Is Enshrouded Worth Playing?

Game Overview.

Enshrouded Is a Great Adventure Game, but a Rather Unimpressive Survival Game

When I originally reviewed Enshrouded in February 2024, I praised its exploration, excellent building mechanics and RPG elements, but criticised its rather shallow survival mechanics and limited multiplayer communities. Having now returned to review the full 1.0 release, I must admit that my overall opinion has not changed very much. Enshrouded is a really good game, and in many ways, it is considerably better than it was when I originally reviewed it, but it still doesn’t feel like a traditional survival game.

Instead, Enshrouded feels much more like a large-scale cooperative adventure game with excellent voxel-based building mechanics, RPG progression and plenty of exploration. There is certainly nothing wrong with that, and I think it is important to recognise that the developers have created something that clearly appeals to a substantial audience. However, as somebody who enjoys games such as Conan Exiles, ARK: Survival Evolved, 7 Days to Die and Rust, I cannot help but feel that Enshrouded is missing some of the elements that make those games so enjoyable.

That doesn’t make Enshrouded a bad game, far from it, but it does mean that despite being marketed as a survival game, I feel it appeals to a rather different audience than most traditional survival titles.

Exploration Remains One of Enshrouded’s Greatest Strengths

One thing I really enjoyed about Enshrouded when it first entered Early Access was its emphasis on exploration, and that remains one of its greatest strengths. Unlike many survival games, where gathering resources, crafting equipment and expanding your base provide most of the motivation to continue, Enshrouded places considerable emphasis on discovering the world around you.

As I mentioned in my original review, the world is filled with lore snippets, letters and records that point players towards valuable resources, interesting locations, treasure and enemy encampments. Some provide relatively vague directions, while others reveal more about the history of the world and the events that led to its current condition. I really like this approach because it encourages exploration without constantly holding the player’s hand.

The Shroud itself also adds an interesting element to exploration, with its corrupted environments, dangerous enemies and limited time available to explore certain areas. Venturing into these locations can be rewarding, but there is also a risk involved, particularly when carrying valuable resources that could be lost if you die and fail to retrieve them.

With the full release, Enshrouded now feels like a content-complete adventure game. There is plenty to explore, plenty to discover and plenty of reasons to venture beyond the safety of your base. I don’t feel that the game is lacking content, even if the type of content it offers doesn’t necessarily appeal to me as much as it might to somebody who enjoys cooperative adventure games.

Enshrouded Has One of the Best Building Systems in the Genre

I absolutely loved Enshrouded’s building system when I originally reviewed it, and I still think it is fantastic. By combining traditional building components with the freedom of voxel-based construction, the developers have created a system that allows players to build some genuinely incredible structures.

Unlike games that restrict players to placing predefined foundations, walls and roofs, Enshrouded allows players to modify individual blocks and seamlessly combine different building components. This makes it possible to create incredibly detailed structures, including buildings that would be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to recreate in games such as ARK or Conan Exiles.

Some of the things people have managed to build are absolutely amazing. There are recreations of Hogwarts, Rivendell and the Shire, along with countless other impressive creations, and I honestly think being able to visit other people’s worlds, explore what they have built and share your own creations is one of the best things about Enshrouded.

The building system gives creative players an incredible amount of freedom, and when you see what some members of the community have accomplished, it is difficult not to be impressed.

Unfortunately, I still have one major criticism of the building system, and it is exactly the same criticism I raised when I originally reviewed the game.

There Is Still Very Little Reason to Build a Defensible Base

Despite how fantastic the building mechanics are, I still feel that there is very little reason to build a substantial base beyond the enjoyment of building something that looks impressive. Now, that is a perfectly valid reason to build, and considering some of the incredible creations I have seen, I can certainly understand why people would spend countless hours constructing their perfect home, village or castle.

However, after playing survival games where building and defending a base is an essential part of the experience, Enshrouded feels like a step backwards in this particular area.

As I mentioned in my original review, there is very little practical reason to build a heavily fortified castle when a relatively modest structure can serve much the same purpose. You need somewhere to accommodate your crafting stations, NPCs and other essentials, but you don’t need towering walls, defensive positions or elaborate fortifications because your base simply isn’t under threat in the same way it would be in games such as 7 Days to Die or Conan Exiles.

