The Mildew Children: Chapter 1
Featuring a blend of 2D adventure and visual novel. Chapter 1 is the very beginning of the grim tale about a village inhabited only by children who follow savage pagan traditions. A young witch Kyrphel, along with her sisters, are bound to perform a macabre Ritual in order to save their village.
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The Mildew Children on Steam
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Featuring a blend of 2D adventure and visual novel, The Mildew Children is a grim tale about a village inhabited only by children who follow savage pagan traditions. A young witch named Kyrphel, along with her sisters, are bound to perform a macabre Ritual in order to save their village.
The Mildew Children is a adventure, story rich and exploration game
developed by The Growing Stones
and published by Valkyrie Initiative.
Released on April 17th 2024 is available on Windows, MacOS, Linux, Steam Deck and Steam Machine
in 9 languages: English, Russian, French, German, Spanish - Spain, Polish, Portuguese - Brazil, Simplified Chinese and Turkish.
It has received 471 reviews of which 433 were positive and 38 were negative resulting in a rating of 8.5 out of 10. 😎
The game is currently priced at 3.41€ on Steam with a 65% discount.
The Steam community has classified The Mildew Children into these genres:
Adventure
Story Rich
Exploration
Detective
Surreal
Visual Novel
Female Protagonist
Colorful
2D
Choices Matter
Psychological Horror
Atmospheric
Mystery
Side Scroller
Magic
Point & Click
Faith
Emotional
Horror
Dark
Here is the detailed breakdown of supported languages for The Mildew Children:
| UI | Subtitle | Audio | |
|---|---|---|---|
| English | |||
| German | |||
| French | |||
| Spanish - Spain | |||
| Simplified Chinese | |||
| Russian | |||
| Polish | |||
| Turkish | |||
| Portuguese - Brazil |
Media & Screenshots
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System requirements
These are the minimum specifications needed to play the game. For the best experience, we recommend that you verify them.
Windows
- Requires a 64-bit processor and operating system
- OS: Windows 10 or newer
- Processor: Requires a 64-bit processor and operating system
- Memory: 4 GB RAM
- Graphics: DirectX 11 compatible video card (integrated or dedicated with min 2GB memory)
- DirectX: Version 11
- Storage: 4 GB available space
MacOS
- OS: macOS 11 or newer
- Processor: Apple Silicon or Intel
- Memory: 4 GB RAM
- Storage: 4 GB available space
Linux
- OS: Ubuntu 18.04 or SteamOS 3 (or newer)
- Processor: x64 architecture only
- Memory: 4 GB RAM
- Graphics: OpenGL 4 Compliant
- Storage: 4 GB available space
Steam Price & Best Deals
User reviews & Ratings
Explore reviews from Steam users sharing their experiences and what they love about the game.
Wow, I have never realized I needed this type of game in my life. I guess The Mildew Children proved me wrong. First of all, the Russian voice acting (the only voice acting available, unfortunately) is INCREDIBLE. Every character is voiced perfectly. I have nothing else to say. Secondly, the world-building, atmosphere, characters, art style, music, and sound design - everything is great. I felt completely immersed in the story, in every character's journey(even the background ones), and in almost every dialogue. Well done! Didn't expect much from this game. Oh, how wrong I was. The only flaw is that the translation isn't equally good in every language. The English one was decent, but I've encountered Spanish speakers who didn't get a chance to enjoy the game because of a poorly made translation:( Additionally, the ending felt kind of rushed to me, but I have no problems with that, for the rest of the game is made brilliantly!
Have you ever wanted to play a witch with a heart disease? No? Well, tough luck, because you should, because this game is good. It is also MESSED UP. The world in which these kids live is completely ♥♥♥♥♥♥ and you are a small cog in it, trying her best and probably making things worse. If you like some existential musings with an aesthetic taken from eastern european paganism, this game is a unique experience.
