By Indie Report in Card Survival: Fantasy Forest — 13 Feb 2026

Card Survival: Fantasy Forest - New Release Announcement

Date: February 13, 2026

Card Survival: Fantasy Forest is the latest installment in the Card Survival Series, offering a card‑based deep survival simulator set in a primordial forest that seems to have a will of its own. Players carve out homes, hunt, craft, and navigate a world where nature reigns with mystery, beauty, and occasional cruelty.

Key Highlights

Quest mode is being discontinued. All existing quest‑mode saves will be converted to research mode, and the tutorial role will be taken over by the huntsman and upcoming pre‑made character bases.
The next update will introduce the first pre‑made character and several additional character bases for new players.
Performance improvements focus on card‑trigger lookup and environment handling, especially NPC path‑finding, to smooth late‑game runs.
A large batch of hunting, animal‑behaviour, crafting, and UI tweaks lands in this patch, together with extensive bug‑fixes and quality‑of‑life changes.
All changes are first rolled out to the public‑beta branch, which remains less stable and may see balance adjustments.

New Features

Performance Improvements: Optimized lookup of existing cards for trigger conditions; optimized environment handling and NPC path‑finding.
Burrow Hunting: Foxes and badgers can now be smoked out of their burrows.
Hunting Fences: Build fences as location improvements; animals avoid them, letting players steer wildlife toward traps.
Partridge Behaviour: Partridges now eat a small amount of player food and interact correctly with traps.
Wolf Aggression: Wolves lower their aggression when a fire is present, reducing attacks while camped (unless starving).
Duck Seasonal Change: Ducks migrate when water freezes, disappearing in winter.
General Animal Behaviour: Wandering animals move slower for easier tracking; fleeing speed unchanged; injured animals now bleed out and leave blood trails.
Retro‑compatibility Fix: Old‑save tracks temporarily appear as blood trails but correct themselves shortly after.
Trap Realism: Traps interact differently per animal; most animals can eat from traps, only some can trigger or be affected by specific traps.
Fishing Additions: New animal “crayfish” (spearfishable at night or catchable in funnel traps).
Funnel Traps: Can now also catch frogs.
Pike Stomach Content: Pikes may contain other fish in their stomachs.
Fish Pasties: Craftable by mixing fish meat with fat and grease dough.
Moving in the Dark: Players can travel at night without a light source, with a chance of getting lost.
Cauldron Iron Fix: Cauldrons can now hold iron, preventing iron‑deficiency when eating from them.
Plaster Production: “Milk of lime” can be made in any container by saturating water with quicklime; plaster blueprint rebalanced for bulk, more efficient production.
Cave Building: Doors, earthen floors, shelves and drying racks can now be built inside caves, making caves viable homes.
Cave Smoking: Caves can be smoked, allowing use as smoking rooms.
Smoking Mechanics: Campfires only produce smoke in rooms with doors or no outdoor exit; mud‑huts without doors no longer need a fireplace urgently.
Ice Hole Speed: Ice holes now take only 3 minutes to make when the temperature isn’t too low.
Mines: Completing a mine now yields dirt, stones and heavy stones as by‑products.
Steam Cloud Storage: Greatly increased capacity to prevent save‑data loss.
Juniper Berries: Can now be added to stew.
Drying‑Rack Help Section: Added descriptive help entry.
BPS (Bulk Production Speed) Tweaks: Crucibles and quivers now cost less.
Smoke Accumulation: Smoke no longer builds up in areas connected to the outdoors unless a door is present.
Barrel Crafting: Final barrel step works with any hammer but still benefits from a mallet.
Ice‑Hole Creation: 3‑minute build time when temperature is moderate.
Minow Eating: Eating minnows now takes 3 minutes.
Brain‑Mush Application: Faster processing on leather scraps.
Trap Bait Message: Added “Bait Missing” warning for traps that need bait.
Flint Mine: Now buildable inside River Pass Cave.
Leather Cutting: Leather skins can now be cut into smaller pieces with a cutter.
Stretcher Size Restriction: Only accepts small‑size leather.
Bread‑Loaf Blueprint: Now shows research requirements before being unlocked.
Levee/Log Boom Bug Fix: Levers that turned into log booms now revert; permanent loss can be reported for manual fix.
Item Drag‑and‑Drop: Fixed items disappearing when moved around houses.
Self‑Triggering Actions: Fixed related bug.
Flood, Frostbite, Sleep‑Deprivation Systems: Now work properly again.
Raw Rye Billberry Pasty: Name display corrected.
Levee Card: Now informs player when repair is impossible due to fatigue or darkness.
Fur‑Coat & Fur‑Mittens: Display fur durability.
Parchments & Frame Drums: Craftable with reworked leather.
Greenstone Powder Smelting: Durability hidden when zero.
Skinning Quest: Updated for reworked leather system.
Wood Sorrel: Description updated.
Bone Hooks: Trading value removed.
Trader: Pays more for leather with higher fur content.
Trimmed Leather: High‑fur leather now shows a special “Fur Leather” art.
Flintclaw: Fixed bug preventing it from attacking the player.
Fat Chunk Quality: Ingredient quality now applied to final result.
Log Boom Blueprint: Fixed bug.
Malting Rye & Reeds: Can no longer be dried on a drying rack.
Fatty Fish Meat: Usable for fishing bait, stew ingredient, and appears in food filter.