I’m not even talking about PvP, although that would obviously introduce additional reasons to build defensively. Even some form of PvE base raid system would have been fantastic, giving players a reason to construct fortifications and defend the buildings they have spent so much time creating.

In my original review, I suggested that the creatures of the Shroud should occasionally attempt to extinguish the Flame at the heart of a player’s base, providing a lore-friendly reason for players to defend their homes.

As a follower of Jesus Christ, I was reminded of John 1:5:

“The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness can never extinguish it.”

While the light of Christ endures forever, I still think Enshrouded would benefit from giving the creatures of darkness a reason to attack the light that sustains the player’s settlement. Even an optional system, where players could decide whether they wanted to defend their base against attacks, would add an entirely new dimension to the building mechanics.

Unfortunately, this is still not part of the experience, and I haven’t seen any clear indication that the developers intend to introduce anything along these lines.

However, perhaps they don’t need to. Enshrouded is clearly doing very well without base raids, and perhaps the audience the developers are catering to simply doesn’t want that kind of experience. I can respect that, but it doesn’t change the fact that I personally find building far more enjoyable when there is a practical reason to defend what I have created.

Combat and RPG Progression Remain Enjoyable

Another aspect of Enshrouded that I praised in my original review was its RPG progression system, which allows players to develop characters suited to different combat roles. Whether you prefer dealing damage, taking on a more defensive role or supporting other players, Enshrouded provides plenty of opportunities to customise your character.

The skill system also allows players to invest in multiple specialisations rather than forcing them into a single traditional class, which is particularly useful when playing cooperatively. It gives players considerable freedom to develop characters that suit their preferred approach to combat and exploration.

Enshrouded has always borrowed quite heavily from the MMORPG genre in this respect, and I think that is one of the reasons it feels more like a cooperative RPG than a traditional survival game. Much of the progression revolves around exploring increasingly dangerous areas, acquiring better equipment, improving your character and taking on more challenging encounters.

Having returned for the full release, my opinion of the combat and RPG systems remains largely unchanged. They are enjoyable and work well within the type of game Enshrouded is trying to be, but they haven’t fundamentally changed my opinion of the overall experience.

Enshrouded Still Doesn’t Have the Multiplayer Communities I Want From a Survival Game

One of my biggest criticisms when I originally reviewed Enshrouded was its relatively small server populations, and unfortunately, this is still something that bothers me.

For this updated review, I played the PC version, and when I checked the Steam player count, there were more than 20,000 people playing Enshrouded. On 10 November 2026, the game reached a daily peak of approximately 50,610 concurrent Steam players, which is an impressive figure and demonstrates that Enshrouded has attracted a substantial audience.

However, when I opened the dedicated server browser, the situation looked very different.

Despite tens of thousands of people playing the game, I found only a handful of publicly accessible servers with active players. Most seemed to have just one or two people online, with three players being about the most I saw on the smaller servers. Even then, there wasn’t much room for additional players, with some servers having capacities of only six players.

I believe I also saw a larger server with a capacity of around twelve or fifteen players, but even when these servers are full, we are still talking about relatively small groups of people compared to the communities that can develop in other survival games.

Enshrouded currently supports up to sixteen concurrent players on PC servers, which may be more than enough for a group of friends who want to explore the world together, but it is nowhere near enough for the sort of larger server communities that I personally enjoy.

When I think of games such as ARK, Rust, Conan Exiles and 7 Days to Die, I think of the communities that develop around persistent multiplayer servers. I think of people building their own settlements, cooperating with other players, trading resources, exploring together and, where applicable, defending what they have built.

Enshrouded simply doesn’t offer that same experience, and the limited server sizes make it difficult for anything resembling those larger communities to develop.

Of course, not everybody wants to join a server populated by dozens of other players. Some people simply want to explore a beautiful world with a few friends, build something impressive and enjoy the adventure together. For those players, Enshrouded is probably a much better fit than many traditional survival games.

The Lack of Cross-Play Is Another Disappointment

Another limitation worth mentioning is that Enshrouded still doesn’t support cross-platform multiplayer between PC and PlayStation 5.

The developers have indicated that they are working towards introducing cross-play, but at the time of this review, players on PC and PS5 cannot simply join one another’s games.

