Well well, lookie what popped up on Steam: It’s a new “massive online sandbox RPG,” Citadel: Forged With Fire, and it came out of nowhere this week to announce an early access debut soon — really soon. Early access begins on July 26th and is expected to last 8-12 months, with a formal launch in 2018 on PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One.

“Citadel: Forged With Fire is a massive online sandbox RPG with elements of magic, spellcasting and inter-kingdom conflict. As a newly minted apprentice of the magic arts, you will set off to investigate the dangerous world of Ignus. Your goal: create a name for yourself and achieve notoriety and power among the land’s ruling Houses. You have complete freedom to pursue your own destiny; hatch plots of trickery and deceit to ascend the ranks among allies and enemies, become an infamous hunter of other players, build massive and unique castles, tame mighty beasts to do your bidding, and visit uncharted territories to unravel their rich and intriguing history. The path to ultimate power and influence is yours to choose.”

Developers Blue Isle Studios and Virtual Basement LLC are promising a large map to explore, crafting, building construction, flight, a dynamic loot system, housing, player alliances, elaborate magic, taming, harvesting, and empire building. Its PvP system isn’t expressly stated, though except at least guild wars with rival houses.

If Blue Isle Studios sounds familiar, that’s because it’s the studio that built the Slender games, so they’re not noobs.

“Our plan is to use Early Access to not only realize our fantasy adventure dreams, but also yours,” the studio says. “We plan to rapidly implement updated content and bug fixes, and we want to do it in collaboration with you, the community. We aim to do everything we can to ensure that community feedback helps to drive the direction of the game’s future. Listening to our players is a top priority, and we’re thrilled to work with you guys in shaping Citadel into something truly special! As we work our way toward our Early Access launch, we will be sharing with you more details about what you can expect on day one. Look forward articles on topics like magic, our building system and monster taming, and tune in for some fun live gameplay!”

Sign-ups for the “pre-release beta test” are live now, as are a batch of introductory screenshots and the announcement trailer.