In the shadow of towering mega-structures and beneath the perpetual drizzle of a rain-soaked sky, the city of Nivalis pulses with a cold, electric heart. While many cyberpunk titles focus on high-stakes espionage or hyper-violent rebellion, ION LANDS is taking a different approach with their upcoming title, Nivalis. Instead of playing as a world-saving hacker or a cyber-enhanced mercenary, you are simply a resident trying to make a life in a city that is quite literally crumbling into the ocean.
As we look toward its anticipated release in 2026, Nivalis stands as one of the most intriguing “slice-of-life” simulations in recent memory—a game that swaps the katana for a kitchen knife and the heist for a hospitality empire.
Inheriting the Sky: From Cloudpunk to Nivalis
To understand the soul of Nivalis, one must look back at the developer’s previous breakthrough hit: Cloudpunk. Released in 2020, Cloudpunk introduced players to Rania, a delivery driver navigating the vertical sprawl of the city of Nivalis in her hovering HOVA vehicle. It was a game defined by its atmosphere—a lonely, meditative journey through voxel-art clouds and neon-lit alleyways.
The Grind of the Future: Gameplay and Mechanics
The premise of Nivalis is deceptively simple: start small and grow. You begin your journey with a humble food stall or a noodle stand. From there, the simulation layers begin to stack:
- Business Management: You aren’t just a shopkeep; you are a manager. You must source ingredients—sometimes by growing them yourself in hydroponic farms or by heading to the docks to go fishing—manage your staff, and design the layout of your establishment. Eventually, you can expand into running bars, restaurants, and even sprawling nightclubs.
- The Social Web: In a city where “Corps” fine you for breathing and gangs look to harvest your organs, relationships are your primary currency. Nivalis features a robust social system with over 135 fully voiced characters. Every interaction matters; you can forge lifelong friendships, make bitter enemies, or even find love amidst the dystopian decay.
- Home and Hearth: Beyond the workplace, the game places a heavy emphasis on personal space. You can purchase various apartments across the city, ranging from grimy “marrow” studios to luxury penthouses. Each can be fully customized and decorated, providing a sanctuary from the bustling streets below.
A World in Motion: The Living Voxel City
What sets Nivalis apart from other life sims is its commitment to a realistic day/night cycle and weather simulation. The city changes as the sun sets; the types of customers who frequent your shops shift, and the dangers lurking in the shadows grow more pronounced.
There is a sense of urgency baked into the lore: the ground beneath the city is unstable, and there is a looming threat that the entire metropolis could fall into the sea. This adds a “make your fortune while you can” mentality to the gameplay. Between managing your empire and decorating your home, you can explore the city at your own pace, taking your boat out onto the water or simply walking the streets to soak in the stunning, hand-crafted voxel art.
The “Cozy Dystopia”
There is a strange, magnetic pull to the “cozy cyberpunk” genre that ION LANDS is pioneering. By removing the high-octane combat typical of the genre, they allow the player to appreciate the beauty and the melancholy of the setting. The game is less about fighting the system and more about finding a way to exist comfortably within it.
Recent updates from the development team have highlighted the massive scale of the project. Originally aiming for a 2025 release, the game was pushed to 2026 to accommodate a massive expansion in voice acting—growing from a small cast to over 200,000 words of dialogue. This delay reflects the studio’s desire to ensure that the city doesn’t just look like a living place, but feels like one too.
Nivalis represents a bold step forward for indie simulation games. It takes the atmospheric excellence of Cloudpunk and grounds it in a complex, rewarding management loop. It’s a game for those who want to get lost in a world, who want to feel the hum of the neon lights and the chill of the rain, and who want to see if they have what it takes to “own the night.”
