity in past blooper videos, but that’s not to say everyone and everything in the game always behaves itself. Here are some bugs that made us chuckle lately — but I’m happy to

09 May 2019Developer post

WolfQuest 3: Amethyst Trailer

Alrighty, we’ve got our first official trailer for WolfQuest 3! Making a trailer sounds so simple — just play the game and grab some cool video clips. But of course it’s never that easy. These things need to be quite cinematic, which means a variety of camera angles — not just th

02 May 2019Developer post

The Music of Sound (Devblog)

This week we look at how we are creating the WolfQuest 3 soundscape. In addition to adaptive music, we are building multiple layers of natural sounds – both environmental (wind, rain, etc.) and animal sounds – that help bring the WolfQuest world to life. Susan spent the last few

https://youtu.be/ARbj57w45-s

This week we look at how we are creating the WolfQuest 3 soundscape. In addition to adaptive music, we are building multiple layers of natural sounds – both environmental (wind, rain, etc.) and animal sounds – that help bring the WolfQuest world to life. Susan spent the last few months researching Yellowstone animals and gathering sounds that you might hear as wolf moving through the habitats of Yellowstone’s Northern Range. She sorted the sounds by season, habitat, and time of day, so I could then integrate them into the game, using a framework that our Unity developer Andrei built on top of a terrific plug-in called Master Audio. I create audio collections, then place audio emitters around the game map, which play the sounds in each collection based on defined rules (randomness, frequency, and time of day).

One challenge has been finding good, clean audio that was recorded by experts (who actually know the difference between a yellow warbler and a yellow-rumped warbler). Field recordings require good equipment, loads of patience, and long hours of analyzing and cataloging. We are grateful, in particular, for the work of Dr. Jacob Job, Sound and Light Ecology Team, Colorado State University/Natural Sounds and Night Skies Division of the National Park Service. Read more about this work at https://www.nps.gov/articles/deeplisteningbringsrewards.htm .

While you are waiting for the release of WolfQuest 3, treat yourself to a wolf serenade in Slough Creek at https://soundcloud.com/gaviaimmer/wolves-howling-at-dawn-in-yellowstone-national-park

__When?
We are getting closer to releasing the first episode, Amethyst Mountain, for PC/Mac on Steam and itch.io, as Early Access. That will be followed by Slough Creek some months later, followed by the mobile versions. We’ll then resume development of the next episode, Tower Fall

___How much will WQ3 cost?
WolfQuest 3 will be a free update to players who own WolfQuest 2.7. If you are buying WQ 3 for the first time, the cost will be more than the current game 2.7 (so it's cheaper to purchase it now and get WQ 3 as a free update). The Tower Fall expansion will be an in-game purchase (DLC).

___Will WQ3 be available on mobile?
WolfQuest is available for Mac, Windows, iPhone, iPad, Android & Kindle. So yes, WolfQuest 3 will be available for mobile phones and tablets...at least some of them, and/or in some form. Bigger maps and more animals may be too much for mobile devices with limited RAM memory. We'll do our best, but some low-end mobile devices will not be powerful enough to run the game. We will keep WolfQuest 2.7 (the current game) available as well (for both computers and mobile).

Original post

WolfQuest: Classic

Updates & announcements

WolfQuest 2.7/Classic Login Issue

Multiplayer Shut Down on WolfQuest Classic (v2.7)

WolfQuest Returns to Yellowstone: Slough Creek

WolfQuest: Anniversary Edition v1.0.1 with new animal behaviors!

Cliff Face Lift (Devblog)

Back from Yellowstone! And a few troubleshooting tips

Release for Early Access: Update

New Beginnings (Devblog)

Looking Forward, Looking Back

Hunting for the Hardcore (Devblog)

Shadow Play (Devblog)

WolfQuest, Graphics Cards, and You (Devblog)

Early Access Release Date

Carcass Camera Trap

Meet the Prey

Battling Bulls (Devblog)

100 New Things in WolfQuest 3: Anniversary Edition

Some Things That Are Not Coming to WolfQuest 3 (Devblog)

WolfQuest 3: Amethyst Trailer

The Music of Sound (Devblog)