Enshrouded’s biggest update just dropped and it fundamentally changes how you interact with the world. Wake of the Water, Update 7 that launched November 10, 2025, introduces the one thing this survival game has been missing since its January 2024 Early Access release: water. Not just decorative puddles or static lakes, but fully interactive, physics-simulated water you can swim in, collect, terraform, and even use to build elaborate bases with flowing rivers running through your living room.
This is Keen Games’ most ambitious update yet for the survival action RPG that reached over a million players in four days and currently sits at Very Positive on Steam with nearly 75,000 reviews. The update adds swimming mechanics with underwater treasure chests and mining, a massive new water biome called Veilwater Basin, amphibious lizard enemies that can pursue you beneath the surface, fishing, water-based puzzles involving floodgates, and so many new building materials and crafting resources that even veterans will feel like they’re playing a different game.
Swimming Changes Everything
The most obvious addition is swimming, which sounds basic until you realize Enshrouded has been a survival exploration game without any functional water for nearly two years. You couldn’t swim before. Water didn’t exist as a gameplay element. This update makes oceans, lakes, rivers, and waterfalls actual interactive environments rather than visual backgrounds.
Swimming comes with full underwater exploration mechanics. You can open treasure chests submerged in lakes, collect plants and resources from the bottom, push buttons to solve underwater puzzles, and use a specialized mining tool to gather ore deposits beneath the surface. There’s even oxygen management creating risk-reward decisions about how deep you dive and how long you stay down before surfacing.
Most of what you can do on land translates underwater with new animations. Your grappling hook works beneath the surface, letting you traverse underwater caves and reach distant areas. The voxel-based water simulation means it flows dynamically through environments, creating waterfalls, currents, and interactive pools you can manipulate through terrain editing.
The one thing you can’t do underwater is fight, which is where the new enemy faction becomes a problem.
The Drak Are Coming For You
Wake of the Water introduces the Drak, a new faction of amphibious lizard people who present unique challenges. Unlike every other enemy in Enshrouded that sticks to land, the Drak can pursue you underwater with spears drawn. Since you can’t fight back while submerged, underwater encounters become escape scenarios where you need to quickly find surfaces or shallow areas where you can stand and defend yourself.
The Drak fight perfectly well on land too, so they’re threatening in both environments. But their amphibious nature forces players to stay aware of surroundings and plan escape routes when exploring underwater areas. If you’re low on oxygen and a Drak starts chasing you through a submerged temple, you’re in genuine danger with limited options besides swimming faster and hoping you find air before they catch up.
This enemy design solves a fundamental problem with adding swimming to games. If combat works identically underwater, there’s no meaningful difference between land and water beyond aesthetics. By making underwater areas combat-free zones where certain enemies can still hunt you, Keen Games created actual tension rather than just adding swimming for the sake of having swimming.
Veilwater Basin Is Massive
The new water biome, Veilwater Basin, is Enshrouded’s first environment built entirely around aquatic gameplay. This lush forested region features vast deep lakes, flowing rivers, towering waterfalls, and dense vegetation creating a completely different visual aesthetic from the game’s existing desert, mountain, and shrouded wasteland areas.
IGN describes the biome as bringing lots of other new things with it, including quests with narrative lore journals scattered throughout, points of interest ranging from settlements to temples, Shroud Roots for progression, and Elixir Wells for character upgrades. There are also new materials and crafting resources specific to the region, so many that they couldn’t list them all.
The underground temples mentioned in the trailer provide new dungeon-style content with water-based puzzles. You’ll need to manipulate floodgates to fill rooms with water, raising the water level to reach previously inaccessible upper floors. Some temples include traps designed to drown you by flooding chambers while you’re solving puzzles or fighting enemies.
Creative director Antony Christoulakis told PCGamesN that water has been added to all existing biomes in more limited quantities, meaning you’ll find smaller lakes and ponds throughout areas you’ve already explored. But Veilwater Basin showcases water’s full potential with massive bodies of water deep enough for extensive underwater exploration.
Water as a Building Tool
The craziest aspect of Wake of the Water is how it treats water as a construction material. The voxel-based simulation allows water to flow freely through your base if you design it that way. Want a river running through your throne room? You can terraform channels and redirect water flow to create artificial streams through your buildings.
The update adds water-specific building items including water dispensers, rain barrels for collection, hydro-powered mills for processing food or forging materials, and irrigation systems for growing crops. You can create elaborate waterfall features, build bases partially or fully submerged beneath lakes, design aqueduct systems transporting water across distances, or construct elaborate fountains as centerpieces.
Kotaku specifically highlights fully submerged bases as a new building option enabled by the update. Imagine constructing your entire headquarters underwater with glass walls looking out at fish and aquatic plants. The oxygen system would make living there challenging, but players have already built insane things like full recreations of Isengard from Lord of the Rings using 22 million voxels across 4,400 hours of work. Underwater bases are definitely happening.
Fishing and Food Systems
Fishing joins the roster of survival activities alongside hunting, gathering, farming, and cooking. The update includes new fish species you can catch, presumably with different values for cooking recipes or selling to NPCs. While details about fishing mechanics haven’t been fully revealed, it likely involves crafting fishing rods and bait, then waiting at water’s edge for catches.