Sights & Sounds Awkward [*] That subtitle is basically how I'd sum up the visual presentation of The Mildew Children in one word [*] Take, for example, a typical snapshot of the gameplay as you're exploring. Feel free to pull up an image search for screenshots to verify what I'm saying. To my eyes, it looks like characters are 3D-modeled and placed on scrolling 2D backgrounds. While not ugly per se, the primitive looking characters on the frankly gorgeous backdrops is a little jarring, almost like the assets are from two different games [*] Character animations are stilted and repetitive. Almost robotic. Additionally, turning around to face a different direction slingshots the screen to maintain your character's position at roughly the 1/4 width mark in the direction you're facing. Hope you're not overly prone to motion sickness [*] As a result, whenever the game is in motion, it looks and feels strange. When you're just talking to someone and can focus on the voice acting, story development, beautiful backgrounds, and expressive character portraits, though? The Mildew Children can be quite the scenic experience [*] I can't really judge the voice acting given that it's all in Russian, but it sounded good to me. And even if a Russian-speaker would judge otherwise, I don't think the typical English speaker would find anything noteworthy to complain about [*] The soundtrack is really where the presentation shines. I find that a lot of other games with grim, oppressive, and evil atmospheres tend to overuse ambient electronic music with sparse arrangements and occasionally squeaky violins to set the mood. Fortunately, that's not the case in this title [*] The tracks are noteworthy not only for their quality, but also for how unique they sound to a Western ear. There's a lot of strings and percussion that I can't quite identify, and the use of whispered incantations, disharmonies, and oblique bends convincingly create a creeping sense of unease. Some game OSTs try to sound scary. The Mildew Children 's sounds like you've broken some arcane ritual law and infernal forces are mobilizing to punish you for it Story & Vibes Never grow old [*] The Mildew Children casts you in the role of Kyrphel, the youngest member of a small coven of witches in a remote forest village. From the outset, it's clear that dark magic in the air [*] The village is governed by an aggressive practice of forced reincarnation. The laws in place dictate that all people, once they turn 19, are led to their grave and made to drink a poison called Black Milk given to them by the current Grave Priestess. Once lulled into their final slumber, the priestess makes a single clean incision with her scythe and lays them to rest to eventually be reincarnated as a new child [*] This practice is in place at least in part to appease a goddess called the Mistress of Death. Even so, these ritual sacrifices aren't enough to hold her off forever. Every 10 years, the village's witches, despite their status as outcasts, have to complete a rite called the Dormition on The Darkest Night to stave off the culling of the entire village. Even when successful, [*] Complicating matters is the fact that the Dormition is typically conducted with four witches, and Kyrphel's currently only contains two others besides herself. Their most senior witch has recently died unexpectedly, making their prospects of success grim [*] While her sisters are given over to resignation or despair, your goal as Kyrphel is to formulate a plan to ensure the rite's success, even if the cost is her life [*] As you can plainly see, the setting, background, and plotline are all unrelentingly dark. There's nary a ray of hope throughout much of the narrative [*] All of this serves as some excellent lore building. Even if the visuals often look uncanny, they never quite break your immersion due to how thoughtfully constructed the in-game world is. I think my favorite bit of lore is that witches in The Mildew Children 's world become less and less powerful as they age. New initiates have the greatest powers of sorcery, even if they're less capable of controlling it effectively. This means that even if Kyrphel is able to find a replacement witch, the coven will only have a short amount of time to train her before The Darkest Night arrives Playability & Replayability Jot it down [*] With its blend of 2D adventure and visual novel gameplay, you'd be forgiven for opining that most of your time in the game centers around walking around and talking. Were it not for the well-written story, I admit that this would get old pretty fast [*] In that vein, not a lot is expected of the player other than their attention. And I certainly do recommend that you pay close attention. The Dormition may be the most important ritual you'll need to perform, but it's certainly not the only one. If someone explains the process of how a certain rite works or what incantations you'll need for success, you'd do well to take a screenshot or scribble some notes [*] Sure, there's guides online available to pull you out of a soft-lock if you couldn't be bothered to focus on what was presented, but at that point, why play a story-driven game at all? [*] These rituals will be the most active part of the gameplay you'll encounter. Beyond wracking your memory for the right words or order of operations, witches must rely on the powers of nature to help them with their practice. These usually take the form of various plants that improve Kyrphel's abilities at the cost of some physical distress [*] After consuming these magic ingredients, Kyrphel will, at times, suffer adverse effects. When this happens, a meter with a moving arrow will pop up next to her character portrait. You'll need hold the direction opposite of the way the arrow is traveling to keep it from touching the sides. Failing to do so can have results ranging from simple failure to instant death [*] I'm kind of split on this method of injecting tension into the VN gameplay. On one hand, it does help immersion. It's not always an easy minigame, with the arrow sometimes rapidly changing directions with a lot of momentum. On the other hand, it can be frustrating to start a ritual over and go through the dialogue again if you fail Overall Impressions & Performance For the genre enthusiast [*] Assigning a score to a game like this always feels a little tricky. People who don't enjoy VNs or 2D adventure games will probably bounce right off of this. If you can at least tolerate it, though, you're rewarded with a great story with dense lore and an incredible atmosphere [*] There's just something riveting about conducting all that dark magic while that creepy OST plays over the witches' incantations. It's truly eerie. Managed to give me goosebumps towards the conclusion. I recommend playing in a dark room to complete the illusion. Maybe light a dribbly candle and lower the thermostat a few ticks [*] Given that the most intense gameplay only involves holding left or right, it's a pretty good Steam Deck title. It ran and performed well on that platform Final Verdict 7.0 /10. I'm potentially overweighting the story in this case, but I think that's the fairest way to judge a VN. I've played far more intense horror titles that didn't manage to get this sort of sympathetic nervous system response out of me. If you enjoy the genre, this is an easy title to recommend
The art and the music are phenomenal! The colors are really pleasing and perfectly sets the atmosphere for each scene. The music has an eerie sense in them no matter how homely it feels. Overall ATMOSPHERE in The Mildew Children is perfectly set, the dread and macabre in this village. The most eerie part is not the blatantly gorey scenes, but the fact that the villagers and every character treats each bloody practice as normal. It really sets you the kind of culture that prevails - both in their practice, customs, and beliefs. Another amazing aspect that deserves praise is the VOICE ACTING. As a non-russian speaker, I had no clue of the dialogue just from listening but even so I can hear each emotion and personality of every character even without reading the english text. The Voice actors are absolutely phenomenal! The game mechanics I applaud in their immersion. You feel for the struggle of remembering these are children, Iva especially. SPOILERS: Her world has turned upside down, she was told she'd die early, the pressure to remember multiple rituals and incantations in such a short amount of time as her body adjusts to poison after poison. The mechanics really lets you feel the struggles of Kyrphel and Iva in not just remembering their practices and powering through poison, but also pushing through very difficult conversations. Amazing game and severely underrated! I'm bound to research more about slavic folklore and more that inspired the game.
