Santa Barbara Games announces Voidwood mic‑driven co‑op horror for PC

Santa Barbara Games announced Voidwood on Aug. 11, 2026 as a 1‑4‑player co‑op survival horror game for PC that uses the player’s microphone as a core gameplay mechanic reacting to real‑world sound. Voidwood is targeted for a 2027 release on Steam for Windows PC.

In Voidwood, The Beast’s detection system monitors real‐time audio amplitude and triggers the hunt whenever sound exceeds a threshold, without parsing spoken words. Any vocalization picked up by the microphone can reveal a player’s position to The Beast and to weaker enemies, forcing teams to whisper or stay silent during gameplay. The game splits each session into a daytime scavenging phase and a nighttime survival phase in which The Beast hunts by sound, and players can whisper to avoid detection while shouting attracts its attention.

A single session of Voidwood lasts between 20 and 30 minutes, with the forest layout changing procedurally for every run. Run modifiers change the conditions of each expedition, ensuring no two runs play out identically. The Steam page confirms that it sets survival runs to 20 minutes long. Between runs, players can spend resources gathered in the forest to upgrade the camp, unlock new tools, and refine strategies, providing meta‑progression across sessions.

This progression lets characters evolve over days, weeks, and months of real‐time play, while the campfire’s light provides a safe zone from lower‐tier monsters. Although the campfire protects against lesser foes, The Beast can still charge into the camp, and players can always regroup there after separation in the forest. Voidwood supports one to four players cooperating online and also offers a solo mode for those who wish to play alone.

The game provides public matchmaking for random players as well as private room codes for inviting friends directly. Santa Barbara Games debuted a public playable demo of Voidwood at PAX West 2026, running September 4–7 at the Seattle Convention Center, Booth #744. Shacknews staff played an early Steam build of Voidwood during a weekend playtest before October 19 2026, with the goal of locating a campfire in the forest.

During the Shacknews playtest, the tester said the microphone was not strictly necessary because objectives are displayed on screen and straightforward to complete. Early testers noted that Voidwood’s cartoony, Studio Ghibli‐like visual style lessens the sense of horror even though the microphone mechanic creates tension. Critics have compared the game to the survival title Grounded, sharing a similar vibe but with a stronger emphasis on horror elements.

An official trailer revealed on IGN on August 11 2026 showed gameplay footage and voice acting, and the story premise holds that none of the children who previously disappeared in the forest have ever escaped. Playtesters described Voidwood’s combat as basic and unreliable, noting that the dodge often fails to prevent enemy damage. Enemies continue tracking players after the start of an attack, so damage can occur even when a dodge appears correctly timed, and weaker enemies scattered throughout the forest attack when they spot players.

The only hiding mechanic available in the playtest build was standing in bushes, where enemies cannot see players, and players must rely on this to avoid detection. The Beast is described as an unkillable monstrous force that players must evade rather than defeat. Voidwood includes a mechanic where one player can sacrifice themselves to allow the remaining players to escape, adding a layer of strategic risk‐taking.

While the campfire’s light creates a safe zone from lesser monsters, The Beast can still charge into the camp, forcing players to remain alert even at base. Santa Barbara Games is a ten‐person indie studio whose founders worked at EA, Bethesda, Riot Games, Unity, and Amazon. Shawn Seibert serves as the founder and creative director of the studio. “Voidwood comes from the horror we loved as kids: that feeling of wonder right before the dread sets in,”

Santa Barbara Games is self‐publishing Voidwood to keep full creative control. Phasmophobia has sold over 25 million copies across PC and console since its 2020 launch, while Lethal Company sold an estimated 10 million copies in its first few months after its late 2023 Early Access release. A 2024 academic study found that the collapse of voice communication when teammates are eliminated creates a fear response distinct from visual jump scares in co‐op horror games.

To run Voidwood, players need at least an Intel Core i5-8400 or AMD Ryzen 3 3100 CPU, paired with an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 Ti or AMD Radeon RX 560 graphics card (each with 4 GB VRAM), 8 GB RAM, DirectX 12 support, and 2 GB storage. The recommended setup rises to an i5‐10400 or Ryzen 5 3600 processor, a GTX 1660 Super (6 GB) or RX 5600 XT (6 GB) graphics card, and 16 GB of RAM under Windows 11.

The game’s interface is English‐only at announcement and players need an internet connection for online co‑op, while early runs emphasize evasion over combat against The Beast, which players cannot fight directly. Santa Barbara Games has not yet released detection‐threshold or audio‐normalization details, the daylight phase eases players in before nightfall removes safety, the October 2026 pre‐alpha test needed no access codes, and the studio posts future playtest sign‐ups on its website.