(This post reflects our current plans as of January 2026)
What we accomplished in 2025
In response to demand for PvP content, we fully developed an in-game matchmaking event system (The Bigmoon Bash!) and subsequently ran 16 events throughout 2025 which each saw thousands of players play many more thousands of matches.
Then, from June to December 2025 we shipped 4 major updates. In that time we went from 18 fully-animated animated Beasties to 50. We expanded the game with a ton of new story content and added Rank Defense (a totally original and exciting challenge mode - on top of the 3 that were already there)! And we added public lobbies, allowing players to easily join PvP outside of events.
As can be expected, there have been unanticipated slowdowns and delays along the way getting here. Part of that is just the chaos of development. But we've also been fairly flexible with our plans up until now - a lot of the biggest features we shipped (including Bigmoon Bashes, Rank Defense and Public Lobbies) weren't in our plans when we first came to Early Access in November 2024. It's been an honest joy following the community's excitement and building awesome things for you this past year.
And even so, all of this is just a tiiiiny slice of everything we shipped in the last year. Reception has been overwhelmingly positive with 98+% positive reviews and playtime statistics that are well above average for titles on Steam. A huge thank you to players for your support and cheerleading - we couldn't make a game this amazing without your help!
What's next!
This year we're firmly setting our sights on wrapping up everything and moving towards 1.0. Up to now we've been talking about 10 planned milestone updates, but with the extra updates we've put out and combining some things, we've condensed the plan down to 9 milestone updates total - or, 6 more milestone updates remaining.
We've settled into a stable cadence of production and releases, and we can now better forecast how long it'll take to finish everything else. That said, I want to be clear this is indeed a forecast, not a guarantee.
We're targeting full release in early 2027! To some players, this time might still seem far away; but for us on the team, who were toiling away at this game for years before anyone even knew about it, it's incredible to have a date so close and tangible ahead of us. Nobody is more excited to see this game finished than we are!
In the meantime: we're excited to bring you tons of PvP events, updates, story content and more this year on our way to the big 1.0!
FAQ
What's the current state of the game in Early Access?
You can play the story from beginning to end credits, recruit every Beastie, and participate in tons of optional endless challenges, not to mention PvP matchmaking and regular timed events. What we called our initial "Early Access" release is what many games would call their full release. For anybody excited about Beastieball, we think the game already fully delivers on its promise. But we have been ever ambitious with our plans and have continued to grow and expand the game during its Early Access period.
The move to 1.0 is mostly going to be marked by all Beasties being animated and all character side stories being completable, along with other bonus content and features.
What features are coming in each update? Is feature X planned?
For specific feature requests and specific dates, we ask that you wait and see! Our plans are always shifting, and as we saw in 2025, some of the biggest things we ship this year may be ideas we haven't yet planned for (...I can already say some of the biggest things coming in the next update were NOT in my initial plans for the game...).
What other platform(s) are you planning for 1.0?
We'll make announcements about this - and more specific timing - when we get closer to the finish line! It's still far too soon to make any promises.
Any plans after 1.0?
We're working on an additional expansion called The Far Out which will release sometime after 1.0. We have a solid plan for everything in that expansion and will be actively developing it in 2026 alongside finishing the base content for 1.0. Don't expect any further information or details about this expansion until after we've released 1.0.