For a title that places so much emphasis on cooperative play, I think this is unfortunate, particularly when the existing server size limitations already restrict the sort of communities that can develop.

I would love to see both cross-play support and larger server capacities introduced in the future, although I suspect the latter may not be something the developers consider particularly important to the experience they want to provide.

Performance Has Improved Considerably

One area where I have absolutely no complaints is performance.

When I originally reviewed Enshrouded in Early Access, I was already impressed by how well it ran on my hardware, particularly considering the game had only recently launched. Even back then, I was able to achieve a very playable experience using my Radeon RX 5700 XT.

Having now returned for the full release, performance feels considerably smoother, and I had absolutely no issues whatsoever during my time with the game.

Everything ran incredibly smoothly, and considering how visually impressive Enshrouded is, that is something the developers deserve credit for. The environments look fantastic, the lighting is excellent, and the overall presentation is one of the strongest aspects of the experience.

Enshrouded Feels Like a Complete Game

One thing I want to make clear is that I don’t feel Enshrouded has been rushed out of Early Access or that it is lacking enough content to justify its full release. Quite the opposite, actually. It feels like a complete game, and I think the developers have done a good job of expanding upon the foundations established back in January 2024.

The world is large, the building system is fantastic, there is plenty of exploration and adventure content, and the overall experience feels much more polished than it did when I originally reviewed it.

My problem isn’t that Enshrouded doesn’t have enough content or that the developers haven’t done enough work. It is simply that the type of game Enshrouded has become doesn’t particularly appeal to me in the same way that a more traditional survival game would.

Perhaps if I had a group of friends who wanted to play regularly, I would get considerably more enjoyment out of it. I can certainly see how exploring the world together, building impressive settlements and tackling difficult encounters could be a fantastic experience for a group of friends.

However, as somebody who really enjoys the survival mechanics, larger communities and base defence systems found in other games in the genre, I cannot help but feel that something is missing.

That doesn’t mean the developers have made the wrong decisions. Enshrouded has attracted a large audience, and its continued success suggests that plenty of people are happy with the direction Keen Games has taken.

Perhaps I am simply not the audience they are trying to appeal to, and that’s perfectly fine.

Enshrouded FAQ

Enshrouded is a survival game developed and published by Keen Games GmbH, it released on 15 October 2026, and is available on PC and Playstation 5.

Is There Group Finding/Matchmaking Support?

Enshrouded offers the following matchmaking options:

• ☑ Solo Matchmaking
• ☑ Group Matchmaking

Are There In-Game Microtransactions?

The Enshrouded in-game store sells:

• ☑ Cosmetic Items
• ☑ Cosmetic Item Bundles

What Peripherals Are Supported?

Enshrouded supports the following peripherals:

• ☑ Console - Controller
• ☑ PC - Controller
• ☑ PC - Mouse and Keyboard

Is There Any Mature Content?

Enshrouded is rated PEGI 12+ and contains:

• ☑ Violence

Final Verdict.

When I originally reviewed Enshrouded in February 2024, I considered it a very good game that unfortunately didn’t offer the sort of survival experience I was hoping for. Having now returned for the full 1.0 release, my opinion remains largely unchanged.

Enshrouded is a fantastic-looking cooperative adventure game with one of the best building systems in the genre, enjoyable RPG progression, plenty of content and excellent performance. The ability to explore other people’s incredible creations and share your own worlds is also one of its greatest strengths.

Unfortunately, the limited survival mechanics, lack of meaningful base defence and relatively small server populations mean that it still doesn’t appeal to me in the same way as games such as Conan Exiles, ARK, Rust or 7 Days to Die.

If I were judging Enshrouded purely on how much it appeals to me personally, I probably wouldn’t consider it an 8/10 game. However, I would be dishonest if I pretended that it wasn’t an 8/10 game for the average gamer, particularly somebody who enjoys cooperative adventures, exploration and creative building.

Enshrouded is a really good game, and while it isn’t the survival experience I personally want, I can absolutely understand why so many people enjoy it. I still recommend it to players who enjoy cooperative RPGs, exploration and building, but those looking for a more traditional survival experience with larger communities and meaningful base defence may find it rather disappointing.