Kiln is the next game from Double Fine Productions, revealed during the latest Xbox Developer Direct. Described as an "online multiplayer pottery-party brawler," the upcoming title marks a somewhat unexpected venture for both the Psychonauts developer and the Xbox Game Studios family as a whole.
Double Fine's most recently launched game is Keeper, a dreamlike platformer with a voiceless story, starring a walking lighthouse and its pelican-like friend. Keeper was released for the Xbox Series X/S and PC on October 17. Barely three months later, the American studio has revealed its next project.
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Kiln Is a Game About Making Pots, Then Making Them Punch Other, Clearly Inferior Pots
Announced during the 2026 Xbox Developer Direct, Kiln is billed as an "online multiplayer pottery-party brawler." The premise marks a fairly novel direction for the Psychonauts developer, even by Double Fine's experimentation-friendly standards. It is named after a type of furnace often used for drying pottery. True to its name, Kiln's gameplay loop centers on players crafting pots that become their fighters, then proceeding to control them to duke it out in 4v4 online matches.
Kiln's inventive premise was not invented overnight, but it did not take much longer either. Its roots can be traced back to Amnesia Fortnight, one of Double Fine's annual traditions where the developer prototypes various game ideas over a two-week period. For the 2017 edition of the event, the studio picked several concepts: three voted by fans, one chosen by Double Fine founder creative director Tim Schafer, and one that the team tasked with developing all of the prototypes—led by principal artist Derek Brand—wanted to make. Kiln was born out of that final pick.
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How Kiln's Pot-Making Works
The game's pot-making mechanics have been significantly streamlined compared to the real thing, but Double Fine still thought it sensible to include them given the premise. "It's just a button and a control stick," Brand says of the in-game pottery experience. In practice, that means aiming somewhere with a stick and throwing a chunk of clay with a button. However, the simple execution still allows for fairly diverse creative applications, especially when paired with the ability to pick between three different clay sizes and eight wheelable shapes, including bowls, cups, and bottles. "You can make any kind of shape you wanted," Brand says.
The whole pottery part is such that it grabs people who might not want to jump into a multiplayer game... If we can, we just slowly ease them into the ‘I want to punch something now with this pot.’
Why Kiln's Pot-Making Matters
Each pot-making session will essentially serve as an engaging and highly granular class picker. Apart from dictating pot shape, the player's decisions during this stage will determine things like durability, speed, and moves, including 24 special attacks inspired by shapes, or rather functionalities associated with shapes. For instance, massive cylinders will turn into hammers, while hockey puck-like pots will be able to pull off a trick shot that ricochets between enemies. Ultimately, the pot-making and 4v4 battles work in tandem to create a unique casual multiplayer experience. "The whole pottery part is such that it grabs people who might not want to jump into a multiplayer game," Brand explains. "If we can, we just slowly ease them into the ‘I want to punch something now with this pot.’"
Kiln Is Coming in Spring 2026
Kiln is presently targeting a spring 2026 release. It will debut simultaneously for the Xbox Series X/S, PlayStation 5, and PC. As a first-party Microsoft game, it will also be a day-one Xbox Game Pass title, available on the PC and Ultimate tiers of the subscription service. While it's still waiting for a concrete release date, Double Fine's last game was announced and launched in a span of just over four months—if that's any predictor for the immediate future, it would help narrow down the spring 2026 window to late April or early May.