# VAEL

> VAEL is a low-poly co-op dark fantasy extraction dungeon crawler for PC. Descend four procedural depths with up to 4 friends, loot, fish and escape alive.

VAEL is a low-poly, multiplayer dark fantasy extraction dungeon crawler made in the Godot Engine. Alone or with up to three friends, you leave the Sanctuary, enter a cursed forest and descend through four procedurally generated depths: the Cursed Forest, the Hollow Ruins, the Forgotten Crypt and the Catacombs of Vael. Everything you carry is at risk until you reach a way out. Push deeper for better loot, or turn back while you still can.

## Key facts

- Genre: co-op dark fantasy extraction dungeon crawler
- Platform: PC
- Players: 1 to 4 (online co-op)
- Engine: Godot
- Status: in active development; playtest sign-up on the website
- Developer: VAEL
- Development: solo developer, AI-assisted
- How it's made: VAEL is made by a solo developer using AI-assisted development: AI tools help write the code and optimise performance, while the design decisions, direction and playtesting are the developer's own.

## Features

- Extraction runs: everything you carry is at risk until you reach a waystone, gate or altar
- Four procedurally generated depths, new every run, from one seed
- Online co-op for up to four players, hosted from your own Sanctuary; graves hold a fallen friend's loot
- Daggers, longswords, staves, bows and flintlock muskets, plus rings and necklaces
- Six loot rarities up to one-of-a-kind Mythics
- Skeletons, ghouls, knights, wraiths, spiders, zombies, goblins, wendigos, drakes and mimics
- Drakes that take to the sky and rain fire down, setting the ground alight; bring them down with bow, musket or spell
- Bosses: the Broodmother in her silk-strung lair, the Drake Matriarch on her nest of eggs, three guardians and the Bone Warden
- Weather rolled per run: rain with lightning, settling snow, the Blood Moon and blood rain
- Puzzle rooms and deadly obstacle courses in the deeper tiers, guarding vault chests
- A full fishing game: 30 species, two waters, rods, fishmongers and the Blood Mere
- Nine skills that level by use, up to eight characters and a detailed character editor
- The Sanctuary: four traders with trust levels, contracts, a stash, a casino, a chessboard, a timed climb, a trophy wall and a training yard
- The Ivory Pocket: pool and snooker with real ball physics, against friends or skeleton hustlers, for gold
- Poker in the Gilded Ossuary: no-limit hold'em against your party or skeleton card sharps
- Chess on a stone board in the courtyard, against friends or four rated skeleton opponents
- A pouch for your gold and every material, with gold you can see piling up and drop by the handful
- Glowing mushrooms in the Cursed Forest that heal you, then make the whole world breathe
- Traps, corruption and a deepening danger the longer you stay below
- Built for low-end PCs: a Potato preset and a Compatibility renderer

## The four depths

- I. The Cursed Forest: Rolling hills, a winding river and a dark lake, all grown from one seed. Clearings hide camps, a cemetery, a stone circle and caches. Deep in the trees the Broodmother waits in a lair strung with silk, and in some forests a Drake Matriarch broods over her eggs in a nest of burnt branches.
- II. The Hollow Ruins: Roofless courts on the edge of sheer cliffs. A river of blood springs from the rock, winds between the ruins under arched stone bridges and pools in the Blood Mere, where a skeletal fishmonger keeps a shack on the shore.
- III. The Forgotten Crypt: The crypt is booby-trapped: spike plates inside doorways, dart passages and pendulum blades in the corridors. Every trap clicks or whooshes before it strikes, a roll beats all of them, and they hurt the dead as much as you.
- IV. The Catacombs of Vael: The deepest tier. Seventeen rooms, a chasm with no floor crossed on narrow bridges, a Reliquary behind an abyssal lock, and the Bone Warden waiting in the farthest hall.

## Roadmap (planned, in order)

- More tiers to explore (Next up): The descent goes deeper. New depths join the Cursed Forest, the Hollow Ruins, the Crypt and the Catacombs, each with its own look, its own dead and its own way out.
- More skills (Planned): More to master beyond the nine skills you can level today. Like the rest, they'll train by doing and climb from Novice to Master.
- More puzzles and obstacle courses (Planned): More trials join the six already hidden in the deep: new riddles to solve and new deadly courses to cross, with sealed vaults at the end of them.
- Pets (Planned): Rare companions found in the depths. Pets will be rare drops, the kind of find you'll want to show off back at the Sanctuary.
- Persistent accounts and a player market (On the horizon): Online accounts that keep your characters, stash and progress, and a player-driven market where you trade gear and items with everyone else who's been down there.