Bug Fixes

Greatly increased Steam Cloud storage capacity to stop save‑data loss.
Optimized environment handling and trigger‑condition processing (performance fixes).
Fixed bug preventing animals from being removed from burrows.
Partridges now correctly interact with traps via the new trap system.
Wolves now correctly lower aggression when a fire is present.
Ducks correctly disappear during winter.
General animal‑escape behaviour tweaked.
Blood‑loss and blood‑trail system for injured animals implemented.
Trap behaviour tweaked for realism.
Added crayfish - bug‑free integration.
Implemented moving‑in‑the‑dark system.
Cauldrons now correctly hold iron nutrients.
Plaster production process fixed for easier bulk creation.
Fixed bug causing Copper Veins to respawn after being mined.
Added Juniper Berries to stew.
Added help‑section description for the Drying Rack.
Adjusted BPS for Crucibles and Quivers, making them cheaper.
Smoke no longer accumulates in outdoor‑connected areas without doors.
Caves now accumulate smoke and can be used for smoking items on a drying rack.
Earthen Floors and Door improvements now buildable inside caves.
Last barrel‑making step now works with any hammer.
Ice Hole creation time reduced to 3 minutes when temperature is moderate.
Eating minnows now takes 3 minutes.
Mining shaft completion now yields dirt, stones and heavy stones.
Brain‑Mush application to leather scraps now faster.
Added “Bait Missing” message for traps lacking bait.
Flint Mine can now be built inside River Pass Cave.
Fixed disappearing items when drag‑and‑dropped around houses.
Fixed self‑triggering actions bug.
Flood, Frostbite, Sleep‑Deprivation actions now work properly again.
Corrected name display for Raw Rye Billberry Pasty.
Levees that turned into Log Booms now revert; permanent loss can be reported.
Leather skins can now be cut into smaller pieces with a cutter.
Stretcher now only accepts small‑size leather.
Bread Loaf blueprints now show research requirements before unlocking.
Fixed bug causing leather cards, fireplaces, campfires and other cards to disappear.
Fixed empty blueprints menu bug.
Fixed Springberry Fat Cake conversion bug.
Fixed nutrient count bug for Springberry/Billberry Fat Cakes and Berry Pasties.
Cellar blueprints and improvements now use the new leather items.
Fixed Frost Spirit Blessing duration bug.
Nesting boxes no longer destroy contents when moved.
Wheat stalks finishing drying now display proper message.
Turnroot descriptions updated.
Fat Chunk creation now correctly applies ingredient quality.
Log Boom blueprint bug fixed.
Malting Rye and Reeds can no longer be dried on a Drying Rack.
Levee card now warns when repair is blocked by fatigue or darkness.
Fur Coat and Fur Mittens now display fur durability.
Parchments and Frame Drums can now be crafted with reworked leather.
Greenstone Powder durability hidden when zero.
Skinning Quest updated for reworked leather.
Wood Sorrel description updated.
Bone Hooks trading value removed.
Trader pays more for leather with higher fur content.
Trimmed leather with high fur now shows “Fur Leather” art.
Flintclaw attack bug fixed.
Drag‑and‑Drop fat bug fixed.
Basic Tanning Quest works with reworked leather.
Tanning water bug fixed (no extra tannin after bark depletion).
Leather clothing enchanting bug fixed.