Keen Games, the German studio behind Enshrouded, was at gamescom 2025 and presented the new update “Wake of the Waters” for their survival hit on Steam. MeinMMO was invited to take a closer look at the new content, and survival expert Benedict Grothaus was there to get a clearer picture. Perhaps the biggest surprise is a feature that was supposed to play a minor role.
During the Opening Night Live of gamescom 2025, a brand new trailer for Enshrouded aired around the middle of the show. Content: The upcoming update “Wake of the Waters” featuring a new biome and, above all, water as a new feature – something fans have been demanding for a long time.
Enshrouded is the surprise hit from Germany, a game that is still in development, but has already won many awards with prize money that benefits the development.
The fact that the new trailer aired during the Opening Night Live is due to a wildcard that the studio received, as the Creative Director Antony Christoulakis reveals to me in a live conversation at gamescom.
But it’s actually about something completely different. For half an hour, he and a developer show me the new update for Enshrouded, which is set to be released in October. And although it brings many new features, our conversation mainly revolves around one.
Fishing excites many more players than it should
Water is the big overarching theme of the new update. A clear consequence is to include a small fishing minigame, according to the developers. After all, one should also make use of the new bodies of water.
I was instantly intrigued: Fishing is a feature that receives an inordinate amount of attention. No matter what game it appears in, it almost always guarantees to attract a lot of players. Players sometimes even exaggerate and fish for the same fish a million times for 3,500 hours.
Enshrouded won’t be a fishing game, as Antony explains, but fishing is supposed to become at least an interesting aside. What I’ve gathered about the new feature:
- You can fish anywhere there is enough water. The game knows the concept of lakes, even if they are artificially created.
- There will be a minigame where you catch a fish. This might even be expanded in the future.
- Fishing itself can be improved, but whether there will be a dedicated fishing skill is still open.
- You always catch fish whole, meaning: You can also collect them and create a small fish pond at home. There is water now, after all.
There will also be special fishing spots where biome-dependent or legendary fish can be found. These fish will only be available there, not in self-created lakes. The fish have uses as well and should be useful for cooking.
In a small aside, Antony mentioned that originally only one developer was working on fishing with support from graphic artists and others. Based on my suggestion, the team might be getting larger now…
“Wake of the Waters” delivers much more than just fish
The actual highlight of the update is, as already mentioned, the water. Since Enshrouded is a voxel-based world, this means that water actually flows. It has pressure, knows boundaries, and can displace other things – such as fog.
A fog valley can be flooded with water to free it from fog. However, Antony explains: This isn’t supposed to be really beneficial. The breath timer is expected to be shorter than the time one can spend in the fog. Because yes: There will be swimming and diving as well.
As for graphic requirements, work is still being done. Currently, everything is supposed to run quite smoothly, but Enshrouded players are known to exaggerate – so much that developers have to intervene with hotfixes. This issue is high on the list, even before the update is released.
Wake of the Waters expands Enshrouded with a new area in the northwest along with new enemies – dangerous lizardmen that will even pursue you into the water – and new locations to explore. These resemble ruins in a Mesoamerican style with treasures and traps.
The exact direction after the update is still uncertain. Although there is a rough roadmap with the clear goal of celebrating a 1.0 release, what exactly will come next will mainly be determined by the community. On the agenda, according to the chief, is an improvement of the combat system and especially the release on consoles with version 1.0.
Since the early access release in January 2024, Enshrouded, including Wake of the Waters, has already received 7 major updates that roughly doubled the world in size. Behind this is hard work: Survival game from Germany is a hit on Steam, brings 6 major updates in the first year, the boss reveals to us: “We didn’t take many breaks”