The hydro-powered mills mentioned for processing food suggest new crafting chains built around water-based production. Maybe certain recipes require mill-ground ingredients. Perhaps some crops need irrigation to grow at optimal rates. The interconnection between water, farming, cooking, and base building creates more complex systems encouraging specialized builds rather than generic multi-purpose bases.
New Gear and Weapons
Wake of the Water introduces new armor sets and weapons, though specific details remain scarce until players explore the full update. The trailer shows new gear designs with aquatic aesthetics, suggesting armor crafted from materials found in Veilwater Basin or dropped by Drak enemies.
New weapons likely include spears for fighting amphibious enemies, possibly underwater variants of existing weapon types, and specialized tools for gathering underwater resources efficiently. The underwater mining tool mentioned specifically for collecting submerged ore suggests at least one new gathering implement optimized for aquatic environments.
Quality of Life and Polish
Keen Games delayed Wake of the Water by a few weeks specifically to add extra polish according to their October development update. That additional time shows in how thoroughly water integrates with existing systems rather than feeling tacked on.
The update includes level cap increases for character progression, meaning veterans who maxed out before can continue advancing. There are also unspecified quality-of-life improvements addressing community feedback about inventory management, UI clarity, and other persistent pain points.
Road to 1.0 Release
Wake of the Water represents a major milestone in Enshrouded’s journey from Early Access to full release. The game launched in Early Access January 2024 and is targeting a 2026 launch for version 1.0 on both PC and consoles. Adding water, a fundamental environmental element, gets the game closer to feature-complete status required for leaving Early Access.
The scale of this update, from a massive new biome to entirely new gameplay systems, demonstrates Keen Games’ commitment to iterative development. They’re not just adding content patches with new dungeons or enemies. They’re implementing foundational systems that change how the entire game works, then building new content exploiting those systems.
For console players waiting patiently for Enshrouded’s official release beyond Steam Early Access, these continuous updates ensure the eventual 1.0 version will be substantially more robust than what PC players experienced at launch. That’s the upside of extended Early Access development when done properly.
Community Reception
Reddit reactions have been cautiously optimistic with some players hesitant to jump in until version 1.0 releases. One highly upvoted comment says “Always checking this game out, but never made the push to buy it, i kinda want to wait for 1.0.” That’s a common sentiment for Early Access titles where players worry about burnout from playing incomplete versions.
But for existing players, excitement is palpable. Content creators immediately started streaming Wake of the Water, with YouTube videos titled things like “Biggest Update EVER” and “Totally Transforms the Game.” The update’s scale justifies that enthusiasm, fundamentally changing exploration, building, and combat through water’s addition.
FAQs
When did Enshrouded Wake of the Water release?
Wake of the Water, Enshrouded’s seventh major update, launched November 10, 2025 on PC via Steam Early Access. The update is free for all existing players.
What is the Veilwater Basin?
Veilwater Basin is Enshrouded’s first water-themed biome featuring vast deep lakes, rivers, waterfalls, and lush vegetation. It includes new quests, temples, settlements, enemies, and region-specific crafting materials.
Can you fight underwater in Enshrouded?
No, combat is disabled while fully submerged. However, the new Drak enemy faction can pursue you underwater with weapons, forcing you to escape to shallow areas or land where you can fight back.
What are the Drak in Enshrouded?
The Drak are a new amphibious lizard people faction that can fight both on land and underwater. They’re the first enemies capable of pursuing players beneath the surface.
Can you build underwater bases?
Yes, Wake of the Water supports fully submerged base construction. The voxel-based water simulation lets you build beneath lakes or incorporate flowing water into above-ground structures.
When does Enshrouded leave Early Access?
Enshrouded is targeting a 2026 release for version 1.0 on both PC and consoles. The exact date hasn’t been announced, but Wake of the Water represents progress toward that full launch.
Is Enshrouded available on consoles?
Not yet. Enshrouded is currently PC-only via Steam Early Access. Console versions for PlayStation and Xbox are planned for the 2026 version 1.0 launch alongside the full PC release.
Conclusion
Wake of the Water proves that Enshrouded isn’t coasting through Early Access with safe, incremental updates. Keen Games added an entire environmental element that most games include from day one, implemented it through sophisticated physics simulation, built a massive new biome showcasing it, designed enemy factions exploiting it, and created building systems integrating it into player creativity. That’s ambitious development that transforms the core game rather than just expanding around the edges.
For players who’ve been waiting for Enshrouded to feel more complete before diving in, Wake of the Water might be the tipping point. The game launched with strong combat, satisfying building, and good exploration. Now it has water, which sounds basic but fundamentally changes how all three of those pillars work. Swimming opens new areas. Underwater resources create new crafting chains. Amphibious enemies force tactical adaptation. And water-based building creates aesthetic possibilities that didn’t exist before.
The road to version 1.0 in 2026 remains long, but updates like this demonstrate consistent progress toward that goal. Enshrouded keeps getting better, and Wake of the Water represents the kind of foundational system addition that makes everything else more interesting. Whether you’re a veteran returning after months away or a new player finally taking the plunge on Early Access, now’s an excellent time to experience what Enshrouded has become.
Just remember to come up for air occasionally. The Drak don’t, but you still need oxygen.