Cairn is a 2026 rockclimbing simulationadventure video game developed and published by The Game Bakers for PlayStation 5 and Windows. In the game, the player assumes control of Aava, a mountaineer who seeks to summit the mysterious Mount Kami. The game received generally positive reviews upon release, and sold more than 200,000 copies.
In Cairn, players must manually position the limbs of a mountineer as she attempts to summit a mountain.
Cairn is a rockclimbing simulation video game played from a third-person perspective. In the game, the player assumes control of Aava, a professional mountaineer, who aspires to become the first person to summit Mount Kami.[1] As Aava, players are tasked to read the rock face to chart out their climbing routes.[2] There are multiple pathways for players to reach the top.[3] Players must manually position each of Aava's limbs on handholds and footholds as she climbs up the mountain, and unlock checkpoints through placing pitons at regular intervals.[4]Chalk can be applied to increase Aava's grip.[5] Players have to be aware of Aava's posture and manage her stamina. If Aava is placed in an uncomfortable position for sustained period of time, overextending or overexerting one limb, she may fall, partially resetting the player's progress.[6][7] The game has no user interface, and players must observe Aava to gauge her level of exhaustion. If she was under extreme stress, she will breathe heavily, and her limbs will tremble.[8] Players can shake one of Aava's tired limbs, or belay off a piton in order to regain some stamina during an ascent. Players are also required to read Aava's body language to determine if a hold is large enough for her to grab on.[5] Weather conditions, time of day, and the composition of the rock wall will also alter the difficulty of an ascent.[9]
The game also features elements from survival games, as players need to rest and recover, eat and drink to lower hunger and thirst.[10] At regular intervals, players will be able to rest at a bivouac shelter, which serves as a save point for players. It is a place where Aava can rest, bandage herself, cook food, and repair equipment.[11] She is also accompanied by a robot named Climbot, which can recycle pitons, and make new chalk for Aava.[5][12] While her backpack has limited space and the resources she brought with her to the mountain will not regenerate, she is able to find new resources necessary for her survival while exploring Mount Kami.[11]Cairn is also an adventure game. Aava will discover the secrets of the mountain and decide the sacrifices she is willing to make to achieve her dream.[1] She will encounter other climbers attempting to summit the mountain, discover traces of past unsuccessful expeditions, and remnants of a long-lost Troglodyte civilization. Through exploration, players may find new resources, upgrades, recipes for food, and shortcuts.[9][5]
In addition to the story mode, the game also features Expedition mode, in which players can choose their playable avatar (Aava or Marco), select their climbing style (alpine or free solo), and share their results with other players.[1] The game was also released with a number of accessibility options that make the experience easier. For instance, players can toggle "rewind", allowing them to turn back time to before Aava falls. Players can also activate assist mode, which turns off all survival needs, and increase the frequency of autosaves.[13]
Aava, a seasoned hiker, aspires to be the first person to summit Mount Kami. She will discover the secrets of the mountain and decide the sacrifices she is willing to make to achieve her dream.
Development
Mathieu Bablet served as the game's art director and writer.
