Experience the legendary adventures of a brave courier rider! Bond with your horse and tame the open wilds of 13th century Mongolia.
Latest Updates from Our Project:
Swimming Horses. Design Pillars. Breeding Update.
8 months ago
– Wed, Feb 25, 2026 at 05:05:27 AM
Dear Backers,
Today we want to take you deeper into the heart of The Legend of Khiimori. Into the windswept steppe, the bond between rider and horse, and the systems that bring this world to life. This update is about the four core pillars that guide every design decision we make - such as the implementation of swimming horses - and how they shape your journey through 13th-century Mongolia.
On top of that, we have an exciting update on breeding (and why breeding different kinds of horses is great for every player), along with a variety of other topics. And of course, we are pretty excited, because: We are just 6 days away from the PC Early Access launch on March 3rd, 2026!
Explore 13th‑century Mongolia on a swimming horse!
What to Expect from Swimming
First of all, we have exciting news about a feature we’ve been working on the past weeks. We did not want to announce this before we were confident that we’d actually be able to implement it to everyone’s satisfaction, but now that we’re far enough along in the process to actually show you, we’re very pleased to reveal: Horses in The Legend of Khiimori will be able to swim!
While all horses can swim in the game, that doesn’t mean that rivers and lakes just suddenly don’t constitute obstacles anymore. Instead, traversing bodies of water will become another way of interacting with our game world that intertwines with many of our existing gameplay systems.
What does that mean for the player?
Swimming drains your horse’s stamina quite quickly, so attempting a water crossing brings a bit of risk. If you can reach the same point via dry land, that may be the safer route, even if it’s the long way around.
Some of the cargo you transport isn’t exactly water-proof. Taking a shortcut through a river may therefore only make sense if you’re in between missions, or carrying something that won’t get water-damage.
How long your horse can swim depends on its stamina and robustness. Through training, you are able to increase the distances your horse can swim, thereby potentially opening up new routes for yourself.
Islands in lakes and rivers may contain rewards or collectible items that aren’t otherwise easy to reach, so taking a detour to these places may well be worth a dip in the water – provided again that you’re not carrying water-sensitive cargo or risking your horse’s health in the process.
Swimming Horse GIF
Game Design Philosophy
To give you a bit of additional insight as to why this choice was made, alongside the various other improvements and fixes we’re investing our extra time into, let’s recap what we think of as the four main pillars of our game. Design pillars are the foundation any big game project is built upon, and reminding ourselves of these pillars is how we decide which features are worth adding and which are not really suited to our core vision.
So what are the four core design pillars that The Legend of Khiimori is built upon?
1. Authentic Horses and Equine Realism
Horses are not just mounts in The Legend of Khiimori they can also be thought of as “tools”.
We are putting extraordinary care into capturing the authenticity of Mongolian horses: their endurance, temperament, and the deep cultural bond they shared with riders of the era. Horses respond to exhaustion, hunger, terrain, and care. Your relationship with your horse grows over time, influencing handling, trust, and survival in the open wilds.
Lose your horse, mistreat it, or push it too hard… and life on the steppe becomes far more dangerous.
2. Believable Setting and 13th Century Mongolia
The open world of Khiimori is inspired by real landscapes, climates, and nomadic cultures of 13th century Mongolia. Vast grasslands, sacred sites, trade routes, river crossings, and harsh weather all shape how you move and survive.
There are no convenience markers or theme-park shortcuts. Instead, the land itself tells stories—through ruins, camps, trails, and the people you meet along the way.
3. Vivid Open World and The Life of a Courier Rider
In The Legend of Khiimori you are a courier rider, carrying messages, goods, and knowledge across an untamed world. Distance matters. Time matters. Preparation matters.
Each journey requires planning:
Which route is safest?
Do you risk a shortcut through hostile terrain?
Can your horse make the trip without rest?
The open world is designed to reward observation, memory, and mastery, making every successful delivery feel earned.
4. Enjoyable Mechanics and Survival Elements
Survival in Khiimori is challenging, but never tedious.
