Never Grave review: The hat would like to borrow your enemy

The big picture

An enemy in Never Grave: The Witch and The Curse can be a threat, an obstacle or a promising set of abilities wearing an inconveniently hostile owner. The cursed hat lets you possess suitable creatures and use their actions. Frontside 180 gives its dungeon adventure a useful reason to look at something dangerous and wonder what else it might be good for. Fashion has rarely taken such an aggressive interest in practical problem-solving.

The game mixes procedural exploration with combat and rebuilding a village between expeditions. You can play alone or cooperate online with up to four players. It is a busy combination, and the important question is whether the connections sound enjoyable: a dangerous trip produces materials, those materials improve home, and home helps prepare another dangerous trip. The hat has ambitions, but it has also acquired a surprising amount of domestic responsibility. Publisher's feature overview

Home needs more than a dramatic return

Back in the village, you clear ruins, build facilities and cultivate crops. Food and potions then support later expeditions. The calmer part of the game therefore has a practical connection to the dangerous part. Returning with materials can improve a place as well as a collection of numbers, giving you something visible to care about between runs.

That is attractive if you like maintaining a base. A repeated expedition can contribute to a larger project even when its immediate result is imperfect. The village gives preparation somewhere to live, rather than reducing every return to emptying bags and selecting another destination.

It can also be an unwelcome interruption. If you want uninterrupted fighting, crops do not become more exciting merely because a cursed hat is supervising them. Be honest about whether food production and building sound like part of the reward or a list of things delaying the reward. The game is intentionally giving both activities a share of your time.

Four players still need compatible plans

The March multiplayer update added public matchmaking and expanded the rewards guests can retain, with exceptions for some story-related blueprints. That makes helping another player more useful to your own progression, but the exceptions matter. Do not assume every reward travels home simply because you were present when it appeared.

Crossplay was announced for the original platforms, yet the developer has also warned about version mismatches affecting compatibility. Check that everyone has the appropriate updates, particularly if a friend uses the later Android release. An announcement of crossplay does not establish that every current platform combination works interchangeably. The first shared challenge should ideally involve a dungeon rather than comparing version numbers. Developer compatibility warning

Solo play avoids the scheduling problem and lets you choose the balance between exploring and building. A group can make those repeated tasks social, provided everyone broadly agrees on the pace. If one person wants to prepare and another has already departed, the village may develop into a remarkably charming source of disagreement.

The Early Access plan did not become the release

Steam dates the full game to March 4, 2026, while Pocketpair's Japanese launch announcement uses March 5. The team had previously planned Early Access, postponed it and then chose a direct version 1.0 launch. Earlier demos remain separate. This is a released game, not an unfinished Early Access purchase whose current limitations can be dismissed as temporary by default. Direct-to-full-release decision

Current platforms are Windows, PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox Series X|S and Android, with Android arriving on August 5. April's Steam version 1.4 changed movement, attack reach, potion recovery and crafting times, and addressed identified save-data problems. Those changes matter to the repeated actions, but do not establish identical patch timing across consoles and mobile. Version 1.4 changes

Never Grave is best considered by players who want possession-based exploration and something useful to build between trips. Its changing dungeons and village routine may be too much surrounding activity for someone seeking a tightly focused platforming map. If the combination appeals, the cursed hat provides a distinctive way to approach it. Just agree who is tending the crops before everyone finds a new creature to inhabit.