The moon is coming apart. You're going in anyway.
Drill twenty depths into a dying moon, clear the objective that unlocks the way down, and haul back what matters — before the collapsing rock closes the route behind you.
Wishlist now and Steam tells you the moment the playtest opens · Online co-op & solo · English, German, French and Spanish
The premise
47 crews went down before you. None reached the core.
NARON is a co-op mining roguelite for 1–4 players. You take a drillship twenty depths down into a dying moon. Every depth has an objective waiting, and the drill won't move until it's done.
Between depths the crew decides the route together at the map table. You see two depths ahead: the biome, the job and the hazards waiting there. The safe route pays less, the hard one pays more, and there is no going back.
The rock is fully deformable — nothing is placed for you, you cut where you decide. And every bit of progress on the main objective wakes the moon: pressure fronts tear open, broods swarm out, the way back gets more expensive. If the crew falls, the run is over — what you learned and permanently unlocked comes with you into the next one.
The loop — four steps, twenty times
Every descent runs the same four beats. What changes is the cave, the job and how loudly the moon objects.
Outside lies a cave that didn't exist a few seconds earlier. Nobody has ever seen it, every wall in it can be cut away, and it is yours for exactly one descent.
One main objective per depth. It is your ticket further down — and finishing it is what wakes the moon.
Ore, side contracts, and the gear a previous crew no longer needs. Everything you carry has to fit — and has to make it back.
At the map table the crew votes on where to dig next. Two depths of foresight, one direction: down.
What you're getting into
The map table in the cockpit shows a branching route tree. You see two depths ahead, and every node tells you what's waiting: biome, task, haul — and what's working against you. Thin air that burns through your stamina. Acid that drains gas mask cartridges three times as fast. Overcrowded breeding grounds.
More than twenty of those are scattered across the tree. The crew votes. Nobody goes back.
The rock is fully deformable. No mining nodes, no scripted lanes — you cut through solid stone in first person, follow veins into the deep and blast shortcuts nobody ever planned for.
Fourteen resources are buried across six biomes, and the safe path is the one you cut yourself.
Progress on the main objective isn't free. Pressure fronts tear open and travel through the cave, broods swarm out of the walls, and the route you came in by tightens around you.
The closer you get to the goal, the more the way back costs. Three boss fights sit between the crew and the core, and the acid always arrives first.
Workshop, storage, map room — and the only place on NARON‑M where the air won't kill you. Between depths you craft, repair, restock and argue about the route.
What you don't start with is the heavy gear. Jetpack, gas mask and shield emitter are lying as scrap in the camps of the lost teams. There's one camp on every depth — but not on any map, and no marker will take you there.
Every completed contract and every depth milestone pays NARON Points. They outlive your death and go into twenty-eight permanent upgrades.
The next run starts deeper in knowledge, not deeper in the rock. And if real life interrupts, the crew can park a run and pick it up later.
By the numbers
Six biomes
Each biome brings its own resources, its own creatures and its own way of making the descent harder.
The baseline. Wide galleries, dense ore veins and just enough room to think you're safe.
Soft ground, spore clouds and a permanent haze that hides whatever is moving in it.
Resources nobody else reached, and a hard limit on how long you can stay under.
Heat, glowing ore and routes that close the moment the rock gives way.
No traction, no warmth, and gear that starts failing before you do.
The one biome that looks least like it wants to kill you. It still does.
Playtest trailer
One minute: the ramp goes down, the moon wakes up, and the crew runs out of route. Then it's your turn.
NARON — Playtest Trailer Open on YouTube instead How we handle this
Screenshots
Questions
NARON is a first-person co-op mining roguelite for 1–4 players. Your drillship descends twenty depths into a dying moon. Each depth sets one main objective, and clearing it unlocks the way further down. The rock is fully deformable, the caves are generated fresh every run, and if the crew falls, the run is over.
The shortest description: Deep Rock Galactic meets the route map from Slay the Spire.
Yes. NARON is fully playable solo. Online co-op supports two, three or four players, and the run scales with the size of the crew.
A single depth takes five to twenty minutes, depending on the objective and the crew. How long a full descent through all twenty takes therefore comes down to the route you pick — and if it goes long, you can pause and pick it up later.
Yes to both. Gamepads are fully supported, and NARON plays on Steam Deck. Mouse and keyboard work the way you would expect.
The playtest runs 10-18 October 2026 — sign-ups run through Steam. The public demo is planned for the Steam Next Fest in February 2027, with the full release in 2027 on Steam for Windows PC. Wishlisting is the reliable way to hear about each of them first.
No — explicitly not. It gets tight and stressful, but the moon isn't trying to scare anyone; it's collapsing, and the crew happens to be standing in it.
The price hasn't been announced yet. NARON ships in English, German, French and Spanish, with Mission Control voice-over in English and German, on Windows PC via Steam.
Yes. Proximity voice chat carries as far as the cave lets it, and a radio channel reaches the whole crew wherever they are. Pings, sprays and emotes cover the rest.
Also from TIDERAFT
Rift Miner is a first-person mining roguelite: mine resources against the clock, escape through the portal, and invest your haul in permanent upgrades. Every rift you open is shaped by what you fed the terminal last time — bigger worlds, more time, richer veins.
The studio
TIDERAFT is a one-person game studio in Hamburg. Development, design, audio and publishing are all handled by the same person.
Two games so far: Rift Miner, out now, and NARON, in development for 2027.
Get in touch
The fastest way to see NARON in progress: new caves, new creatures, and the occasional thing that broke. Come argue about routes.
Join the serverFact sheet, ready-to-paste descriptions, screenshots, key art and the teaser in both languages — everything in one place.
Open the press kitBusiness enquiries, collaborations or direct feedback — it all lands in the same inbox, and it gets read.
moin (at) tideraft.de