We are building systems that are deep, readable, and respectful of your time. Food, warmth, exhaustion, and equipment condition all play a role, but they are designed to support immersion.
Every mechanic exists to reinforce the fantasy of being a rider struggling against nature, scarcity, and distance, rather than fighting menus or micromanagement.
Where will your deliveries take you?
Adding Richness to Traversal
We’ve been closely listening to the feedback we received from our Next Fest Demo, played by over 50.000 people, and the Alpha Playtest for Kickstarter backers, played by about 4.000 people, who are very passionate and have invested hours and hours into the game already. Horse Swimming is something many of you have asked for, so it made sense for us to explore and find out not just how technically feasible it was, but if it would fit into the aforementioned design pillars.
Horses can swim in real life, and they can be trained to swim with a rider → that fits our goal for authentic equine representation
For Mongolian nomads, horses were the form of transportation, carrying riders across all terrain. We found historical sources from the 13th century describing the ways Mongolian riders would cross rivers with their mounts → swimming horses thus fit into our intentions for a believable historical setting
Route planning and weighing risks against rewards is already a core element of our game, and applies to various aspects from dangerous wildlife, to harsh weather conditions, to treacherous ground types. Adding water crossing fits neatly into those systems → that makes it a perfect fit for our vivid open world and courier rider gameplay
Swimming comes with limitations, remember the stamina drain and water-sensitive cargo we mentioned above, that add meaningful challenges to our survival and traversal gameplay. At the same time, making some rivers and lakes cross-able on horseback adds another way of interacting with the level and potentially reducing frustration of having to take a long way around. Meaning → this suits our goal of providing enjoyable mechanics and survival elements really well.
This thought experiment of fitting a feature into the design pillars may strike you as overly theoretical, especially if you find it obvious that horses in a game should be able to swim for the sake of fun and realism. But with hundreds and thousands of feature requests from players reaching us, it’s important to us that we listen with a critical ear and make sure that a new mechanic really fits into our vision of the game before we invest the precious time of our coders, animators and technical artists to bring that feature into the game.
Plan your delivery routes wisely!
An Update from the Breeding Paddock
We’ve talked about our horse breeding feature before, but we wanted to share some cool updates on this topic. As you can see, we’ve overhauled our breeding UI quite extensively to make it clearer what your foal is inheriting from its parents and what you might be able to influence.
If you’re the kind of horse nerd that already got excited about seeing Extension and Agouti and Dun genes explicitly listed here (and we know we are!), we don’t need to explain to you why this is cool.
For anyone else though, let us remind you that horse breeding is one of the core avenues of progress in The Legend of Khiimori.
Think of your stable of horses as the party in your RPG, the Garage full of race cars, the arsenal of weaponry, where each steed is suited for particular purposes and upgrading (training and breeding) them over time is what lets you traverse the world more easily, reach places you weren’t able to reach before and take on more difficult missions.
Horses in The Legend of Khiimori are not just adorable companions (though they are very much that too!) but also specialized tools that allow you to do your job as a Yam courier rider.
Select a mare and a stallion…
…check possible outcome…
…apply blessings for optimized breeding.
Starting Into Early Access
We’re just a week away from releasing into Early Access on March 3rd, 2026, and can’t wait for all of you to try the game for yourselves! As we’ve said before, the Early Access release is just the next step on our journey together, not its destination, so we’re looking forward to your feedback and your enthusiasm to help us fit the game into the vision you as players and we as developers share.
When the game releases, please consider that by leaving a Steam review very soon after release, you’re doing a huge service to the game to increase its visibility in the store.
By reviewing games quickly and generously, you’re actively helping us gain more traction, which in turn helps us invest more time into improving the game. We know the game won’t be perfect yet - that’s the point of Early Access after all, to improve it with your input! - but positive reviews are actually more helpful towards getting improvements made in the long run than negative ones, which risk getting the game buried in the Steam algorithm.
