LIVING HELL, the upcoming one-to-four-player survival horror game from DEVOUR creator Joe Fender, has opened its first Steam playtest. The game is planned for Steam in 2027, with Future Friends Games handling publishing.
Its premise gives the survival loop a particularly grim industrial purpose. Pelican City has been devastated after the ozone layer’s collapse led to widespread mutations. Survivors are attempting to reach one of the remaining rockets capable of leaving Earth, but their route depends on a train. Keeping that train moving means capturing mutated specimens and processing them into biofuel.
That setup positions every encounter as more than a simple attempt to stay alive. The creatures are both a threat and a resource, while the train is not merely transport but the group’s stated escape route. LIVING HELL’s newly released trailer and playable test offer an early look at how that uneasy equation may work.
A survival objective built around momentum
Survival horror traditionally places pressure on players through danger, limited supplies and vulnerable moments of exploration. LIVING HELL appears to add another layer: progress itself is fuel-dependent. The announced loop asks players to acquire specimens, turn them into biofuel and use that output to power the train onward.
“Biofuel,” in this context, means fuel derived from biological material. It is a familiar real-world term, but LIVING HELL uses it for a fictional and macabre conversion process involving the city’s mutated inhabitants. The important practical implication is that players may need to move toward danger rather than simply avoid it. If creatures supply the material needed to travel, a cautious team cannot necessarily remain cautious forever.
The train also gives the setting a clear forward drive. Pelican City is described through its subway routes, with handcrafted locations reached as those routes change. Instead of presenting one fixed sequence of areas, the game is built around multiple routes through the network. That could make route selection meaningful to a group’s planning, though the announcement does not yet specify how routes are chosen, whether they are randomized, or what risks and rewards distinguish them.
What is confirmed is the presence of numerous locations across those subway lines, along with more than a dozen mutated creature types. Each creature is said to have distinct behaviour. For a survival horror game, behaviour differences matter more than just visual variety: players need to read what a threat does, decide when to retreat or engage, and coordinate around the particular danger in front of them. Details on individual enemies have not yet been shared.
Co-op horror, with an offline alternative
LIVING HELL supports online co-op for one to four players, but it will also offer full offline single-player. That is a notable split for a game whose systems lean into group survival. Co-op gives the premise obvious opportunities for divided roles: one player might carry equipment, another could manage supplies, and the team might need to communicate while trying to secure a specimen. Solo play, meanwhile, means the core experience is not restricted to finding a group online.
Six playable characters are planned, each with a unique passive ability. A passive ability is a trait that functions without requiring the player to activate it manually, unlike a skill with a cooldown or a triggered attack. The announcement does not define the six abilities, so it is too early to judge how much they will alter strategy. Still, passive character bonuses can encourage groups to think about complementary team composition without adding another button-heavy system during tense encounters.
The game also includes proximity voice chat with lip-sync and handheld radios. Proximity chat generally means a player’s voice is heard based on in-game distance, rather than by every teammate at all times. It can make separation consequential: communication becomes less reliable when a group splits up, and players may have to physically regroup to speak clearly. Handheld radios suggest a means of communicating across greater distance, although the precise limitations and operation of the system have not been detailed.
Lip-sync refers to character mouth movement matching a speaker’s voice. It is a presentation feature, but in a horror co-op setting it may make interactions feel more embodied than floating usernames and disembodied audio. Whether it becomes genuinely useful for locating teammates or reading situations will depend on the final implementation.
Classic survival-horror systems, framed for repeat sessions
Fender’s game is also set to include crafting and inventory systems described as being inspired by classic survival horror. Inventory management is a central survival-horror concept: players have limited carrying capacity and must choose which weapons, healing tools, materials or mission items are worth bringing along. Crafting adds the ability to turn collected materials into something useful, potentially extending a run when a team’s resources are low.
Neither feature automatically tells players exactly how LIVING HELL will balance its economy. The announcement does not identify recipes, inventory size, item scarcity, weapon types or the consequences of losing equipment. But the combination makes thematic sense with the biofuel objective. A survival game about harvesting dangerous specimens has room for decisions about what to take now, what to save for later, and what can be sacrificed to keep the train moving.
Persistent save files are also planned across sessions. In straightforward terms, persistence means progress can be retained rather than being erased whenever players stop playing. That is especially relevant to co-op games, where a four-person group may not finish a longer objective in a single sitting. The exact extent of persistence has not been outlined, so players should not assume that every item, location state or character outcome will carry over; only the presence of continuing save files has been confirmed.
For PC players considering how they would play, LIVING HELL is announced with full gamepad support and Steam Deck support. Gamepad support means controller inputs are accommodated on PC. Steam Deck support indicates the title is intended to work with Valve’s handheld PC, though no further performance targets or verification status were provided. Those promises could be significant for a game with a potentially deliberate inventory interface, but their final quality will need to be assessed once more information is available.
What the playtest can and cannot answer
The Steam playtest is available now, making it the most immediate way for interested players to engage with LIVING HELL before its 2027 launch window. A playtest is an early public testing period, not necessarily a final representation of the finished game. It can allow developers to gather feedback and observe technical performance, balance and player behaviour, while players get an early sense of the game’s direction.
That distinction matters for a project built on interconnected systems. The tension of capture-and-processing objectives, the usefulness of character passives, the reliability of proximity communications and the rhythm of subway-route progression will depend on how these features operate together. A test may showcase some of that foundation without representing the eventual breadth of locations, enemies or progression.
The Steam-only 2027 announcement also establishes the sole confirmed platform at present. No console release has been stated. With the game still set for a future year, the playtest is a chance to examine the current build rather than evidence that every listed feature is complete or final.
Why the subway structure stands out
The changing subway routes are perhaps LIVING HELL’s clearest structural hook. Handcrafted locations imply designed environments rather than a wholly procedural world, while changing access routes suggest that the order or availability of those environments can vary. That combination can preserve authored spaces while preventing the journey from feeling identical every time.
For co-op horror, the subway framing may also create a useful contrast between relative safety and exposure. The train is tied directly to escape and fuel, so it naturally functions as the centre of the group’s larger objective. The locations beyond it are where the team must obtain what it needs. The announcement does not explicitly call the train a safe zone, and players should not assume it is one, but it is clearly the vehicle that turns successful resource gathering into forward movement.
Players who follow PC releases targeting 2027 can also keep an eye on other projects already discussing that period, including World of Warcraft: Forever’s early-2027 beta-feedback plans. For LIVING HELL specifically, however, the present focus is the available Steam playtest and the first look at its mutation-fuelled escape story.
An original score by Mario Sello Nuñez rounds out the announced feature set. Music can carry a great deal of survival horror’s atmosphere, especially in a setting built around abandoned transit routes, creature encounters and the pressure to reach an evacuation rocket. Specific musical themes or implementation details have not been announced.
For now, LIVING HELL’s strongest confirmed identity is a co-op survival horror game where escape requires participation in a brutal resource cycle. It has a defined Steam destination in 2027, offline and online play options, and a public test already underway. The larger questions—how varied its routes are, how harsh its resource economy becomes, and how its creature behaviours reshape a team’s plans—remain for the playtest and future updates to clarify.
