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The Mildew Children on Steam - User reviews, Price & Information
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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 and Linux
in 9 languages: English, Russian, French, German, Spanish - Spain, Polish, Portuguese - Brazil, Simplified Chinese and Turkish.
It has received 315 reviews of which 295 were positive and 20 were negative resulting in a rating of 8.6 out of 10. 😎
The game is currently priced at 3.70€ on Steam with a 62% discount.
The Steam community has classified The Mildew Children into these genres:
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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
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User reviews & Ratings
Explore reviews from Steam users sharing their experiences and what they love about the game.
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
*Conditional recommendation, read below: After an outcome so personally unfavorable to me that I cried, I've looked around online at who exactly seems to be both enjoying and understanding this game. It appears that this game is quite popular with people of Slavic or Central European heritage/ancestry. I don't feel that this game makes a lot of sense to people outside of those cultures, myself included. That's not a bad thing, which is why I still recommend this game but with a word of caution. I feel the best parts of this game are its art style and its voice acting. Please listen to it in its original language! There are subtitles for you, and you can slow or quicken their pacing so that you don't read what happens before it happens. This is unquestionably a beautiful game. It is a coherent work of written, drawn, and musical art. I enjoyed the game completely right up until the unfavorable outcome. I personally did not mind the emotion mechanics. Apparently it used to be worse before people commented on it, so I'll say in its current state it is alright. I have heard reports that it is impossible to turn off, if you want to do that, which is unfortunate. My critique of the game is that it is difficult to obtain the outcome that you want, specifically because many aspects of the game's greater lore remain unexplained. This is why I believe this game has great cultural appeal for the community it was designed for, but not necessarily outside of that community. I'll give an example: My historical culture is of formerly enslaved people of African origin in the United States. Our fantasy lore includes many West African deities and supernatural figures. If I created a game that featured Papa Legba, I and my fellow members of the African diaspora would quickly understand his role as a communication facilitator and protector of children. People outside of our shared culture tend to perceive him as the embodiment of Satan, or at least a trickster. Therefore, people would likely play my game very differently based on whether they had heard of him or not AND whether they had learned the foreigner's perception of him or the West African perception of him. I believe a similar dynamic exists for this game. As a foreigner to Eastern European lore, I wasn't sure which characters to take seriously, to help, to ignore, or to fear. I wasn't sure whether the spirits I sometimes came across were evil or just scary-looking. I wasn't sure whether to follow the spirits' directives or defy them. If you're similarly unfamiliar with Eastern European lore, you may want to read on it before playing.
haven't finished it at the time of writing this review but ohhh my god this is one of THE most unique visual novels i have ever played (from a story perspective at least)! what incredible world building. there's a lot of walking around between story scenes but i don't mind that so much as the creepy pagan village is fun to look at. could do without the minigames but i think they're optional, i'm just too lazy to turn them off~
Another Russian indie banger detailing the lives of a tribe of children who follow a pagan system loosely based on the belief that the 27 club is simply waiting too long. The main character, Kyrphel, is a witch who the game teases may or may not be experiencing shared psychosis with the rest of the village. Her wacky antics involve gaslighting an impressionable 14 year old girl into joining her circle of witches for their important ritual. Overall, pretty good story and voice acting. Whoever decided that one of the achievements needed to be locked behind an RNG guessing game needs to get kicked in the teeth. <3
The Mildew Children, developed by The Growing Stones and published by Valkyrie Initiative, is an atmospheric and intricately crafted 2D adventure game that delves deeply into folklore and dark fairy tale aesthetics. The game invites players into a secluded village inhabited exclusively by children who live by ancient pagan traditions, immersing them in a world steeped in mystery, superstition, and eerie beauty. Central to the story is Kyrphel, a young witch preparing for a significant ritual alongside her sisters, aiming to protect their community from an impending threat. Over the course of twelve chapters and roughly eight hours of gameplay, players navigate a narrative filled with moral ambiguity, cryptic puzzles, and the weight of difficult choices that shape the fate of the village and its inhabitants. Visually, The Mildew Children stands out for its hand-drawn art style, which perfectly captures the haunting and somber mood of the game’s setting. Every scene is rendered with great attention to detail, from the dilapidated wooden cottages to the mist-covered forests that surround the village. The color palette leans heavily on muted tones and shadowy contrasts, reinforcing the feeling of isolation and otherworldliness. Character portraits are expressive and richly designed, communicating subtle emotional shifts that deepen the narrative engagement. This visual presentation not only supports the story but elevates the overall atmosphere, creating an immersive experience that feels both intimate and unsettling. Gameplay in The Mildew Children blends exploration, investigation, and decision-making in a way that encourages players to engage thoughtfully with the world around them. Players move through various village locations, interact with a cast of enigmatic characters, and piece together clues to unravel the mysteries that haunt the community. The dialogue system offers multiple choices, allowing for player agency that affects relationships and story outcomes, though these choices often carry ambiguous consequences rather than clear-cut resolutions. Alongside narrative progression, the game incorporates puzzles and quick-time events that require both strategic thinking and reflexes. These mechanics are thoughtfully integrated to maintain immersion without interrupting the flow of the story, striking a balance between gameplay and storytelling. The sound design further enriches the game’s eerie atmosphere, employing a carefully curated soundtrack that complements the narrative’s dark themes and quiet moments alike. Ambient sounds—such as the rustling of leaves, distant animal calls, and the creaking of wooden structures—add layers of authenticity to the village setting. The music oscillates between haunting melodies and subtle, tension-building compositions that underscore critical scenes and heighten emotional impact. While the game lacks voice acting, the written dialogue combined with sound effects creates a compelling audio environment that draws players into Kyrphel’s world. Critically, The Mildew Children has been praised for its originality and depth, standing out as a rare example of Slavic-inspired fantasy in the gaming landscape. The storytelling is lauded for its mature themes and richly woven folklore elements, which explore community, sacrifice, and the blurred line between superstition and reality. The game’s moral complexity and the sometimes ambiguous nature of player choices invite reflection, encouraging players to consider the consequences of their actions in a nuanced context. Some criticism has been directed toward the game’s pacing, as the heavy emphasis on dialogue and slower narrative beats may challenge players seeking more dynamic or action-oriented gameplay. Nonetheless, its unique atmosphere and compelling narrative make it a memorable experience for fans of story-driven adventures. Overall, The Mildew Children is a captivating and thought-provoking game that offers a distinct blend of folklore, mystery, and dark fantasy. Its hand-crafted visuals, immersive soundscape, and complex storytelling combine to create an experience that resonates emotionally and intellectually. While it may not appeal to every player due to its deliberate pacing and narrative focus, those willing to immerse themselves in its world will find a richly rewarding journey filled with beauty, tension, and haunting intrigue. Rating: 9/10
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Frequently Asked Questions
The Mildew Children is currently priced at 3.70€ on Steam.
Yes, The Mildew Children is currently available at a 62% discount. You can purchase it for 3.70€ on Steam.
Yes, The Mildew Children received 295 positive votes out of a total of 315 achieving a rating of 8.59.
😎
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.
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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Last Updates| Steam data | 16 July 2026 13:29 UTC |
|---|---|
| SteamSpy data | 24 July 2026 23:40 UTC |
| Steam price | 28 July 2026 18:17 UTC |
| Steam reviews | 26 July 2026 03:57 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
5
Developer
The Growing Stones
Publisher
Valkyrie Initiative
Release
17 Apr 2024
Platforms
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