Also, on the day of launch, we will be holding an Early Access Launch Livestream at 3 PM CET / 6 AM PST with interesting guests and all that is Khiimori: https://www.twitch.tv/aesirinteractive?lang=en
Tune in at 3 PM CET / 6 AM PST on March 3rd, 2026!
LAST REMINDER: BackerKit Survey & Credits
Have you answered the BackerKit Survey we sent out in January 2026 yet?
If not, please do so now, to receive a PC Early Access Key for Steam or the Epic Games Store on March 3rd, 2026.
If you are going for console, you will not receive a PC Early Access Key and will need to wait for the full release of the game. In that case, there’s no need to stress as the survey can be filled out and edited (console system of choice) until later this year.
Please note: if you chose a console version in the BackerKit survey, you can still change it to PC (Early Access) until March 1st, 2026, and will receive a PC Early Access Key for Steam or the Epic Games Store by March 3rd, 2026.
All necessary information can be found in our Kickstarter Update #36:
For those of you who have already filled out the survey, we have a little treat…
Your name (or nickname) will be mentioned in the credits of the Early Access version of the game!
However, the “100‑character personal message” will not be part of the credits yet. These will be added for the full release of the game. We will keep you posted about this :)
One last jump and we launch!
So, what do think? Any additional questions or feedback for us? Excited for next week? Please drop us a message right here or on one of our Social Media channels!
Your Team at Aesir Interactive
PS: The Early Access release of The Legend of Khiimori on March 3rd, 2026, on Steam and the Epic Games Store is only the beginning! More features and content will be added throughout Early Access. Make sure to check our Trello board to see what we’re currently working on and which content and features are coming next: https://trello.com/b/eIMKv1On/the-legend-of-khiimori-development-roadmap/
Soundtrack Making-of
8 months ago
– Thu, Feb 19, 2026 at 02:15:33 AM
Dear Backers,
Sit back, relax, and enjoy… today it’s all about the sounds of the steppe and the music of The Legend of Khiimori.
Soundtrack Making-of
For us, music has always been at the heart of every unforgettable game experience, and The Legend of Khiimori is no exception. That is why our soundtrack has been a top priority from day one!
Composing for this world is particularly inspiring because the game isn’t just set in Mongolia, it takes place in the ancient 13th century, a time and place rich with distinctive sounds and cultural depth. A setting that gives us an incredible playground filled with unique instruments, rhythms, and melodies to explore.
To bring this to life, we’re collaborating with the traditional Mongolian band Khukh Mongol, as well as Zolzaya Boldbaatar, master of the Morin Khuur (horsehead fiddle), whose strings and bow are made out of horsehair. You may remember Zolzaya from our Gamescom 2025 booth, where he performed the Morin Khuur live to captivate the crowd.
The making-of video also touches on other traditional Mongolian instruments, such as the Shagai, which consists of sheep’s knuckle bone.
Check out our The Legend of KhiimoriSoundtrack Making‑of below! Share it, like it, pump up the volume: https://youtu.be/XP_EpuycWcQ
If you want, you can already give a couple of tracks a listen on SoundCloud:
And it’s not just the music that brings our world to life! Sound effects (SFX) play an equally crucial role, especially in an open‑world adventure built around horses. That’s why we went the extra mile and captured many of these sounds live on a real horse ranch. You can see how we did it in the behind‑the‑scenes video we shared last year:
If you want to get the soundtrack of The Legend of Khiimori on Vinyl (featuring a Bonus Track) or CD, head over to our BackerKit Shop for these and more merch items. Please note that all items from the shop will not be sent out until the full release of the game. Let’s rock:
Please make sure to fill out the BackerKit Survey now if you want to receive a PC Early Access Key for Steam or the Epic Games Store on March 3rd, 2026.
If you are going for console, you will not receive a PC Early Access Key and will need to wait for the full release of the game. In that case, there’s no need to stress as the survey can be filled out and edited (console system of choice) until later this year.
How do you like our soundtrack so far? Ready to pick up the Morin Khuur yourself? :D
Let us know in the comments below!