Красивая драматичная игра! Мне очень понравилось, несмотря на то, что новеллы обычно это не моё, но тут я не могла оторваться! Плюсы: + Прекрасная история + Красивая рисовка + Интересные персонажи + Озвучка! Голоса приятные, выразительные, погружающие в сюжет и отлично подходящие персонажам. Особенно прекрасна Вавна! + Оооочень красивая музыка + Отдельным пунктом: заговоры ведьм - атмосферные стихи создают ощущение той самой славянской магии + Собственно, сеттинг: мир ощущается живым и пугающим, со своим прошлым, есть небольшие детали которые позволяют увидеть традиции этого мира и его историю + На удивление понравились мини-игры, они добавляли напряжения там, где это было необходимо Минусы: Неудобная система сохранений, можно только с начала главы начать либо с начала диалога, если остановиться посреди диалога. С другой стороны главы небольшие, так что это мелочь.
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Frequently Asked Questions
The Mildew Children is currently priced at 3.41€ on Steam.
Yes, The Mildew Children is currently available at a 65% discount. You can purchase it for 3.41€ on Steam.
Yes, The Mildew Children received 433 positive votes out of a total of 471 achieving a rating of 8.54.
😎
The Mildew Children was developed by The Growing Stones and published by Valkyrie Initiative.
Yes, The Mildew Children is playable and fully supported on Windows.
Yes, The Mildew Children is playable and fully supported on MacOS.
Yes, The Mildew Children is playable and fully supported on Linux.
Yes, The Mildew Children is playable and fully supported on Steam Deck.
Yes, The Mildew Children is playable and fully supported on Steam Machine.
No, The Mildew Children does not support VR.
The Mildew Children is a single-player game.
Yes, there are 2 DLCs available for The Mildew Children. Explore additional content available for The Mildew Children on Steam.
No, The Mildew Children does not support mods via Steam Workshop.
No, The Mildew Children does not support Steam Remote Play.
Yes, The Mildew Children is enabled for Steam Family Sharing. This means you can share the game with authorized users from your Steam Library, allowing them to play it on their own accounts. For more details on how the feature works, you can read the original Steam Family Sharing announcement or visit the Steam Family Sharing user guide and FAQ page.
You can find solutions or submit a support ticket by visiting the Steam Support page for The Mildew Children.
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Additionally, we incorporate data from the SteamSpy API, which offers insights into game sales and player statistics. This helps us present a comprehensive view of each game's popularity and performance within the gaming community.
Last Updates| Steam data | 23 October 2026 16:56 UTC |
|---|---|
| SteamSpy data | 20 October 2026 04:09 UTC |
| Steam price | 26 October 2026 19:18 UTC |
| Steam reviews | 22 October 2026 16:04 UTC |
If you'd like to dive deeper into the details about The Mildew Children, we invite you to check out a few dedicated websites that offer extensive information and insights. These platforms provide valuable data, analysis, and user-generated reports to enhance your understanding of the game and its performance.
- SteamDB - A comprehensive database of everything on Steam about The Mildew Children
- SteamCharts - Analysis of The Mildew Children concurrent players on Steam
- ProtonDB - Crowdsourced reports on Linux and Steam Deck The Mildew Children compatibility
Game modes
Features
Online players
0
Developer
The Growing Stones
Publisher
Valkyrie Initiative
Release
17 Apr 2024
Platforms
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