## FAQ

- What is VAEL? A multiplayer dark fantasy extraction dungeon crawler. You go down into four procedurally generated depths, take what you can, and try to get back out alive with it.
- Can I play solo? Yes. Every run works alone, or with up to three friends.
- What happens when I die? You lose everything you carried except your one insured item. In co-op, a grave holds your gear so a friend can bring it home.
- Does the weather change how a run plays? It changes how it looks, sounds and feels: rain and lightning, settling snow, a Blood Moon. It's rolled per run for the forest and the ruins, and the whole party shares it.
- How do I kill a flying drake? Shoot it. Arrows, musket balls and spells reach it in the air, and raising your weapon lets you aim almost straight up. Break its poise and it crashes to the ground stunned. With only a blade, survive until it lands, then hit it while it's on its feet.
- Who is the Drake Matriarch? A boss who guards a nest of dragon eggs in about two Cursed Forests in five. She wakes when you come close, flies, breathes fire, won't be led far from her nest, and hatches her eggs into drakelings when she's badly hurt.
- What are trials? Puzzle rooms and deadly obstacle courses that turn up from the Hollow Ruins down. Solve a puzzle to open a sealed vault, or cross a course to reach its prize.
- Can I play pool? Yes. The Ivory Pocket in the Sanctuary has two pool tables and a full-size snooker table. Play your friends or a skeleton hustler, for banked gold or for nothing. There's chess and poker too.
- What do the mushrooms do? Eat one of the glowing clumps in the Cursed Forest and you get back nearly a third of your health. Then, for ten seconds, the world starts to breathe.
- Is fishing worth it? It's a whole game of its own: thirty species, a Fishing skill, rods with their own stats, fishmongers who pay in gold, and the Blood Mere's rare catches for anglers at level 20.
- Will it run on my laptop? VAEL is built to run on low-end machines, with a Potato preset and a Compatibility renderer for integrated graphics.
- What engine is it made in? The Godot Engine.
- Is AI used to make VAEL? Yes. VAEL is made by a solo developer using AI-assisted development: AI tools help write the code and optimise performance, while the design decisions, direction and playtesting are the developer's own.
- When can I play? VAEL is in active development. Leave your email and we'll tell you when playtests open.

