Key Highlights:
- Isle Goblin received a new gameplay trailer during Gamescom 2026 and is playable at the Indie Arena Booth.
- Up to eight players can play together online, while the full adventure can also be played solo.
- A Steam playtest is coming, although a final release date has yet to be announced
Humans have invaded an island belonging to goblins, destroyed their home and scattered their community.
Naturally, the only reasonable response is to rebuild everything, steal the humans’ rubbish and fight back.Developer Kilowatt Games and publisher Fireshine Games have shown off a new gameplay trailer for Isle Goblin during Gamescom 2026, offering another look at its colourful sandbox survival adventure ahead of an upcoming Steam playtest.
The game is also playable on the Gamescom show floor at the Indie Arena Booth, marking a pretty significant moment for its solo developer, who only recently moved into game development full-time.
Isle Goblin turns one of fantasy’s most frequently bullied creatures into the heroes.
Players take control of a customisable goblin after humans invade the island, leaving its inhabitants to reclaim their home piece by piece.
That means exploring different biomes and sprawling cave systems, gathering resources, mining, crafting equipment and eventually facing powerful human bosses. The island itself is handcrafted rather than procedurally generated, with human temples, underground areas and plenty of places to investigate.
But getting revenge is only part of the job.
Players can restore their goblin village by constructing homes, shops and taverns before filling the settlement with an increasingly strange collection of neighbours. Goblin NPCs have their own personalities and daily schedules, while relationships can be developed through conversations, quests, gifts and other interactions.
Perhaps my favourite idea in Isle Goblin is that human rubbish is genuinely useful.
Discarded objects found around the world can be salvaged and turned into equipment, upgrades and other creations, effectively allowing the goblins to fight their invaders using the junk they’ve left behind.
It’s exactly the kind of slightly ridiculous detail that suits a game about rebuilding an island full of goblins.
There are more traditional survival systems too, including farming, raising livestock, resource gathering and crafting. Players can also customise their goblin’s skin tone, hair, facial features, clothing and accessories.
Recent development updates have revealed even more work going into the inhabitants themselves, including dozens of NPC cutscenes designed to flesh out individual goblins and their stories.
Things can get considerably more chaotic in multiplayer.
Isle Goblin supports eight-player online co-op, allowing the host and up to seven friends to explore, build, mine and fight together as one particularly dysfunctional goblin tribe.
For anyone who prefers their survival games alone, single-player is fully supported too.
There’s currently no confirmed release date for Isle Goblin, with the Steam listing still showing its launch as to be announced. However, players can already request access to the upcoming Steam playtest, with Kilowatt Games saying access will gradually open to more players as development continues.
Between rebuilding a goblin settlement, exploring caves, befriending bizarre neighbours and turning human rubbish into useful equipment, Isle Goblin looks like one of Gamescom’s more charming survival offerings.
And frankly, any game that lets eight goblins collectively decide how best to throw themselves at the humans already understands the potential for multiplayer chaos.