Your Team at Aesir Interactive
PS: The Early Access release of The Legend of Khiimori on March 3rd, 2026, on Steam and the Epic Games Store is only the beginning! More features and content will be added throughout Early Access. Make sure to check our Trello board to see what we’re currently working on and which content and features are coming next: https://trello.com/b/eIMKv1On/the-legend-of-khiimori-development-roadmap/
Spirit Combat & Corrupted Zones
9 months ago
– Wed, Feb 11, 2026 at 05:15:56 AM
Dear Backers,
This is a big one!
We received a lot of feedback from our Alpha Playtesters, and one of the most common requests was to expand the use of Naraa’s bow and arrows, as well as to dig deeper into the myths and spirituality of 13th‑century Mongolia that heavily inspired our game.
Yes, we do have hunting in the game, but as stated in the past, it will be presented in a respectful way and true to historical Mongolian culture. So, no spamming arrows or ruthless hunting.
The other aspect is the huge potential that Mongolian spirituality has to offer. So, please welcome: Spirit Combat & Corrupted Zones!
Spirit Combat in a Corrupted Zone
Spirit Combat & Corrupted Zones
In Mongolian culture, gods and spirits are understood to be associated with specific geographical locations, animals or even objects (more on this exciting topic below). With that in mind, we decided to feature Blessed Locations as well as Corrupted Zones.
Blessed Locations are usually ancient ruins that are considered sacred. Corrupted Zones, on the other hand, are areas near Ovoos (Mongolian shrines) that have been damaged by people, thus angering the spirits.
These areas will be marked on the map and will be haunted by spirits at night. The light of the scenery will change and the spirits frighten your horse (scare buff). You can choose to ride around them or confront them with your bow and arrow! This means that Spirit Combat is optional. However, the rewards can be significant if you choose to confront them!
Not only will your level of Prestige (our experience points) increase, but if you succeed, Starflowers will begin to grow in the area. These can then be used at Blessed Locations to craft improved items, such as a Blessed Health Syrup, which is more effective than the regular one.
On top of that, you can craft special items that will assist you in your Spirit Combat.
Corrupted Zones also have a cooldown, meaning that after a few days they will become haunted again, ready to offer a fresh portion of risk and reward!
Check out the GIF below for a first impression of a corrupted zone that will return to normal once all spirits have been defeated:
Spirit Combat GIF
Inspired by Mongolian Spirituality
As you know, we strive to deliver an experience that feels authentic to 13th‑century Mongolia and not a 100% historically accurate one: our take on Mongolian spirituality is fantastical, partially inspired by ancient myths and folklore.
So, let’s get started. Mongolian spirituality is not based on a strict binary of good/bad or even heaven/hell. Spirits are part of the world - they share it with humans. Some are vicious and mischievous, while others are friendly and helpful, and sometimes they’re even both.
1.) Gods
Mongolian Tengrism is an animist faith which focuses on the worship of spirits and the various Mongolian gods. Gods are understood to be associated with geographical locations. A mountain or a river was a minor god, and you made offerings to them for protection and fortune. Finally, there are 99 deities (tengri): 55 White (beneficent) and 44 Black (terrible to evildoers and enemies of the Mongol Nation).
As Tibetan Buddhism enters the upper classes in the 13th century, entities called the four Dignities (Gurada, Snow Leopard, Tiger, and Dragon), and Khiimori are introduced. Each represents the four winds, virtues, and elements. Khiimori isn’t just an entity, but also your soul or the breath of the soul, and it’s depicted as your wind horse.
2.) Mongolian Cosmology: Corruption and Imbalance
The universe is divided into three worlds, or realms (Upper, Middle, and Lower), and these worlds are both separate and sort of overlap:
Upper Realm: A pure, beautiful, and compassionate world that is the home of the high deities and is typically not inhabited by human souls. Legends say it has seven suns and Tengri, The Eternal Blue Sky rules as the supreme deity.
Middle Realm: Our world where humans and animals reside. High places are seen as close to the Upper Realm, and Ovoos are placed there. Low places are seen as close to the lower realm. Sometimes deer stones were at “thin places”.