## Links

- [Home](https://vael.lol/): overview, screenshots and playtest sign-up
- [Wiki](https://vael.lol/wiki): items, fish, enemies, depths, skills and guides
  - [Your first run](https://vael.lol/wiki/your-first-run): The loop at the heart of VAEL: leave the Sanctuary, descend, loot, and get out alive.
  - [Controls](https://vael.lol/wiki/controls): Every key and gamepad button, plus the advanced moves: riposte, roll attack and more.
  - [Death and extraction](https://vael.lol/wiki/death-and-extraction): The ways out of each depth, how long you must hold them, insurance, and what dying costs.
  - [Co-op](https://vael.lol/wiki/co-op): Playing with up to three friends: lobbies, loot rules, graves, targeting and friendly fire.
  - [The Cursed Forest](https://vael.lol/wiki/the-cursed-forest): Depth I: hills, a winding violet river, a dark lake, campfires, the Broodmother's lair and sometimes a dragon's nest.
  - [The Hollow Ruins](https://vael.lol/wiki/the-hollow-ruins): Depth II: roofless courts on the cliffs, a river of blood, stone bridges and the Blood Mere.
  - [The Forgotten Crypt](https://vael.lol/wiki/the-forgotten-crypt): Depth III: torchlit halls of spike plates, dart passages and pendulum blades, where corruption begins.
  - [The Catacombs of Vael](https://vael.lol/wiki/the-catacombs-of-vael): Depth IV: the deepest tier, a bottomless chasm, the Reliquary and the Bone Warden.
  - [The Sanctuary](https://vael.lol/wiki/the-sanctuary): Home: a walled keep above the forest with traders, your stash, games, a trophy wall and the training yard.
  - [Bestiary](https://vael.lol/wiki/bestiary): Every enemy: base health, where it walks and how it fights, from skeletons and zombies to drakes and the bosses.
  - [Drakes and dragon fire](https://vael.lol/wiki/drakes-and-dragon-fire): Flying drakes, how to bring them down, burning ground, and the Drake Matriarch and her nest.
  - [Weapons](https://vael.lol/wiki/weapons): Daggers, longswords, staves, bows, muskets and rods: every weapon with its base stats.
  - [Bows and elemental arrows](https://vael.lol/wiki/bows-and-elemental-arrows): Every bow and what it's made of, the fire, poison and frost bows, and how an archer stands and draws.
  - [Armour and shields](https://vael.lol/wiki/armour): Body armour, helms, gloves, legs, boots and shields, with their base stats.
  - [Rings and necklaces](https://vael.lol/wiki/jewellery): Rings (one on each hand) and necklaces, charms and pendants, with what they give.
  - [Mythic items](https://vael.lol/wiki/mythics): Every Mythic in the game: one-of-a-kind items that shimmer in every colour.
  - [Rarities and loot](https://vael.lol/wiki/rarities-and-loot): The six rarities, how they scale stats and value, and where the best loot hides.
  - [Materials, keys and supplies](https://vael.lol/wiki/materials-and-supplies): Your pouch and gold, what the dead drop for contracts, plus keys, ember vials and purifying salts.
  - [Fishing](https://vael.lol/wiki/fishing): The reel game, rods, both fishmongers and all 30 fish: weights, values and habits.
  - [Puzzles and obstacle courses](https://vael.lol/wiki/trials): All six trials, where they appear, how to beat them and what they guard.
  - [Weather](https://vael.lol/wiki/weather): Rain, snow, the Blood Moon and blood rain: how often they roll and what they bring.
  - [Corruption and traps](https://vael.lol/wiki/corruption-and-traps): Why lingering deep is dangerous, and every trap in the Forgotten Crypt.
  - [Skills](https://vael.lol/wiki/skills): The nine skills, how each one trains, what it gives at level 50, and the origins.
  - [Games in the Sanctuary](https://vael.lol/wiki/sanctuary-games): Pool and snooker, poker, chess, the casino tables and the Climb: what to do between runs.
  - [Traders and contracts](https://vael.lol/wiki/traders-and-contracts): The Sanctuary's traders, trust levels, contracts, keys, upgrades and the casino.
- [Roadmap](https://vael.lol/roadmap): what's planned next
- [Devlog](https://vael.lol/updates): every update to the game (78 so far); Atom feed at https://vael.lol/feed.xml
  - [v0.63.3: vid, a film set for recording gameplay](https://vael.lol/updates/v0-63-3) (2026-10-27)
  - [v0.63.2: eyes in the dark, and a new skills screen](https://vael.lol/updates/v0-63-2) (2026-10-26)
  - [v0.63.1: gear keeps pace, Mythics pay off, parties meet more](https://vael.lol/updates/v0-63-1) (2026-10-26)
  - [v0.63: progression: earn your way down](https://vael.lol/updates/v0-63) (2026-10-26)
  - [v0.62.1: a proper archer's stance, and a clear first-person view](https://vael.lol/updates/v0-62-1) (2026-10-26)
  - [v0.62: bows of their own, elemental arrows, and archers who hold them right](https://vael.lol/updates/v0-62) (2026-10-26)
  - [v0.61.1: aim at the sky, and the bow's own crosshair](https://vael.lol/updates/v0-61-1) (2026-10-26)
  - [v0.61: the Drake Matriarch, and lairs that hang together](https://vael.lol/updates/v0-61) (2026-10-26)
  - [v0.60: dragons take to the sky, and their fire burns](https://vael.lol/updates/v0-60) (2026-10-26)
  - [v0.59.1: armour icons face you](https://vael.lol/updates/v0-59-1) (2026-10-26)
- [Trailer](https://vael.lol/#watch): 40 seconds of gameplay (https://vael.lol/static/video/vael-promo.mp4)
- [Press kit](https://vael.lol/press): fact sheet, screenshots and logos