How to Play Guardians of the Wall

Guardians of the Wall is not a live-service mobile wall-defense clone and it is not a Roblox experience. It is a PC co-op action RPG from the two-person studio Boiling Bits, built in Unreal Engine 5, listed on Steam for Q1 2027. You are a Guardian: one of the people still willing to walk through the cracks in humanity’s last fortress and fight what the Abyss is pouring into the world. This page is the honest first-hour briefing — what the store page actually promises, what the trailer shows, and what you should do before you queue.

If you only came here to install something tonight, go to How to Join the Playtest instead. The rest of this guide assumes you want the loop, the roles, and the mistakes that will get a four-stack wiped in a ruined village.

What you are signing up for

Steam tags the game as indie, action RPG, co-op, dark fantasy, hack and slash, online co-op, third-person shooter, and character customization. That mix is the pitch: melee and firearms in the same kit, grenades in the same breath as dashes and blocks, and heroes that are not reskins of one melee class. Boiling Bits has said in public that the goal is chaotic, brutal fights rather than a single “correct” stance.

The world language is simple. The Wall holds. Cracks form. The Abyss spills through. You leave the Bastion, run a raid, and come back with only some of what you found. Official copy names the outdoor spaces as haunted ruins, frozen wastelands, and cursed battlegrounds, plus ruined strongholds and forgotten graveyards. Screenshots match that: burnt pines, wooden palisades, torch poles, stone houses, and undead that do not wait their turn.

The announcement trailer is the best public look at pacing. Watch it once for mood, then once for the mix of shotgun blasts, melee commits, and the blue energy lash that commenters already noticed.

Guardians of the Wall official announcement trailer

The Bastion and the raid

Two progression layers matter, and mixing them up is how people over-invest in junk.

Between raids you are in the Bastion. Steam describes it as refuge, upgrades, and preparation. Permanent power lives here: resources, essences, rare materials, crafted weapons, ability upgrades, and newly awakened heroes. If a reward is meant to still exist next session, it has to survive this screen.

Inside a raid you get temporary upgrades, weapon modifications, and session-based perks. Stack damage, elemental effects, or defense for that run. When the raid ends, those mid-run toys mostly vanish. That is the roguelite contract, and it is why our builds page splits “kit you bring” from “kit you roll.”

Missions are a mix of handcrafted arenas and procedurally generated zones with undead waves and larger bosses. Steam also teases world events such as The Breach of the Wall that change the battlefield. Treat those as upcoming systems, not as a calendar you can plan around today.

Choose a role before you choose a skin

Boiling Bits has not published a named roster with skill trees. It has published three combat jobs:

• Brutal frontline fighters who take space and hold it
• Ranged specialists who delete clumps before they reach the team
• Elemental casters who bring the weird damage and control

Screenshots currently show at least two silhouettes worth remembering: a horned, fur-cloaked heavy with a firearm and a blade on the back, and a lighter melee runner pushing through a burning cabin yard. Until official names drop, pick the job, not the fashion. The Guardian roster expands each job with what we can actually see. The hero tier list ranks those jobs for a first playtest queue — with the giant asterisk that the list will move the moment a full kit list exists.

If you are playing solo, start on the frontline or a sticky ranged kit so you can create space for yourself. If you have three friends, do not all bring shotguns. Read the co-op guide before you ready up.

Combat in one paragraph, then a page

You will swap melee and ranged, throw grenades, chain abilities, dash, and block. Aggression is the advertised default; standing still is how the horde wins. Mature-content notes on Steam mention firearms, close-range weapons, and possible decapitation on critical hits, which matches the gore in the village screenshots. Full movement tables, controller mappings, and “is this a parry or a hold-block” live on Combat and Controls. Come back here if you only needed the pitch.

A first-session checklist

1. Confirm Windows 10 or 11, 64-bit, DirectX 12, and at least 25 GB free. Numbers are on system requirements.
2. Wishlist and hit Request Access on Steam. The wishlist and access page is the short version; the playtest article is the long one.
3. Set expectations: English interface and full audio only, partial controller support, online co-op up to four, solo allowed.
4. Agree on roles in chat using the three-job list, not “whoever clicks first.”
5. In the raid, greed mid-run mods only if the team can still move. A shiny perk that roots you in a doorway is a wipe.
6. After extraction, spend Bastion currency on a weapon or ability you will still want next run. Do not hoard essences for a hero who is not in the playtest build.

What this wiki will not pretend

We will not publish fake codes, fake Discord drops, or a 12-hero spreadsheet with invented ultimates. When Boiling Bits names a Guardian, that name goes on the roster page and the updates hub in the same pass. When a control scheme ships in the playtest overlay, it goes on the combat page. Until then, the useful work is orientation: loop, roles, raid risk, and where to click on Steam.

If you finish this page and still do not know whether to install, you probably need the hardware check more than another lore paragraph. If you already have access, skip to combat and raids and bosses and let the first death teach you the rest.