Lower Realm: An underworld more than a hell, but it is an abode of wicked souls, devils, and evil deities. It’s a dark place where the sun and moon are half orbs, rather than full orbs. It is the source of malevolent entities that cause disease and mental illness in Middle World.
3.) Sacred Thinking
Ancient Mongolian sacred thinking was landscape-focused rather than monument-focused, spirit-presence oriented rather than artifact oriented, and maintained through ritual rather than preserved through time.
So, ruins aren't sacred because they are old, and even looting ruins might be an act of preservation. It would all be about the relationship to the space. New things can be sacred, old things can be sacred.
For example, trees possess a certain spiritual power, and according to legend, Genghis Khan kept a collection of special trees in his palace to which shamans would pay homage, as it was believed that a tree represented the “center of the universe.”
Early, partly unused Spirit Combat Concept Art
To cozy, or not to cozy, that is the question
Once again, the Spirit Combat is completely optional. On top of that we will already have various difficulty settings available at Early Access, reducing the damage taken from the attack of a spirit.
However, we do hope that the Spirit Combat and Corrupted Zones add another layer of excitement to our system-driven open world, further enabling YOU to write your own stories in 13th century Mongolia :)
Explore our system-driven open world
Win a 200 EUR Mifcom PC Voucher
As mentioned before, a decent PC is required to run The Legend of Khiimori (see Minimum Specs below).
So, just in case you want to upgrade your hardware, we have partnered up with amazing Mifcom once again to give away 30 Mifcom vouchers worth €200 each for getting one of their hot gaming PCs. Enter the contest via Instagram, Facebook, or X:
Courier Video & New Key Art
9 months ago
– Thu, Feb 05, 2026 at 01:32:19 AM
Dear Backers,
We are excited to share something truly special with you this week! Enjoy our new five‑minute gameplay walkthrough video, “A Day in the Life of a Courier”, captured directly from the current build.
A Day in the Life of a Courier
The video features commentary from our experienced Design Director, Steve, who guides you through a full gameplay loop.
You’ll follow Naraa through one complete, eventful day in 13th‑century Mongolia, from preparing her deliveries as a thriving Yam courier to facing the many challenges of the open wilds.
We are quite happy of how everything is coming together, and we can’t wait for you to experience it! What did you think of the video above? Did you enjoy it? Any feedback? Please let us know below, or join our Discord for in‑depth discussions and everything The Legend of Khiimori.
New Key Artwork Revealed
We are also proud to unveil our new Key Artwork today!
It showcases the tone and atmosphere of The Legend of Khiimori, from the vast Mongolian landscapes, to the bond between Naraa and her horse, as well as the spirit and challenges of the Yam courier tradition.
We hope it gives you a good sense of the world that we are building for you.
New Key Artwork
Reminder: BackerKit Survey and Shop
Once again, we are using BackerKit for the fulfillment (sending out all rewards) of this Kickstarter campaign. So, have you answered the BackerKit Survey we sent out in January 2026 yet?
If not, please do now, so that we can send you the required game key in time for the Early Access launch on Steam and the Epic Games Store on March 3rd, 2026!
More information can be found in our Kickstarter Update #36:
EA Roadmap & Intro Video
9 months ago
– Thu, Jan 29, 2026 at 04:59:01 AM
Dear Backers,
Our Early Access release date on March 3rd, 2026 is inching closer and closer, and our team is working hard to fit the most valuable improvements into the bit of time we have left to make the best first impression we can.
For today’s dev log, we want to dive more deeper into what you can expect from Early Access now that we’ve spent additional time on it, which updates to expect after the initial launch and which aspects of the game will take longer still.
System-Driven Gameplay
We already talked a bit about systems and story in our Update #35, but we’ll reiterate it here because this is an important topic we want our players to be aware of: Do not expect a main story in our Early Access release. The initial version of the game will have plenty of missions and things to do, but our focus is on discovery through exploration, and the hundreds of small personal stories that emerge from the gameplay itself, depending on the routes you take and the paths you go down. This also means that what a “playthrough” of the available content will look like can vary a great deal between players!
