Blackfrost: The Long Dark 2 will hit Early Access in 2026, and this time it'll have co-op

Blackfrost: The Long Dark 2 is in development and will hit early access in 2026. The announcement came during the 2024 The Game Awards, with a gorgeous trailer showing a considerably more varied color palette than what we saw in the brilliant original. Better still, this instalment will add co-op.

While that early access launch is a long way away, you can already wishlist The Long Dark 2 on Steam. According to its Steam page, Blackfrost "evolves every aspect of the survival formula to its 2.0 iteration, setting the table for the next generation of survival games.

"Build your own survivor, customize traits and skills, collect scars and stories, and experience a life as a survivor in this beautiful yet dangerous world. Many games have tried to bring survival mechanics to their open-world RPGs, but Blackfrost is the first survival game built ground-up as a survival RPG."

Interestingly, The Long Dark 2 will take place in a vanquished world with "19th-century level" technology, and will add a new psychological survival element. It'll boast plenty more environmental threats than in its predecessor, and it's approach to death seems to take a leaf out of Outward's books (though a classic permadeath mode will also be available.

Like it did with The Long Dark, Hinterland Studio plans to spend a lot of time in early access iterating the game's prickly survival systems. "When we launch Blackfrost in Early Access in 2026, we anticipate the game including a portion of our full world map, and a range of foundational survival mechanics and supporting content. We will update players with more details about our specific plans for Early Access and what they can expect when we get closer to launch.”