What is Everhaven (codenamed Project Dragon)? v2
Everhaven was a sandbox survival crafting multiplayer RPG game that was being developed by Phoenix Labs. It had fantasy characters and quests inspired by Minecraft and The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. It was cancelled months from Early Access in 2024, but there is a community that wants the game to be revived and finished. We first hear about Everhaven through the former development team of the game, including the character artist @nicholaskole on his Twitter/X where he explains what the game was about and how far along it was in development.
The game had been in development since 2021, 3 years. It was to be announced in June 2024 and released later in Early Access in September. The player would've started with 5 playable races: Humans, mountain-dwelling Fauns, plantlike Valekins, draconic Wyvarrs, and the feline Purrans.
Players would also collect creatures and have them as pets or ride them as mounts. Many regions were planned, and a starter region was to be used for launch, the Inner Lands - "a cosy pastoral paradise of rolling fields, lush forests, and alpine slopes". Like Minecraft, players would be able to build houses and customize their land, and grow crops and gardens.
Fully voiced NPCs would've given the world of Everhaven life, expanding the lore surrounding the 5 playable species and a story for players to follow. Enemies would also fill the regions of Everhaven as you explore the land, embark on quests and gather materials.
Each NPC was designed with unique art, gameplay traits, quests, and quirks. They each had a profession, a culture, a backstory. Some had friends and rivals and possible love interests. Aside from their personal quests, they had no linear story. Instead, by playing the game, players would discover their own developing narratives. Narrative designer Bethany Higa stated that the world of Everhaven would be procedurally generated each time, and everyone's experience with the characters would be different. When you met them, and how, and where in your journey, would all be unique. Phoenix Labs wanted to give players the freedom to choose how to build their own story using the NPCs.
The story of the characters would've been told through cinematics driven by the aesthetics and motifs of their cultures.
According to Nicholas Kole, Phoenix Labs was entering the final 3 months stretch with Everhaven: the character customization was working, music soundtrack and character voiceover was mostly done and still being recorded, cinematics were close to completion. After the Early Access period, Phoenix Labs would've went on with a full plan from there.
The game received excellent feedback and mock reviews, as it was preparing for its upcoming release.
Unfortunately...
A blockchain company named Forte quietly bought Phoenix Labs in 2023 and later decided to cancel all projects that were in development, including Project Unicorn and Everhaven. The team members assigned to the projects were also laid off. This decision was done to focus fully on the other existing games at Phoenix Labs, Dauntless and Fae Farm. There were internal attempts made to save Everhaven but they were unsuccessful.
On July 12, 2024, the embargo for Everhaven was lifted, allowing the former team members to post their contributions of the project on social media and on their personal portfolios.
Phoenix Labs wasn't the first company Forte had purchased. They had also bought Rumble Entertainment, the developer of the mobile game Towers and Titans, and decided to shut down the studio this year in July 2024 in, what a former Rumble dev member calls it, "a ruthless pursuit of profit". This reveals that Forte buys game studios and would casually shut them down if they choose. A gaming news article with anonymous former Phoenix Labs employees later revealed that Forte would close down studios they acquired and cancel their game projects if they can’t find ways to implement their blockchain tech into the games.
The same interview revealed that Forte allowed Phoenix Labs 3 months to try and find a new owner for Everhaven, but Forte stopped them 1 month in and laid off the dev team. Forte mentioned they currently aren’t looking for funding on paused projects.
After seeing the content made for Everhaven, a movement was formed by fans; this campaign was called #BringBackProjectDragon, at the hopes of getting Forte's attention and convince them to revive Everhaven and at least sell the game to another publisher. Word spread, and a few cozy game influencers covered Everhaven and its cancellation.
A petition was even created that has reached over 10,000 signatures as a way to show Forte and others that there is a fanbase that cares for Everhaven.
In 2025, after a disastrous monetization update for Phoenix Labs' other game Dauntless, Forte shut down the game in response to negative user backlash instead of reverting their update. Later that year in September, Forte announced quietly the closure of Fae Farm's online services. These two games were the game Forte said they would focus on after shutting down Everhaven. But in a twist of fate, they sold Fae Farm to a new game studio, saving it fom sharing Everhaven and Dauntless' fate. This shows that Forte is willing to part with the game IPs they gain if supposedly offered a big amount of money. And this reopens the possibility/hope of Everhaven being saved.
To try and get Forte's attention, or share this game to other game studios who might save Everhaven, please spread the word about Everhaven to your friends and on social media (Twitter/X, Facebook, here on Tumblr, Bluesky, etc.), sign the petition, send big game studios passive messages about the game and suggest they save it from Forte.
For Everhaven fans, there is a Facebook Fan Group, a Bluesky fan account, one for Twitter/X, a subreddit, and a discord server.
