Witchfire is a dark fantasy shooter from The Astronauts, the dev outfit behind Bulletstorm, Painkiller, and The Vanishing of Ethan Carter. The game takes place in a cursed medieval version of our world in which the Church deploys condemned convicts to track and hunt witches and the monsters they create. Using an assortment of eldritch firearms and magic spells, players launch their hunts, get as far as they can before getting taken down by the ever-increasing onslaught of enemies, and use their acquired loot to improve their odds the next time they go on the hunt. That sounds great, but it begs the question: is witch-hunting a lonely business, or does Witchfire support co-op or PvP multiplayer?
The early footage shows that Witchfire is focused on frenetic arena combat against large groups of enemies with different movement and attack patterns. This gameplay combined with the roguelite premise promises a solid solo experience. And yet, many players would love to take on the challenge with friends, or even up the ante by facing off against other human opponents in addition to the monsters. Unfortunately, multiplayer does not seem to currently be in the cards for Witchfire.
The Astronauts is “100% focusing on the single-player experience,” mostly because the studio is not large enough to tackle multiplayer at this stage. This means that for the time being Witchfire does not have co-op or PvP multiplayer, though the developers note that this may change later on in the game’s life cycle.