Stepping into RailGods of Hysterra Preview feels like plunging headfirst into a world where locomotives breathe, landscapes shift with cosmic malice, and every mile of track is an in‑depth exploration of creeping dread. This early-access descent into Lovecraftian survival blends monstrous machinery with eldritch worldbuilding, pulling you into a realm where your train is both sanctuary and predator. As you carve a path through Hysterra’s corrupted wilderness, the game wastes no time immersing you in its unsettling rhythm, one part strategy, one part horror, and entirely unlike anything else on the rails.

RailGods of Hysterra Preview Pros

• Awesome graphics.
• 7.22GB download size.
• Steam achievements.
• Graphics settings – window mode, resolution, frame rate, v-sync, upscaling, graphics quality preset, screen percentage, quality settings for – shadows, textures, anti-aliasing, global illumination, reflections, post processing, and effects.
• Colourblind support.
• You can remap the controls for the keyboard.
• Audio sliders for UI, environment, music, and master volume slider.
• Solo mode is an offline single-player.
• Play game or join game is online supported game.
• Session settings – satiety depletion time slider, death drop availability, enemy settings (easy/normal/hard, which affects enemy quantity, health, and damage).
• Character creator – name (randomised option available), body, head, hair, eyebrows, eyes, beard, moustache, underwear, bottom wear, and cosmetics.
• Excellent voice work.
• Compendium houses entries for knowledge, stories, recipes, and quests.
• A full 3D Gothic world, and you play in third person. You can rotate the camera at will, and it will stay in place.
• Handy hover text when going over items and menus.
• Simple drag and drop system along with a hotbar for quick swapping and using.
• Satiety is your hunger bar, and you need to eat in order to stay alive. When you get it to zero, you start losing health.
• You can craft from the inventory, and find blueprints to increase what you can craft.
• Action survival gameplay.
• Opening tutorial in the Crypt and then ongoing tutorial pop-ups as you play.
• The mini map shows at the top with a compass, and the map fills in as you explore.
• I like how the game looks; it’s very atmospheric with fantastically dark locations.
• The game moves at a pace, the controls are tight and responsive, and it feels good to play.
• Damage numbers pop up against enemies and the environment.
• Collect and farm resources and materials by smashing up crates and boxes in the world or hacking down trees and mining rocks, etc.
• Press the Alt key to see all interactive elements on the screen and any mission objectives.
• Any dropped items and loot will emit a light to make it easier to find.
• Button prompts show to help with the game controls.
• Inventory wise you have slots for the backpack, satchel, and the belt.
• When looting, you can just hit transfer all.
• Action-wise, you can sprint and roll/dodge, but it does have a cooldown.
• Hack and slash combat, and again it feels good, nice and meaty.
• The Railgods are these fascinating sentinels that change their flesh to bond with vehicles like trains, and only Dreamers (you) can pilot them. You feed these Gods with sacrifice and arcane magic.
• Dark gifts are special abilities bestowed upon you as you play the game.
• OK, loading times kind of fluctuate, to be honest.
• Your Railgods has its own satiety (food) meter, and you need to feed them in order to keep them going, and if their health is zero, they stop randomly and won’t move until fed. (The number next to the satiety meter shows how many stops you can make)
• The coordinates panel on your train lets you put in any set of numbers with the dials; there are 9 numbers in total.
• I love the Rail God and all the slime squishy noises he makes as you feed him and watch him engulf this train.
• Central storage is available, and you can again transfer individually or all at once.
• Blueprint desks are where you can learn and create blueprints for general use.
• Abdul is your talking Parrot friend who hangs out on your train and gives help.
• The train is long and has many compartments, and the best part is that you can go into build mode, craft and place new utilities, and customise the train to your heart’s content.
• Different weather types and a day-night cycle.
• All train building has variants for visuals, and tiers for how good they are.
• You can dismantle and repair utilities and gear.
• The radio station is where you communicate with towns and set where to go. After that, you get a train ba,r and you can choose to stop when you want. Stops cost food, and you can find optional locations and secrets.
• There are three train speeds you can change instantly.
• Building is easy, green and red show if it can be placed, and walls, doors, etc all snap together.
• You can make and use melee and ranged weapons to mix it all up.
• As it’s Lovecraft, you know madness is in the game! As you explore, your madness meter will go up, and as it does, you start to lose the ability to recognise items, and then if it continues, the world and map go all distorted.
• There is a lot of potential here, and even now, the game has more than enough to offer players.

RailGods of Hysterra Preview Cons

• When selecting solo, it tells you it’s single player offline, which is fine, but it won’t let you back out, so I don’t see the point.
• No native support for the controller, but I have heard people getting it to work via big picture mod,e but my attention span out way before I got it working.
• Camera control is a pain; it’s clicking the wheel to turn the camera around, and I wish it could just be simpler or follow you better.
• You don’t get much voice work, but when you do, it’s good.
• There is a lot to take in, and the first hour will be constant pop-ups and reading; it does go down over time, but it’s a lot.
• Using the train bar is simple granted but timing to stop at designated locations is not always great, I wish you could just put where you want to go and leave it but it requires constant nursing.
• Loading screen instances do start to become more common, and it just slows it all down.
• There is no hard or even quick save option,s so you never know when it last saved.
• You have to be really precise with aiming when picking up items.
• Any items are picked up one by one, even when you have multiple,s and it just turns encounters and adventures into a clicking mini game.
• I wish the game let you do clothing, accessories and all that quicker so you can feel like you have a properly created character.

Related Post: The Electric State RPG Review – A Mind-Bending Adventure Awaits!

RailGods of Hysterra

Official Website:

Developer: Troglobytes Games

Publisher: Digital Vortex Entertainment

Store Link:

Steam