As we’ve been chronicling – and I might be a little obsessed with it now that I’m finally catching up on its existence, sorry – Bohemia Interactive’s multiplayer survival sandbox Ylands has officially launched on the Nintendo Switch this week… in non-multiplayer form.
The original game, which is has been out for years on PC and mobile, sit somewhere on the spectrum between Minecraft and Valheim, with all the survival trappings like building and sailing your own pirate ship, foraging for resources, exploring new locations, and PvP, but all packaged up in a cute voxel-esque box. And of course, on Steam, the game is free-to-play and multiplayer, funded through DLC and in-game transactions, so if you want multiplayer, go that route.
The newly launched Switch version, however, is neither of those things; it’s a standalone, single-player title, with a one-time buy-in and nothing else, specifically aimed at younger players and folks who game without an internet connection. And of course, that means the game is future-proofed against possible maintenance mode or shut-down of the multiplayer version.
We chatted with Bohemia about the launch earlier this week; the team told me it hopes to continue supporting the game well into the future as it’s supported DayZ and Arma 3, that it’s already working on the next update, and that the success of the game on Switch will influence how much love PC gets. Incidentally, I’m told it’s pronounced “Islands,” not “Why-lands.” Time to correct my headcanon!