Cairn was developed by The Game Bakers. Development of the game started in 2020, and a team of 25 people worked on the game.[14] Emeric Thoa served as the game's creative director. The team collaborated with Lukas Julian Lentz (known for his work on Cocoon), and Martin Stig Andersen (known for his work on Limbo and Inside) for Cairn's audio, while recruiting comic book artist Mathieu Bablet for the game's art direction and story.[1] It had a budget of €5 million.[15]
It was described by the team as the conclusion of their "trilogy on freedom", following Furi and Haven. Creative director Emeric Thoa felt that alpinism stories captured a sense of "absolute freedom", and that Cairn was "a reflection on mountaineering itself, on what drives people to push themselves beyond their limits to climb mountains". Thoa was inspired by underground climbing documentaries and the manga The Summit of the Gods while creating the game.[13] The game also explores the darker side of mountaineering, including the dangers and isolation associated with it.[13] The Game Bakers wanted a story in the game that is "moving". Bablet described Aava as an individual who is demanding, perfectionist, and highly disciplined, though these qualities sometimes inflict a heavy toll on the people around her. A number of side characters was introduced to reveal Aava's background and personal history.[16] The team spent three years consulting alpinist Élisabeth Revol and Chamonix mountain guide Loan Giroud, who shared with the team their mountaineering experience.[17] Mount Kami was inspired by the Himalayas, the Alps, and the Vercors massif, and the team also attempted to ascend Aiguille du Midi themselves.[15]
The Game Bakers described the game as a "survival climber".[18] It compared summiting the game's mountain as a persistent boss battle, in which players use their skills and manage their resources in order to conquer it.[19] The game initially did not have any save points, and that the player character would die permanently if they fall, though this idea was scrapped and relegated to a side mode after realizing that this punishing difficulty would not appeal to all players.[13] The team compared it to Death Stranding and the Dark Souls series, though Thoa stressed that Cairn was not a "rage game",[8][14] and that the game was designed with mechanics that allowed players to "comeback from a failure".[13] To prevent overwhelming players in the beginning of the game, the team also added many accessibility features.[13] The team also found several similarites between playing a video game and mountaineering, as both had clearly defined rules and "instinctive success and failure consequences".[10] A lot of screaming sounds were recorded for Aava, as Thoa believed that it was a "signature of that sport", and that it helped created a "shared feeling of exasperation" between the players and Aava.[13] Each rock face and its handholds are handcrafted by the team. Thoa added that creating the game's technology was challenging, as the climbing movements were "controlled by maths, not animations", meaning that a small improvement to the level will bring about a cascade of other changes to other areas of a level.[10]
The Game Bakers announced Cairn in June 2024 for PlayStation 5 and Windows. A time-limited demo for the game was released through Steam in December 2024[20] More than 600,000 players tried the demo.[15] The game was originally planned to be released on 5 November 2025[1][21][22] but it was delayed to 29 January 2026.[23]
Cairn received "generally favorable" reviews, according to review aggregator website Metacritic.[24][25] Fellow review aggregator OpenCritic assessed that the game received "mighty" approval, being recommended by 90% of critics.[26]
Will Borger from IGN wrote that summiting Kami was an "exhilarating" and "rewarding" experience, noting that players need to manage Ava's health and stamina, as well as her hunger and temperature in order to succeed.[11] Keza MacDonald from The Guardian wrote that Cairn is a "punishing, beautiful survival game that turns mountaineering into an intimate test of endurance, fixation and emotional resolve". She felt that climbing the mountain was a tense experience, and reaching a safe point provided relief that was "intoxicating".[33] Matt Miller from Game Informer compared Mount Kami to "one massive puzzle to solve, or a single, improbably long boss fight, with many strategies for success", and praised the game for having many alternative paths for players to reach their objectives.[27] Shaun Prescott from PC Gamer described the game as "approachable" and compared it to Baby Steps and Death Stranding, and praised how the game successfully captured a sense of fear and vertigo associated with rock climbing, and the gratification of reaching a destination after extended hardship.[30] Lewis Gordon from Eurogamer wrote that Cairn and Baby Steps, as opposed to combat-heavy games, provided a "kinder, more generous masocore" experience where arduous, incremental progress still yields euphoric satisfaction.[34] In a more negative review, Ali Jones from GamesRadar criticized the climbing mechanics for being "clumsy".[29]
The game's story received strong praise from critics. James Pickard from TechRadar noted that the story was well-written and that its characters were "compelling".[32] Borger noted that the game's environmental storytelling was "moving", and noted that they "recur and build on themselves" as players progress. She further described Aava as a "complicated, complex, imperfect" character, and added that the game had a very memorable ending.[11] Miller liked that how the provided "emergent moments of beauty", added that its narrative explored "themes of loss, the hard words we leave unspoken, and the way that people run away from the things they love",[27] Moises Taveras from GameSpot also praised Aava for being a person with "real struggles and a real lack of answers", though she felt that other NPCs could have had more screen time to further flesh out their character.[28] Several critics noted that the challenging gameplay further elevated the game's story and its messages.[33][11]
Sales
The Game Bakers estimated that the game would sell between 300,000 to 1 million units in its first year of sales.[15] More than 200,000 copies were sold within the first three days of the game's launch.[35]
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