Intro Cutscene
With above being said, we do have a special narration-related treat for you today, and that is an exclusive first look at our Intro Cutscene, featuring Mongolian VO and English subtitles.
Did you enjoy the intro cutscene of our system-driven Early Access version of The Legend of Khiimori - please let us know in the comments below :)
Voice Acting
As you can hear in the video above, we are incredibly proud to introduce Erica Baatarbold as the voice of Naraa! Erica is a native speaker of both English and Mongolian, and we’re beyond thrilled to have her on board.
For the Early Access release, voice-over will only be available in English and Mongolian. Our focus is on conversations featuring Naraa herself, and we’re working with eight voice actors per language to give life to our most important side characters as well as generic NPC dialogue. However, not all dialogue will be voiced over at Early Access launch, since many texts are still subject to change.
We’re particularly happy to offer Mongolian language support, both in the voice over as well as in all dialogues and UI: Mongolian is often a low priority in localizing video games, and very few games come in Mongolian at all. Since Mongolian people’s roles are often limited to enemy hordes shouting commands, hearing regular dialogue in the language is rarer still.
Facial animations are already in(n) as well
Recent Additions
With the extra time we’ve had since moving our release back a few months after the successful Next Fest Demo, we’ve tried to improve on the most urgent fronts, based on the feedback we’ve gotten from people who played the public demo, as well as from you, our Alpha Playtesters!
Exciting recent additions and updates include the following:
We overhauled various aspects of the the horse riding controls, as explained in more detail in our Update #35. The changes include animation reworks, physics-based movement and iterating on controls while keeping what was already working well.
We added new items to craft and use, such as additional arrow types, powder pouches and other recipes
We created additional mission types and updated our cargo missions
We added Outpost Stables that allow for the player to change horses while on a long journey, including options to upgrade them
We added places where your hard-earned in-game resources can be invested for permanent upgrades such as building bridges or upgrading certain locations.
The map now contains more points of interests with specific rewards and challenges – we won’t spoil the details on this one though!
You got an interesting point there
Upcoming Updates
As you all know by now, Early Access is not the end of the road. We’ll absolutely keep our eyes and ears open for urgent feedback and reports, but we also have a lot of specific improvements already planned for the coming months:
For example, we plan to:
Overhaul portions of the user interface for better looks and easier understanding, such as the Horse Overview, Merchants, Crafting and parts of the HUD
Improve direct player feedback on things that are affecting your horse, e.g. what is causing its stamina/health conditions
Add more NPCs for the player to interact with, and making those NPCs feel more alive by making them busier and more emotive
Improve animal behavior AI for both horses and wildlife
Add more prominent wind and weather effects that affect you while riding, e.g. with the wind at your back giving you a speed boost
Further planned changes on our immediate to-do-list are iterating on cargo balancing, active item collecting and powder pouch gameplay feel.
Note that most of the Stretch Goals unlocked during our Kickstarter campaign will not yet be available in the Early Access release but are planned for later down the road, in time for the full-release of the game!
For a closer look at what’s planned, we recommend keeping an eye on our Trello Board:
When discussing our Early Access expectations, our Game Design Director recently put it best: “Early Access is a process.”
There’s the game that we have, and there’s the game that our audience wants. Even after months of playtesting and improving, there will inevitably be a gap in between those two things. Early Access is the tool that allows us – through your reviews, feedback and discussions – to find out precisely where that gap is, and to fix it in time.
For that, we hugely appreciate your patience and your passion, so we can together shape The Legend of Khiimori into the best game possible.
13th century Mongolia and its diverse landscape
BackerKit Survey and Shop
For the fulfillment of our campaign (sending out all rewards), we are using BackerKit. Have you answered the BackerKit Survey we sent out in January 2026 yet?
If not, please do so now, as we cannot send you the rewards or the required game key otherwise!
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